Plotting disaster
Sunday, February 25, 2007In Year 7 English at school, I distinctly remember our teacher telling us that the first rule of creative writing was a good, well-planned plot. A harsh but fair woman, she ridiculed anyone whose tales had even a whiff of ‘and then I woke up and it was all a bad dream’. So why do Hollywood blockbusters think they have a right to disappoint us in the same way?
Yesterday, behind a pillow and courtesy of our brilliant new tellybox, I watched The Day After Tomorrow. Besides the intended ridiculousness of the plot, and a stupendous number of other goof-ups, I was pretty angry that after a steady period of getting worse and worse and worse, three continent-wide storms literally vanished into thin air, shocking everyone on the ground. Even astronauts in space (can’t have a disaster movie without some incidental astronauts) were astounded, even though they had bugger all else to look at. Five minutes of major/modal orchestral swooning and a bit of heroic presidential fluff later, the film is over. My pillow’s covered in sick.
I felt exactly the same way about War of the Worlds. Massive thunderbolts, bloodsucking, a futile war waged by puny man on these mammoth beasties from Mars. Everyone’s dead. Brilliant! All that’s left is for Tom Cruise to have his eyes plucked out and the film will be over and I can gleefully recommend it to all my friends. But no: the beasties get a cold and everyone’s fine. There’s a certain beauty in mankind being saved by one of its greatest nuisances, the rhinovirus. However, I think Friedman, Spielberg and co must’ve been contractually obliged by the money morons to tack on a feel-good ending. Pass the bucket. Only one good thing came out of the ludicrous ending: it gave John Williams a breather from wasting a whole orchestra solely on making menacing, chromatic, brass-led stabbing noises.
Ironic then, that The Science of Sleep – a film entirely about the beauty and power of dreams, and with the most simple and loosest of plots, floated my boat entirely. It wasn’t all that surprising, since we watched it at the lovely Electric Cinema and I’m a big fan of Gondry’s Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. That said, it was a real tonic to watch a film with no particular agenda other than just to be a bit beautiful and quirky. More of that, please.
Share this
I’m going to see The Science of Sleep tomorrow, and now I’m even more excitied!
&to be fair, you can’t really expect too much from Hollywood blockbusters. They would hardly be crowd-pleasers if they all ended in death and destruction. People *like* happy endings, it makes them feel all warm and fuzzy (read: sick) inside. However, I really enjoyed The Day After Tomorrow, on two points. 1. Jake Gyllenhaal (yep, shallow!). 2. Extended scenes of PERIL. How can one not like a film with extended scenes of peril?!
Love the new layout twist, by the way :)
xx
Penny
on February 26th, 2007
You’re all about Jake and the peril. Jake in the peril. Jake rescuing ladies from the peril. Not predictable at all :P
I hope you enjoy Gael Garcia Bernal in extended scenes of SURREAL!
Simon
on February 27th, 2007
War of the Worlds might have feel good ending, but that was the original ending given by HG Wells.
However, American-made films might have the endings that the director/writer wanted if films weren’t tested on a group of movie-goers (lowest common denominator presumably) and then re-written if they didn’t like it.
America would have liked a happy ending to “Vera Drake”!
mrsdanvers
on March 3rd, 2007
You’re right, Mrs D – I’ve always thought HG Wells’ ending was a bit of a cop out, though – and perhaps that’s why it makes good Hollywood fodder.
There are, of course, films which could really do with a happy ending – I’ve never seen Vera Drake (is this required viewing?), but Requiem for a Dream springs to mind as the bleakest film I’ve ever seen, and that’s American-made.
I guess I’m just a bit infuriated with the sickly-ending formula (aren’t lots of people?) – it’s ubiquitous in television too. For a one hour comedy/drama, the first twenty minutes are solely exposition, the next half hour will be high crisis, and the last ten minutes will involve a hasty conclusion and a bit of morality thrown in for good measure. You can set your watch by it.
On the other hand, I don’t have to watch it. And I’m a big fan of Ugly Betty, even though it definitely fits the above description…
Simon
on March 3rd, 2007