taking sides: P.T. vs Wes Anderson

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i'm not much of a 'film geek' and so probably don't belong on here, and perhaps this question is bettered suited for ile, but inspired by the p.t. anderson thread over there, here goes...

me, i think p.t. is classic. love his films.

wes anderson's films i find mildly amusing, but that's about it. seems to me he tries way too hard.

i'm interested to see what those of you with a more sophisticated grasp on things have to say about these two as compared/contrasted to one another.

i could moan about how i loathe hal hartley's films, but i guess i'll save that for another thread...

― Dallas Yertle (Dallas Yertle), Tuesday, 29 April 2003 09:55 (twenty-two years ago)

PT Anderson = The devil

Hal Hartley = A (momentarily) fallen angel

― Nordicskillz (Nordicskillz), Tuesday, 29 April 2003 09:59 (twenty-two years ago)

More later.

― Nordicskillz (Nordicskillz), Tuesday, 29 April 2003 10:00 (twenty-two years ago)

Altho' if anyone "tries too hard" it's def PT! Bottle Rocket is totally aimless and charming in comparison.

― Nordicskillz (Nordicskillz), Tuesday, 29 April 2003 10:01 (twenty-two years ago)

bottle rocket tried less hard than rushmore or tanenbaums; i didn't mind it so much...i guess i mean 'trying too hard' in terms of the screenplay/overall concept, said elements being what turned me off so much in wes' other two films. like, i realize that p.t. throws all kinds of cinematic 'hey, look what i can do' kinda things at the audience...like the large group set pieces that everyone says he rips off of (pays homage to?) alman...but as a casual filmgoer, i love it! (okay, i admit the aimee mann lipsynching sequence in magnolia was a little too much for me)

i guess it probably bugs you more since you studied/work in film?

watching rushmore, i got the feeling that wes was so pleased with himself; thinking 'damn! am i clever!", but his 'cleverness' to me seemed overdone and fell flat on its face... the very premise of tenanbaums seemed overwrought and absurd (& not in a good way)

ok, i'm being pretty vague/inarticulate here, so i curiously await your further comments...

but no one could ever convince me that there is good stuff going on in hartley's films...yecchhh. i've never walked out of a movie, the exception being this one hartley film (don't remember the title offhand, but it was released in '95)

― Dallas Yertle (Dallas Yertle), Tuesday, 29 April 2003 10:30 (twenty-two years ago)

Bet it was Amateur! :)

(I wonder if that's where amateurist gets his name...)

― Nordicskillz (Nordicskillz), Tuesday, 29 April 2003 10:40 (twenty-two years ago)

P.S. I wish I "worked in film" :(

― Nordicskillz (Nordicskillz), Tuesday, 29 April 2003 10:41 (twenty-two years ago)

well, you have aspirations to do so. that's one up on me, anyhow. my filmwatching is from a very naive perspective. i admire people who can wax lyrical about the 'rhythm' of a film's editing and so forth...

in one of the film classes i took in school, the professor showed us 'die hard'...he really thought it was a great piece of cinema. i had a very difficult time swallowing that.

― Dallas Yertle (Dallas Yertle), Tuesday, 29 April 2003 10:52 (twenty-two years ago)

DIe Hard is a really great piece of cinema - he was cock on.

― Pete (Pete), Tuesday, 29 April 2003 11:01 (twenty-two years ago)

it's always hard for me to get past bruce willis...

― Dallas Yertle (Dallas Yertle), Tuesday, 29 April 2003 11:22 (twenty-two years ago)

A shoulder charge usually does it for me. Or distract him by calling him baldy.

― Pete (Pete), Tuesday, 29 April 2003 13:26 (twenty-two years ago)

I've liked all of Wes Andersons films, more or less. Rushmore was a major artisitc leap from Bottle Rocket in his expressive use of cinematic devices. What bothers me about the Royal Tennenbaums is that instead of raising his level of artistry, in visual terms, it plays out like a largely uninspired Rushmore victory lap. The performances were good and their were some poignant moments but I really could have done without the crazy costumes. Some of the jokes fall way flat. Also, the idea of a large dysfunctional wealthy family had really been done to death at that point. The New York Times critic actually had it right, I think when he or she described Tennenbaums as similar to the kinds of plays Max Fisher authored in Rushmore.

― theodore fogelsanger, Tuesday, 29 April 2003 15:54 (twenty-two years ago)

i think pt anderson is okay - i didn't care about boogie nights at all and magnolia was nice as a "short cuts" ripoff but ultimately, i'd rather watch an altman film. (kudos to hiding the # 82 throughout the film - a very peter greenaway stroke!)
wes anderson - "bottle rocket" is probably in my top 10 films of all time. the dondelillo-like tendencies in his other films drag them back a bit for me, but i still enjoy them a lot. tenenbaums didn't click with me the first time, but i liked it more the second time and loved it the third time.

― j fail (cenotaph), Tuesday, 29 April 2003 16:52 (twenty-two years ago)

the dondelillo-like tendencies in his other films drag them back a bit for me

Please explain. I can't think of any way in which Wes Anderson is like Don DeLillo.

― jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 29 April 2003 16:56 (twenty-two years ago)

I've been sort of down on both Andersons lately. Part of it's because I know too many people that worship one or both of them, and that ruins whatever moderate enjoyment I have of their films (I end up shouting Look, it was good, but it wasn't THAT good! a lot.) And then also, David Gordon Green recently said in an interview something to the effect of "Kill me if I ever do something that's considered clever." Which, in light of the fact that All the Real Girls emotionally affected me more than anything the Andersons have done, made me re-evaluate the whole post-ironic, new-sincerity trend in culture overall.

― jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 29 April 2003 17:08 (twenty-two years ago)

heh, i threw that delillo comment in just to see if anyone was reading. i guess i just meant the focus on child geniuses (ratner's star, the kids in 'the names'/'white noise' vs max fischer/the tennenabum kids).

a lot of wes anderson stuff he throws in definitely to show how clever he is - like having a parody of OLIVER SACKS in tenenbaums. but when i get the jokes, i feel clever too.

― j fail (cenotaph), Tuesday, 29 April 2003 17:10 (twenty-two years ago)

Okay, well, of the DeLillo you named, I've only read White Noise. But the mere fact that DeLillo has smart kids in his books doesn't make the analogy work for me. His tone and his concerns are so markedly different than Anderson's. I'd say the obvious literary forebear for the Tenenbaum family in particular is JD Salinger's Glass family. Not only were they certifiable child geniuses, but Salinger shares Anderson's interest in character and dialogue and general quirkiness. (I'm even attempted to make a Holden Caulfield/Max Fischer comparison.)

I agree, the cleverness is often fun. But sometimes it feels empty later.

― jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 29 April 2003 17:38 (twenty-two years ago)

true re: glass family; i've only read a couple of stories from nine stories so i didn't make the connection.
oh, you ought read the names right away - it's delillo's masterpiece in my opinion.

― j fail (cenotaph), Tuesday, 29 April 2003 17:56 (twenty-two years ago)

Thanks, j fail. That's actually been my next-one-to-read for a while now. (My current fave is Underworld.)

Also: attempted = tempted.

― jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 29 April 2003 19:06 (twenty-two years ago)

'underworld' i couldn't finish, but perhaps this discussion belongs on I Love Literature.

― john fail (cenotaph), Tuesday, 29 April 2003 19:40 (twenty-two years ago)

I wish more filmmakers would incorporate DeLillo thematics, dialogue into their stylistic approach. Salinger is definitely the major influence for Anderson's stories. The child genius thing doesn't wash, Delillo often uses satire to comment on the absurdity of post modern life whereas Anderson doesn't strive for much beyond superficial quirkiness a lot of times.
Underworld perhaps isn't the best Delillo novel to start with, since it's kind of an epic tome of much of the themes he worked through in previus books. It's well worth sticking with, but not as consistent and well structured as novels like White Noise, Mao II, The Names, or especially End Zone.

― theodore fogelsanger, Tuesday, 29 April 2003 21:56 (twenty-two years ago)

mamet has come close to delillo territory.as far as the anderson boys go, the one thing that i do admire about them above all else is that they are trying so hard.and yeah, it can look forced and stagey, but they throw so much in out of what seems to be exuberance for the possibilities of film and what you can show people. One of these days one of them is gonna get it just right.i like that they sweat the details. they are smart and they love movies and that's a good start.overrated? yeah, of course.how could they not be given what else is out there.

― scott seward, Wednesday, 30 April 2003 21:44 (twenty-two years ago)

Both are overprecocious directors with great casting and inspired moments, but I prefer P.T.'s willingness to be sentimental over Anderson's relative detachment. Both need to never be allowed to have narrators ever again.

― Anthony Miccio (Anthony Miccio), Thursday, 1 May 2003 00:54 (twenty-two years ago)

When did PT Anderson have a narrator? (in one of his movies, I mean)

― slutsky (slutsky), Thursday, 1 May 2003 00:56 (twenty-two years ago)

(As opposed to the narrator he employs to follow him around Los Angeles? "Paul Thomas Anderson enters the restaurant. He [long pause] spies Tom Cruise in the far corner of the smoking section. He [pause] takes [long pause] three cocksure strides to Cruise's table." "Hi Tom." "'Hi Tom,' he says, expectantly.")

― amateurist (amateurist), Thursday, 1 May 2003 01:26 (twenty-two years ago)

"In one violent move, Paul Thomas Anderson, great directing hope of his wasted generation, overturns the rack of Fiona Apple CDs, her mocking laughter ringing in his ears. His last thoughts before the security guard's baton bludgeons him into unconscious are of Paris..."

― slutsky (slutsky), Thursday, 1 May 2003 01:31 (twenty-two years ago)

What's wrong with the narration in Tenenbaums?

― Justyn Dillingham (Justyn Dillingham), Thursday, 1 May 2003 13:30 (twenty-two years ago)

nashville is the film that pt anderson jerks off to, and harold and maude is the film that wes anderson jerks off to.

― j fail (cenotaph), Thursday, 1 May 2003 14:39 (twenty-two years ago)

please no one start a thread called "what film do you jerk off to?"

― slutsky (slutsky), Thursday, 1 May 2003 23:12 (twenty-two years ago)

the narration in Tennenbaums is horrific and often redundant and superfluous. The most criminal moment is when the narrator shows up after Hackman says he loves his family to tell us that he meant it. WAY TO DO THE ACTOR'S WORK FOR HIM! That is Gene Hackman you casted, you '60s-fetishizing superficial wannabe muthafucka.

There's narration at the beginning and end of Magnolia, like the narration of Tennenbaums it was a stupid prententious idea both directors should have tossed when they realized the story was no better for it.

― Anthony Miccio (Anthony Miccio), Friday, 2 May 2003 21:52 (twenty-two years ago)

i teared up at that point in Tennenbaums, though i cant justify it. i think young directors, especially now, are drawn to narration because its like "here are my themes bitches!"

― ryan (ryan), Friday, 2 May 2003 21:56 (twenty-two years ago)

Do you hate narration in general or are just bugged by the way these two use it?

― slutsky (slutsky), Friday, 2 May 2003 21:59 (twenty-two years ago)

I'll admit its a sore spot for me. Ironically, Billy Wilder, in that Cameron Crowe interview book, summed up how it can be used well, in INTRODUCING characters. But he notes that by the end of the movie we should be into the story, we shouldn't need a buffer between us and the actors.

It's usually a crutch in most films, like adverbs can be to young writers. In rare cases it's used to get us further into a character's personal P.O.V. and tell us something that can't be expressed otherwise (High Fidelity does it well). Most of the times its just redundant (big example would be Wonder Boys, which wouldn't express shit if Douglas wasn't telling the viewer what we're SUPPOSED to be seeing, even though it's not there to see).

In these two movies, it's more superfluous than redundant though, especially in Magnolia. I think Ryan is OTM with the "here are my themes!" crack. But some of the weakest jokes in Tennenbaums were in the cheesy narrative biographical info and the language at the end of Magnolia tells us NOTHING.

― Anthony Miccio (Anthony Miccio), Friday, 2 May 2003 22:12 (twenty-two years ago)

anybody else particularly annoyed by unnecessary narration?

― Anthony Miccio (Anthony Miccio), Friday, 2 May 2003 22:13 (twenty-two years ago)

classic example would be the narrator saying "I went to Mary's house" when we can see his car pulling into Mary's driveway. There's actually a scene like that in Wonder Boys.

― Anthony Miccio (Anthony Miccio), Friday, 2 May 2003 22:16 (twenty-two years ago)

obviously I'm annoyed by unnecessary narration (and I thought Wonder Boys was pretty weak all-around) but it has its place: Malick for example. And there's some narration I just have a soft spot for, like The Third Man: "I never knew the old Vienna before the war, with its Strauss music, its glamour and easy charm..." (interestingly in Graham Greene's original treatment he writes "bogus charm.")

― slutsky (slutsky), Friday, 2 May 2003 22:20 (twenty-two years ago)

that line from the Third Man sounds fine (it's descriptive in a way that would be extremely difficult to express otherwise). I'm pretty sure that movie starts with narration and ends without it, too.

― Anthony Miccio (Anthony Miccio), Friday, 2 May 2003 22:22 (twenty-two years ago)

ahh but what about Malick?

― slutsky (slutsky), Friday, 2 May 2003 22:23 (twenty-two years ago)

The Thin Red Line is odd since the main narrator isn't even a major character. I think there are a total of three shots of him in the film, and lots of people mistake his voice for Private Witt's.

Malick seems keen on juxtaposing words with images to produce certain effects, not to tell us what is happening or tell us what to feel.

― ryan (ryan), Friday, 2 May 2003 22:46 (twenty-two years ago)

haven't seen any Malick. Though my tendency to think along the same lines of P. Kael (whose work tought me a hell of a lot more than film school did) hints at an unlikelihood I'll be satisfied by his work. Where should I start?

― Anthony Miccio (Anthony Miccio), Friday, 2 May 2003 22:55 (twenty-two years ago)

Tenenbaums' narration IS mostly superfluous, but I have to admit I really like the framing device of it being a kids' book (and it's frustrating for me that it isn't REALLY one, as it looks like the kind of kids' book I'd like). I agree that Anderson's relatively detached, but it's not an ironic detachment (he genuinely likes his characters), so it doesn't bother me.

The only Malick film I like is Badlands, and I'm not sure I'd like it so much if I saw it again.

― Justyn Dillingham (Justyn Dillingham), Saturday, 3 May 2003 02:04 (twenty-two years ago)

There isn't one narrator in Thin Red Line--it goes back and forth between a number of the characters, usually corresponding fairly closely with their appearances on-screen but not always. In term of the narration's content, its relationship to the onscreen action is fairly complex--sometimes it seems to follow directly from the imagery, sometimes it continues the thoughts of a previous scene will contrasting with a current one, sometimes it muses in a way that doesn't relate in any obvious way to what's being shown. There's never a simply "explanatory" or "ironic" role for the narration, though.

― amateurist (amateurist), Saturday, 3 May 2003 06:13 (twenty-two years ago)

Justyn that last sentence wounds me in my heart. See it again, on the big screen if possible.

― amateurist (amateurist), Saturday, 3 May 2003 06:14 (twenty-two years ago)

It's usually not possible, but I'll keep an eye out for it anyway (and Days of Heaven too, which I can see being improved by a bigger screen).

― Justyn Dillingham (Justyn Dillingham), Saturday, 3 May 2003 07:14 (twenty-two years ago)

There isn't one narrator in Thin Red Line

yeah i didnt mean to imply otherwise. and the one i call the "main" narrator probably doesn't actually get more lines. but he is where the film starts and ends.

i had to write a paper on the movie very recently and i watched it very very closely, and I was astonished at the attention to detail, and the complexities of the narration. i hate watching movies that way, but TTRL really benefitted from it. i think it became one of my favorite films really.

― ryan (ryan), Saturday, 3 May 2003 15:58 (twenty-two years ago)

I love the Andersons. I think PT is a really major talent. I think all his films so far are tremendous, and I am certain that he will make more great films. Wes may be less talented as a director, but I adore his films even more. There are few films I've loved more in the last couple of years than Rushmore and Tenenbaums. I enjoy them (and see the narration) in pretty much exactly the same way as, say, the Coens' The Big Lebowski. I also think this approach to narration has something to do with a problem raised on the Kaufman thread, that of ending a film.

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Saturday, 3 May 2003 19:22 (twenty-two years ago)

Sam Elliott's cowboy narrator in Big Lebowski was another What Value Do You Hold narration device that would not STOP. The movie would have been better (though admittedly, I do love the movie) if they just told the fuckin' story and didn't bookend it with endless drawl.

― Anthony Miccio (Anthony Miccio), Saturday, 3 May 2003 19:51 (twenty-two years ago)

It wasn't much for useful information (though there was some), but I think it serves a few functions. One is the emphasis that we are being told a story. Another is linking this modern messing around with dudes and bowling and terrorist groups with classic cowboy mythologising, and indeed with heroic narrative, a notion the Coens have played with elsewhere (the Odyssey). It removes the tale an extra level from conventional realism, which fits with the style of the film on that heroic level and in its general feel. There were some laughs. It does make an ending a huge amount easier. It does make explicating themes a lot easier, which I find far more tolerable when what the narration does is nudge us towards what the subjects might be, rather than towards what the meaning is - the former is the approach you'll find in these PoMo films. Cleverer people than me or ones who've seen the film more often or read anything much about it will undoubtedly be able to cite more positives and interesting things about it. (I think one could say as much about the device in the Royal Tenenbaums but I've only seen this the once so wouldn't speculate.)

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Saturday, 3 May 2003 21:16 (twenty-two years ago)

i have huge problems with voiceovers too but i'm with Martin here [hi Martin! glad to see you having a look around] - most of the people mentioned so far actually seem quite aware of its pitfalls and are among the few filmmakers doing anything remotely interesting or referential with it (none of the stuff mentioned above comes close to the obviously-tacked-on bit at the of se7en, for instance)

― jones (actual), Saturday, 3 May 2003 22:08 (twenty-two years ago)

(nb. i don't recall the narration in Magnolia so i'm not defending pta here)

(or anywhere else)

― jones (actual), Saturday, 3 May 2003 22:13 (twenty-two years ago)

Yes, I think there is a huge problem with the kind of voiceover that is plainly a desperate stratagem for getting out of a mess. That reminds me of (topically on a film board) the death of Phoenix in X-Men 137. The artist John Byrne pulled back in the final panels from the grieving Cyclops, leaving lots of space around him. The writer then jammed this with hugely unwelcome explanation of what had happened, either since the artist and writer were pulling in different directions or they'd changed their minds at the last moment or something. And whatever the reason, it was an utterly unconvincing end anyway.

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Saturday, 3 May 2003 22:18 (twenty-two years ago)

narration in tenebaums = device not crutch (ie purpose of device is to announce POV = UNRELIABLE, PLEASE WATCH CAREFULLY)

(the point being the GAP between what yr being told and what's happening on-screen: RT has a lot of this gap, often heartbreakingly funny and awful) (eg the giant pile of porn videos)

a better forebear than salinger (who actually has zero sense of humour) is probbly the children's book eloise: the depth charge in that story is how effectively the child's actual anger and grief are masked by apparent amusing cleverness and hilarious naughtiness

(as older ile-ers know, i larfed non-stop in tenenbaums, and so did dr vick)

― mark s (mark s), Sunday, 4 May 2003 12:29 (twenty-two years ago)

a better forebear than salinger (who actually has zero sense of humour)

you know I love you Mark but this is SO NOT TRUE I don't even know where to start. JDS does the same thing in his stories, covering genuine loneliness and despair with wit and faux-sophistication. in fact, the arch framing device in "For Esme - With Love and Squalor" (which is about being traumatized by war experiences so horrible Salinger can't even allude to them) reminds me of what you're praising in Tenenbaums.

an even better analogue for WA than Salinger or Eloise, I think: "Peanuts."

― Justyn Dillingham (Justyn Dillingham), Sunday, 4 May 2003 16:53 (twenty-two years ago)

as far as Big Lebowski goes, I don't like being told I'm watching a story (isn't that kind of a given?), or what references I'm "supposed" to be picking up. If that's all the purpose that it serves than it's seems really unrelated to what's good about the film (the characters and how they interact, the dialogue).

The only film I can think of that did this kind of book-end thing well is The Princess Bride.

I laughed a lot at Tannenbaums too, but it had everything to do with Hackman, Huston, Stiller and the Wilsons and Nothing to do with the narration, the fetish for old, short ethnic men or Paltrow (Murray even felt superfluous). All those elements sound like what Anderson WANTED to achieve, and probably should have been excised when it was clear what works and what didn't. I don't like to reward directors for their aspirations ("I want to make a movie like a novel"), but for their achievements ("wow, I gave a strong cast a lot of interesting roles to play").

― Anthony Miccio (Anthony Miccio), Sunday, 4 May 2003 19:30 (twenty-two years ago)

five years pass...

hahaha amazing

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C01E6DD1339F932A05752C0A96F958260&scp=33&sq=&pagewanted=all

― Mr. Que, Friday, 13 March 2009 16:09 (seventeen years ago)

wau that is awesome

― johnny crunch, Friday, 13 March 2009 16:19 (seventeen years ago)

I remember reading that when it was published.

''It's very nice to meet you. How are you?''

''Old.''

― Dr Morbius, Friday, 13 March 2009 16:25 (seventeen years ago)

:D howd u dig this up, que?

― °° × Þ°))·ΞЊ (Lamp), Friday, 13 March 2009 16:41 (seventeen years ago)

it was linked in this essay

http://therumpus.net/2009/03/fade-to-orange-the-theory-of-receptivity-and-some-thoughts-on-ethan-hawkes-face/

― Mr. Que, Friday, 13 March 2009 16:46 (seventeen years ago)

lol

― ice cr?m, Friday, 13 March 2009 16:52 (seventeen years ago)

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