User:TPoole/sandbox: Difference between revisions

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Consider, for example, Francois Truffaut’s remark that he liked Hollywood films because they were so similar to one another. Despite technological changes, aesthetic evolutions, and generic boundaries, it is easy to argue that Hollywood films always have more in common with one another than they have differences. By extension, the same could be said of all narrative cinema, whenever and wherever it is produced.

Mikhail Bakhtin once referred to the novel as a genre {{sfn|Bakhtin|1981|pg=~~3-40~~}}. Foregoing my early devotion to auteur theory and the uniqueness of particular film directors, I might well be led to a similar conclusion about the cinema, at least on some days of the week.

Mikhail Bakhtin once referred to the novel as a genre {{sfn|Bakhtin|1981|pp=3–40}}

. Foregoing my early devotion to auteur theory and the uniqueness of particular film directors, I might well be led to a similar conclusion about the cinema, at least on some days of the week.

In years past, I have given many lectures on the importance of modern

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However, once enacted by Ryan O’Neal, the words seem detached from intentionality. Their impact is cumulative, and it is extremely memorable, but certainly not in a way that O’Neal appreciated. Touted for its awful acting, the scene has become a favorite “so bad it’s good” clip for the YouTube crowd. But rarely do viewers stop to ask whether any actor could have read those lines in accord with what passes for believability in Hollywood films. Many persons involved with ''Tough Guys'' urged Mailer to remove the scene,

but he would not budge. His cinematic laboratory not only recorded his experiments, but also required their dissemination.

When I began this essay, I proposed the question, “How much film history does a film need?” Norman Mailer believed that ''Wild 90'', ''Beyond the Law'', and ''Maidstone'' represented a unique approach to filmmaking. They were distinct, and so for him they bore little relation to what had gone before.

However, a conscious decision to break from the past is still engaged in a conversation with it.

In Mailer’s case, that conversation was complicated. However original those three films were (and remain), there is no doubt that certain elements of them—including the basic idea of tackling fiction in the guise of documentary—

had many important predecessors. And Mailer’s films constituted a small part of their own history. ''Wild 90'' influenced ''Beyond the Law'', and

both of those influenced ''Maidstone''.

With all of this I mind, I believe that another, related question is now in

order: ''How many film historians does a film need?'' The past needs a present

to remember it: that much is clear. Many films have been forgotten because they were forgettable. But others have just slipped through the cracks. No one can watch every film. Some are lost, and even some of those that are found sit comfortably in archives without attention from viewers. They await rediscovery, their joys currently imprisoned in aging film cans. And they

await interest from enough film historians (and theorists and critics) to be chronicled in studies of the cinema.

Regrettably, only a few of us have examined Norman Mailer’s films in any

depth. Herewith we announce an open call for membership in our small club. We seek allies and enemies alike. The ranks need to swell. After all, even in the space of just a few words, it is possible to suggest why Mailer’s films

deserve intervention by historians (and others) who have to date neglected

them.

''Wild 90'' and ''Beyond the Law'' are mockumentary films, important if for no

other reason than the fact that they helped initiate a genre that did not yet

even have a name. They predate Mitchell Block’s ''No Lies'' (1974), which has

sometimes incorrectly been called the first mockumentary. They anticipate

the large numbers of mockumentaries that have been produced from the eighties until the present day. And, rather than retrospectively copying the aesthetics of direct cinema, they were produced while its style was still being forged.

Long before most persons even knew what amockumentary filmis—and even some time before Orson Welles’ important cinematic experiment ''F for Fake'' (1975)—Mailer tore down the genre’s walls. With ''Maidstone'', he marched into a more complicated terrain, one that proposed to re-examine the very nature of the cinema. Here Mailer chased the authentic, an elusive property that seems to be chimerically reconstituting itself in front of his cameras.

I submit that Mailer’s first three films are important to film history and that their general absence from discussions of documentary film, mockumentary film, and the films of the sixties represents a gap that limits those of us interested in the cinema far more than it does Mailer.And while ''Tough Guys Don’t Dance'' never rises to the level of importance of Mailer’s earlier films, I believe that it can speak volumes about the rarely discussed issue of self-adaptation.

In ''Wild 90'', Norman Mailer (as Prince) asks who invented the hammer.

Norman Mailer did not invent the hammer. Nor did he invent the wheel.

But in the best tradition of films like ''Citizen Kane'' (1941), he borrowed various elements from prior films and reassembled those ideas anew. Rather

than regurgitate via remake and rather than appropriate via homage, Mailer

reinvented past practice. He reinvented a cinematic wheel, and more film historians need to keep it turning.

===Citations===

===Works Cited===

* {{cite book |last=Bakhtin |first=Mikhail |date=1981 |chapter=Epic and Novel |editor=Michael Holquist |title=The Dialogic Imagination |location=Austin |publisher=University of Texas Press |pages=3–40 |ref=harv }}

* {{cite web |url=http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0169606/ |title=Beyond the Law |date=2011 |website=Internet Movie Database |publisher=IMDb.com |access-date=10 October 2011 |ref=harv }}

* {{cite web |url=http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0064625/ |title=Maidstone |date=2011 |website=Internet Movie Database |publisher=IMDb.com |access-date=10 October 2011 |ref=harv }}

* {{cite book |last=Mailer |first=Norman |date=1971 |chapter=A Course in Film-Making |editor=Theodore Solotaroff |title=New American Review 12 |location=New York |publisher=Simon |pages=200–241 |ref=harv }}

* {{cite AV media |people=Norman Mailer (director) |date=1970 |title=Beyond the Law |type=Film |publisher=Evergreen |language=English}}

* {{cite AV media |people=Norman Mailer (director) |date=1970 |title=Maidstone |type=Film |publisher=Supreme Mix |language=English}}

* {{cite AV media |people=Norman Mailer (director) |date=1987 |title=Tough Guys Don't Dance |type=Film |publisher=Golan-Globus |language=English}}

* {{cite AV media |people=Norman Mailer (director) |date=1967 |title=Wild 90 |type=Film |publisher=CineMalta |language=English}}

* {{cite AV media |people=François Truffaut (director) |date=1959 |title=The 400 Blows |type=Film |publisher=The Criterion Collection |language=French}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Reinventing a New Wheel: The Films of Norman Mailer}}

@@ Line 4: / Line 4: @@
 Consider, for example, Francois Truffaut’s remark that he liked Hollywood films because they were so similar to one another. Despite technological changes, aesthetic evolutions, and generic boundaries, it is easy to argue that Hollywood films always have more in common with one another than they have differences. By extension, the same could be said of all narrative cinema, whenever and wherever it is produced.
-Mikhail Bakhtin once referred to the novel as a genre {{sfn|Bakhtin|1981|pg=3-40}}. Foregoing my early devotion to auteur theory and the uniqueness of particular film directors, I might well be led to a similar conclusion about the cinema, at least on some days of the week.
+Mikhail Bakhtin once referred to the novel as a genre {{sfn|Bakhtin|1981|pp=3–40}}
+. Foregoing my early devotion to auteur theory and the uniqueness of particular film directors, I might well be led to a similar conclusion about the cinema, at least on some days of the week.
 In years past, I have given many lectures on the importance of modern
@@ Line 257: / Line 258: @@
 However, once enacted by Ryan O’Neal, the words seem detached from intentionality. Their impact is cumulative, and it is extremely memorable, but certainly not in a way that O’Neal appreciated. Touted for its awful acting, the scene has become a favorite “so bad it’s good” clip for the YouTube crowd. But rarely do viewers stop to ask whether any actor could have read those lines in accord with what passes for believability in Hollywood films. Many persons involved with ''Tough Guys'' urged Mailer to remove the scene,
 but he would not budge. His cinematic laboratory not only recorded his experiments, but also required their dissemination.
+When I began this essay, I proposed the question, “How much film history does a film need?” Norman Mailer believed that ''Wild 90'', ''Beyond the Law'', and ''Maidstone'' represented a unique approach to filmmaking. They were distinct, and so for him they bore little relation to what had gone before.
+However, a conscious decision to break from the past is still engaged in a conversation with it.
+In Mailer’s case, that conversation was complicated. However original those three films were (and remain), there is no doubt that certain elements of them—including the basic idea of tackling fiction in the guise of documentary—
+had many important predecessors. And Mailer’s films constituted a small part of their own history. ''Wild 90'' influenced ''Beyond the Law'', and
+both of those influenced ''Maidstone''.
+With all of this I mind, I believe that another, related question is now in
+order: ''How many film historians does a film need?'' The past needs a present
+{{pg|180|181}}
+to remember it: that much is clear. Many films have been forgotten because they were forgettable. But others have just slipped through the cracks. No one can watch every film. Some are lost, and even some of those that are found sit comfortably in archives without attention from viewers. They await rediscovery, their joys currently imprisoned in aging film cans. And they
+await interest from enough film historians (and theorists and critics) to be chronicled in studies of the cinema.
+Regrettably, only a few of us have examined Norman Mailer’s films in any
+depth. Herewith we announce an open call for membership in our small club. We seek allies and enemies alike. The ranks need to swell. After all, even in the space of just a few words, it is possible to suggest why Mailer’s films
+deserve intervention by historians (and others) who have to date neglected
+them.
+''Wild 90'' and ''Beyond the Law'' are mockumentary films, important if for no
+other reason than the fact that they helped initiate a genre that did not yet
+even have a name. They predate Mitchell Block’s ''No Lies'' (1974), which has
+sometimes incorrectly been called the first mockumentary. They anticipate
+the large numbers of mockumentaries that have been produced from the eighties until the present day. And, rather than retrospectively copying the aesthetics of direct cinema, they were produced while its style was still being forged.
+Long before most persons even knew what amockumentary filmis—and even some time before Orson Welles’ important cinematic experiment ''F for Fake'' (1975)—Mailer tore down the genre’s walls. With ''Maidstone'', he marched into a more complicated terrain, one that proposed to re-examine the very nature of the cinema. Here Mailer chased the authentic, an elusive property that seems to be chimerically reconstituting itself in front of his cameras.
+I submit that Mailer’s first three films are important to film history and that their general absence from discussions of documentary film, mockumentary film, and the films of the sixties represents a gap that limits those of us interested in the cinema far more than it does Mailer.And while ''Tough Guys Don’t Dance'' never rises to the level of importance of Mailer’s earlier films, I believe that it can speak volumes about the rarely discussed issue of self-adaptation.
+In ''Wild 90'', Norman Mailer (as Prince) asks who invented the hammer.
+Norman Mailer did not invent the hammer. Nor did he invent the wheel.
+{{pg|181|182}}
+But in the best tradition of films like ''Citizen Kane'' (1941), he borrowed various elements from prior films and reassembled those ideas anew. Rather
+than regurgitate via remake and rather than appropriate via homage, Mailer
+reinvented past practice. He reinvented a cinematic wheel, and more film historians need to keep it turning.
+===Citations===
+{{Reflist}}
+===Works Cited===
+{{Refbegin}}
+* {{cite book |last=Bakhtin |first=Mikhail |date=1981 |chapter=Epic and Novel |editor=Michael Holquist |title=The Dialogic Imagination |location=Austin |publisher=University of Texas Press |pages=3–40 |ref=harv }}
+* {{cite web |url=http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0169606/ |title=Beyond the Law |date=2011 |website=Internet Movie Database |publisher=IMDb.com |access-date=10 October 2011 |ref=harv }}
+* {{cite web |url=http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0064625/ |title=Maidstone |date=2011 |website=Internet Movie Database |publisher=IMDb.com |access-date=10 October 2011 |ref=harv }}
+* {{cite book |last=Mailer |first=Norman |date=1971 |chapter=A Course in Film-Making |editor=Theodore Solotaroff |title=New American Review 12 |location=New York |publisher=Simon |pages=200–241 |ref=harv }}
+* {{cite AV media |people=Norman Mailer (director) |date=1970 |title=Beyond the Law |type=Film |publisher=Evergreen |language=English}}
+* {{cite AV media |people=Norman Mailer (director) |date=1970 |title=Maidstone |type=Film |publisher=Supreme Mix |language=English}}
+* {{cite AV media |people=Norman Mailer (director) |date=1987 |title=Tough Guys Don't Dance |type=Film |publisher=Golan-Globus |language=English}}
+* {{cite AV media |people=Norman Mailer (director) |date=1967 |title=Wild 90 |type=Film |publisher=CineMalta |language=English}}
+* {{cite AV media |people=François Truffaut (director) |date=1959 |title=The 400 Blows |type=Film |publisher=The Criterion Collection |language=French}}
+{{Refend}}
+{{Review}}
+{{DEFAULTSORT:Reinventing a New Wheel: The Films of Norman Mailer}}