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

Mr. Peasant On The Trade Off Problem

From How to be Happy an old catalog, 1901.

There are no solutions only trade-offs.

THOMAS SOWELL

We have heard a variation on this theme many times. The theme is that every solution breeds new problems. When making decisions, we are forced to weigh the costs and benefits of those decisions. No perfect solution exists or can exist. That is the nature of existence.

We hit the trade off problem whenever we go shopping. For instance, you can buy a toolbox in either blue or red, but you can't have it both ways. Every positive decision comes with a negative. Choosing one thing means not choosing the other thing. This doesn't seem like such a big deal in this example, but it is a big deal in many other examples. Should you buy metric wrenches or standard wrenches? I have learned that you need both.

There is a magic solution to the trade off problem, but it is a false solution. This is the solution known as "one size fits all." With the wrench example, you could buy an adjustable wrench and learn to live with stripped bolts and nuts. There's a reason adjustable wrenches never took over.

Mr. Peasant's practical solution to the trade off problem is "one size fits most." I have learned that every solution has its limits. I personally went through this journey when trying to decide between a 4 wheel drive pickup versus a 2 wheel drive pickup. The 4WD has more utility because you can go off-road and drive in the snow. For me, these situations are exceedingly rare. The rest of the time is spent paying more for gas on the 4WD and the all terrain tires that never leave 2WD. I had to choose between utility and fuel economy, and I chose fuel economy. Over the last decade, that has turned out to be a genius decision.

I went with the vehicle that covers 80% of what I need in a truck. That's close enough. If I need something more robust, I will have to seek out alternative solutions such as renting a truck. This flies completely in the face of the larger culture that wants as many options and features as exist. This would be the smartphone with a thousand apps or subscribing to more streaming services that can possibly be watched because there aren't enough hours in a day or a lifetime.

Goldilocks or The Three Bears, 1911. Jessie Willcox Smith 

Why do people go to such excess? I think it goes back to that old maxim that says that it is better to have it and not need it than need it and not have it. The problem with that maxim is that it never accounts for the cost of having a lot of things that you don't need. One of those costs is the rent on a storage unit for all that unused stuff that you might need.

I find myself living in agreement with the wisdom of Yvon Chouinard who said, "The more you know, the less you need." This is hippie wisdom that people in the homesteading and prepping communities would be wise to learn. What we think we need will always be larger than what we actually need. This is because we don't know anything.

In my experience, I find those 80% solutions to be the best. What happens when those solutions aren't sufficient? This happens. I have learned to follow the strategy of the Marine Corps known as "adapt and overcome." That covers the 20%. I also refer to these strategies as the "white trash option." The result is that my method is a quilt work of improvisation and intentionality. I keep the intentionality at 80% and the improvisation at 20%. That is a nice ratio.

Another issue that comes up is choosing "tactical" gear and options. This is opposed to "practical." What is the difference between tactical and practical? I would say the difference is about $200 because this is how much you will pay more for a Goruck tactical backpack as opposed to the JanSport practical backpack. At the end of the day, a backpack is a compartment with two straps. Those tactical backpacks have those cool looking MOLLE straps, but I have rarely seen anyone actually use the things. Generally, you want to carry your gear inside the bag instead of outside of the bag because this is practical. But I digress. . .

Something is called tactical because it is designed for a narrow purpose or activity. Something practical is designed for general purpose activities. I have learned over the years to aim for the practical while eschewing the tactical. That is a way to achieve "one size fits most." Tactical is "one size fits one."

You can get away with using a tactical backpack to carry books to class the same way you can commute to work in a Jeep Wrangler. Why would you? This hit me decades ago trying to work in a pair of jungle combat boots when I just needed a basic and more comfortable pair of work boots. Those jungle boots looked bad ass, but they were crippling on a concrete floor for twelve hours a day.

Woman and child buying shoes. Drouin, Victoria 1944

I remember in high school in the 1980s that the local National Guard unit had Army Jeeps. They also had a basic Chevy pickup truck they painted camouflage. That pickup truck was their preferred vehicle for doing anything. It even lasted into the Humvee era because it was so practical.

Tactical isn't just limited to military type stuff. Hippies get into the act with their mountain bikes and gravel bikes when they would find more use in a beach cruiser bike. The same applies to trail specific shoes that are basically sneakers with some traction on the sole. The term the hippies use isn't "tactical" but "technical." It is the same animal. Your wallet gets lighter without any benefit over the practical option.

The bottom line is that marketers and businesses seek to undermine your confidence in the practical option of one size fits most. Because you know little, you need more stuff. A better investment of your purchasing dollar is to spend more time and money reading in an effort to know more. When you know more, you need less stuff. This knowledge boosts your confidence and allows you, Gentle Reader, to tune out the frequent pitches for your hard earned dollars.

Thank you for reading!

What Happened then stories. 1918. Ruth Dyer