Mrs. Peasant Goes To The Movies: Against the Sicko Cinema of the 70's

Edmund Blair Leighton: The Accolade 1901 
Henry VI the Good of Wrocław is knighted

But to be a person is to be precisely in a story 

and it's narrative is what gives coherence and meaning to events. 

Otherwise they are just random. 

It's just one damn thing after another.

                                              

-MALCOLM GUITE 

I wasted a lot of time as a teenager in the 90s and early 2000s watching really awful films. I wish I could enter a montage of all the faces I made walking out of the darkened theaters. There were all faces of confusion and anger from the wasted time with no payoff. I tried for years to get into indie films and the award winning films. I went to see the films the critics in the paper thought were excellent. I thought all of them were literal trash-Trainspotting, Pulp Fiction, Three Weddings and A Funeral, Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, Evita, and The Ice Storm. Everything I saw was bad. So, I gave up on new movies for 15 years. 

When I met Mr. Peasant, he introduced me to so many great movies. Mr. Peasant is an English major, and he is all about the story. We watched tons of free old movies on Tubi and bought DVDs for a dollar at the thrift store. I cherish all the great films we watched together! Mr. Peasant picks the movies, and I watch them. 99% of the time it is wonderful. But there have been a few of Mr. Peasant's picks that aren't so wonderful. All of the films I don't care for happen to be from the 70s. 

Mr. Peasant requested that I write about my ideas on film. You see, friends, I am very particular about what I will NOT watch. I am a visual person, and I have a list of images I don't care to see. I don't want these images in my mind and certainly not in my dreams. Some images are so excessively gross I don't find them entertaining at all. The key word is excessive. I know that life is filled with monsters and sin. I just don't need to see every gory or lustful detail. I can fill in the blanks after a brief suggestion of an event.  Many people have grown desensitized to scary and sexy stuff. I have not. I call these movies SICKO films, and I don't want to watch them. 

Mr. Peasant and I love a good western. He was so excited for me to watch The Good, The Bad and The Ugly. I love the music of Ennio Morricone and was excited to see the film. I hated the movie. I literally spent half the film with my eyes closed. I didn't like when they tortured the guy for 5 minutes. I also hate movies where there is no hero. None of the characters are good. Why do I even care what happens to a bunch of bad guys? That movie is a sicko, violence for violence's sake. The mental exercise of rooting for the least evil guy is not very satisfying. It's not really a win. Maybe it would be a tragedy type story except nobody cares. The viewer has no emotion toward any of the characters, and there is no feeling. 

The Knight Errant b John Everett Millais 1870.  
"The distressful maiden has been despitefully used by robbers,
who have been dispersed by the gallant knight.
Some of them can be seen in the right distance.
This is the only nude female figure painted by the artist."
(From the Tate Gallery)

The second type of film I don't want to watch are films where the stories are wonky and disordered. There is no good guy. All the characters are shades of bad. It forces you to root for the least bad person. Since there is no hero, I can't really invest in any of the characters. These are the films that you walk out of the theater thinking, what the hell was that about? Or, if I am being charitable, you might think wow. They have no real endings, or the endings are gray or a big weird shock. I call these movies "art films," and I don't want to watch them.

I remember shouting at the TV screen when the first Rocky ended. I hated the first Rocky. I couldn't believe he didn't win the fight. I couldn't believe I sat through that entire film and the main character got his ass whipped in the end. I looked over at Mr. Peasant and said, "Is this an art film or something?" I remember asking Mr. Peasant to explain the ending to me. It reminded me of movies from the 90s with letdown endings, the kind of endings where they punk the viewer with realism. It's a movie. It's fiction, so make it magical. I would much rather watch The Karate Kid than Rocky. If I want realism, I'll read the newspaper. I like a happy ending. Rocky is an art film. Quentin Tarantino reveres Rocky as a rare film of optimism from the 70s. 

The art/sicko film throws all the soda flavors in one cup and dares you to drink it. What if you just want a Cherry Coke? Once you are in a state of grace, you look at the world differently. I only see the beautiful order of God and the disorder of sin. I have custody of my eyes, mind, and heart. I do not want to let lust or indifference come into my heart. I always want a hero. I always want the bad guy to be seen for what he is. I never want to root for evil, adultery, or sin. I want a reason for watching. I like watching a film about something disordered becoming ordered in the end. I want to catch the bad guy. I want to finish the quest. I want to have fun watching. I want to see them get together in a one and only romance. I want an ending that is ordered. Or, I want the ending to reveal the darkness of the disorder. I want disorder to be shown as sad, dark, and bad. I want the sky to be blue and the grass to be green. I want a Cherry Coke. That is why I hate 70s/90s films because what they call "daring" is really just nihilism. 

Joan of Arc - John Everett Millais 1865