Ten Years of Film Interpretation

In Metaphilm, and in these books . . .

Friday, October 31, 2003

Hop into History

A feature piece on the Donnie Darko phenomenon includes a few stabs at interpretation—and suggests that the difficulty of interpreting the movie is key to its increasing cult success. We knew that—"Donnie Darko” is perennially our most popular search term. ”Andrew Frank, Visions’ founder and president, first saw the movie on cable TV, and his own personal theory about its resonance with audiences is that Donnie Darko is one of the truest movies ever made about mental illness.” Frankly, we question his commitment to Sparkle Motion. (Hank Stuever, “Hop into History,” The Washington Post, November 1, 2003).

What compels us to visit The Exorcist?

Kathy Shaidle of Relapsed Catholic fame points us to a couple of interesting takes on The Exorcist. One is her own 2000 article, “What compels us to visit The Exorcist?”, where she argues that it’s not horror, it’s a Western, and explains why, “instead of scaring me, The Exorcist made me cry.” The other is from Sean Collins’ Alltooflat blog, which takes another look at the movie in light of recent history. “This movie begins in Iraq, an appropriate instance of synchronicity given that The Exorcist, the film widely considered to be the greatest horror film of all time, is actually a war movie.” He’s talking spiritual war, mostly, but he follows the metaphor nicely. 

Sunday, October 05, 2003

Anything Else

Tony Nigro of Flak Magazine takes on Woody Allen’s Anything Else. ”Like its distant cousin Deconstructing Harry, Anything Else is best understood by the unpopular stance of admitting a distinction between Woody Allen the man and Woody Allen the character. Harry deconstructs the man, begging forgiveness for any links between his art and the tabloids. Seemingly in response, Anything Else deconstructs the character, giving us a grim view of who he might become.” Thanks to burningheart63 for the link.

City of Angels Film Festival, Oct 23-26

For ten years, this unusual L.A. film fest has intuitively understood that cinema is the new synagogue, and that the role of contemporary believers should be inside, not outside, the industry of filmed entertainment. Metaphilm is pleased to announce its corporate sponsorship of this important festival, and is sending publisher Read Mercer Schuchardt to attend and participate on various panels. See the festival site for more details.

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