21st Century v 20th Century Films

[wba]

Yes, I think somewhat similar to St. Gloede, that with the internet and all those social media connected cinephiles around the globe, we should have heard of a lot more great talents and artists since the beginning of the new millenium, and whatnot with the digital technology and so many more people being able to make films cheaper and faster than ever before. If someone started out between 2000 and 2010 they should have made a few films by now and should have amassed some kind of body of work. If filmmakers were so greatwe should have hundreds of those and no problem at all to list some 30 or 50 on the fly. Instead it seems to me everybody is struggling to name consistently fascinating directors who are under 50 or have started to work in the last 20 years.

I'm trying to do a list myself now, and it will be interesting to see how many names I will be able to come up with. I doubt it will even be 20...

[JADEreigns]

Yes, I think somewhat similar to St. Gloede, that with the internet and all those social media connected cinephiles around the globe, we should have heard of a lot more great talents and artists since the beginning of the new millenium, and whatnot with the digital technology and so many more people being able to make films cheaper and faster than ever before. If someone started out between 2000 and 2010 they should have made a few films by now and should have amassed some kind of body of work. If filmmakers were so greatwe should have hundreds of those and no problem at all to list some 30 or 50 on the fly. Instead it seems to me everybody is struggling to name consistently fascinating directors who are under 50 or have started to work in the last 20 years.

I'm trying to do a list myself now, and it will be interesting to see how many names I will be able to come up with. I doubt it will even be 20...

We should have heard of them... if the systems were set up to get their names known. They’re not. They’re echo chambers with far, far, far more noise in them now than in the 60s.

[JADEreigns]

My stance and point is similar to WBA in that the number of obvious all-time
Though of course, there is a big, big element of taste in this. Honestly the list is not particularly impressive to me, some all-time greats, a few possibly on the way there, and all notable and good directors, but it is not the shocking tour de force. I could get a bigger and equally impressive list from France, Japan and Czechoslovakia alone (counting the period from '57 to '76 with focus on the new generation coming in, obviously I could have included people like Ichikawa, etc. as well if I had expanded the reach slightly):

Godard
Varda
Resnais
Marker
Rohmer
Malle
Truffaut
Chabrol
Rouch
Rivette
Demy
Robbe-Grillet
Duras
-
Yoshida
Masumura
Okamoto
Suzuki
Oshima
Imamura
Teshigahara
Hani
Wakamatsu
-
Chytilová
Herz
Kachyna
Forman
Uher
Vlácil
Jakubisko
Jires
Menzel
Jasný

We do actually have the tools and capacity to source out long lists of spectacular films. Programmers, critics and more engaged cinephiles have done this for decades - and now there is more access and ways to spread the word than ever before. I would claim that any additional load of cinema is perfectly countered by the ability to spread the word.

I do think you pinpointed the elephant in the room though: Funding. Clearly a large part of the issue is that younger directors seem to struggle far more to be able to consistently put out films and build notable ouvres in a decade.

I used to read a now defunct forum where there was a decently sized group that would seek out new directors as a sole purpose. They had SO MUCH to choose from that it would have been entirely inpossible to make a similar effort without excluding the great, great majority of “best of” lists by critics - because almost all critics are paid to see films that get commercial releases, and the films that get commercial releases are already almost uniformly either middlebrow fare for old people or festival winners and nothing else. I’ve been to arthouse all over the place, and they’re mostly patronized by old people and those people mostly walk out of the good films. Funding is not the problem. The films are getting made. They have no viewership and no outlet. I have still NEVER heard of almost any of the most-praised films from that group anywhere else, and it is through that group that I discovered many of my favorite films from the early 2000s. The idea that the great films will just randomly bubble up in the collective conscience is false, and I can say this because I can name the great films that are still buried 15 years on. It’s probably worse than ever these days with the constant list-making cementing canons quicker than ever before. The TSPDT list is as official as it comes, and comparing to any other period it is boring and tame and awful DESPITE a plethora of better options available. Probably too many options for a poll like that. Amalgamation is the death of idiosyncrasy, after all.

As for your list - I agree with you that taste is an inescapable component of these sorts of discussions. My list is not going to satisfy you, because you have different tastes. Conversely, your list makes me think the rose tinting on your glasses is STRONG. Some of the names may be canon, but I find their work middling at best. Some abysmal. Some merely typical genre fair. Your Czechoslovak New Wave list is especially weak, since even though I love a great number of films from the movement, almost all of the filmmakers failed to produce more than 2 or 3 great films in a lifetime (with or without state influence, depending on the person), and some none at all - and you skipped two of my favorites in Havetta and Juracek.

Overall, I think only 10 of your group would make my list. I’ll agree with Godard’s own opinion on his 60s films, which is not highly positive. Given your list as high water marks, we are absolutely in a golden age of cinema! Such is the way things go trying to send lists back and forth. All I can tell you is that I highly value the filmmakers I listed, and I also feel woefully out of the loop because I know of so many more filmmakers that I have not gotten to and so many films that are not available to buy, stream, or steal that got raves from critics, friends, etc. I don’t disparage your tastes for disagreeing with me, because that’s not how this sort of thing works, but the fact that you like a lot of filmmakers from the 60s doesn’t mean that the current generation is worse if you have ignored or missed the good ones to your tastes. It could be that the filmmakers as a whole are missing the mark for you - but it’s just so hard to even get a picture that’s not clouded by distribution aimed at old people.

Instead of people listing what they like from the 2000s, let’s see a list of films you watched in a given year of the decade. If you don’t even try to find good stuff, then it won’t be any surprise that you don’t think there’s any good stuff available! Now, yes, this will also be a ridiculously arduous process and equally plagued by issues of taste, but hey, it’ll pass the time!

[JADEreigns]

Yes, we live in strange times, indeed!

Of course one can say who cares about an average film? And I'm not interested in watching average films myself (I always try to see a film cause I think it will be potentially great, and if I myself choose to watch a film it's always in the hope of seeing a new personal favorite). I didn't mean "average" in a derogatory way though, but just regarding the general standard of what's being made and how it is made. As I said, groundbreaking and fascinating films have been produced in every year since the invention of cinema, and will surely get made for years to come. But I don't think that's the way to judge a time period, a decade or whatever one wants to talk about, cause then everything is excellent and fine and one only has to watch the "right" stuff. Groundbreaking work has always been made and will probably always be made. I'd say one should go with the general "average" output of a country, a film movement, a studio and compare that. And in my opinion, if I watch some random 50 films from 1965 and compare them to some random 50 films from 2015, boy oh boy has there been a decline in the quality of filmmaking!

Maybe you would simply disagree, cause your standards are different than mine (and your idea of what is good filmmaking and what makes a great film and such). In my opinion the cinema knowledge has massively declined and the craftsmanship as well. The editing alone is so much worse these days that it's almost not fair to compare how much better the editing was in the past. I'd agree that it has become much much easier to edit a film. And maybe that's part of the problem: the filmmakers and editors have become lazier or simply overwhelmed by the amount of choice and possibilities they have nowadays.

Thus it could be that we are watching different films, and I have seen the "wrong" ones (though that still wouldn't invalidate my argument, which isn't so much that not as many outstanding films get made today, but more simply that the general quality of filmmaking has declined considerably), but it's probably more likely that we might watch the same films from the 21st (and thus probably also from the 20th) century and still come to vastly different judgments and conclusions about them and their qualities.

I skipped this post, but I think it’s worth addressing. Regarding your last paragraph, I disagree entirely that we’re watching the same films now as previously. Bergman’s films were getting big showings in the 60s. I will go months these days without finding anything but middlebrow nonsense aimed at old people. Cinephiles simply don’t go to the cinemas any more, in part because they have so many options and in part because the art houses no longer cater to them, which creates a death-spiral of quality. I think the idea that we have the opportunity to watch the same kinds of films is simply false, and blatantly so. It takes much more effort and skepticism these days because every single element, from festivals to streaming to cinemas has trended toward homogenized Prestige cinema with strong central narratives and little ambiguity or experimentation or artifice.

Secondly, and informed by that statement, your “average film” idea seems odd to me. If you say that you arent impressed by mountains because the average mountain isn’t that tall we would rightly wonder whether you were counting every hill as a mountain and further why you would count hills at all. We love mountains because they are tall and imposing and treacherous, not because they are technically higher than the ground around them. You say that you don’t like films anymore because the average film is worse, but you try not to see the average film? And you only watch what the cinemas are showing, which you know will be Middling because it’s aimed at old people who have no appetite for or interest in the type of cinema you love from the 60s? So you dislike films because of the quality of films you try not to see, average, despite knowing that you’re getting them from a source that only provides average films? To me, this all sounds CRAZY - but, again, I have no idea about your tastes, and I have no idea how thick your rose colored glasses might be!

One root cause of the problem with the current poor canon and “common knowledge”: absolutely shitty critics, and lots of them, and most of them only viewing the same small set of films. That’s like the 30th nail in the coffin, but a big one.

Oh, and, speaking from personal experience, it’s far, far more likely for me to watch something awful these days because of some trailer or some friend’s recommendation or because it’s playing on TV whereas that is not the case for films from the 60s and 70s because I didn’t grow up then and thus stick far more to the films that are exceptional, and that bias goes a LONG way to misrepresenting the “average” film. Plus, I just don’t buy the grass is greener idea. It’s a bunch of people the same ages in the same place doing the same things. History repeats.

[pabs]

All I can tell you is that I highly value the filmmakers I listed, and I also feel woefully out of the loop because I know of so many more filmmakers that I have not gotten to and so many films that are not available to buy, stream, or steal that got raves from critics, friends, etc.

Please tell some of these friends to join this forum, and tell us more about these great, hard-to-find films and directors, so that we might eventually find a way to see some of them too!

[St. Gloede]

My stance and point is similar to WBA in that the number of obvious all-time
Though of course, there is a big, big element of taste in this. Honestly the list is not particularly impressive to me, some all-time greats, a few possibly on the way there, and all notable and good directors, but it is not the shocking tour de force. I could get a bigger and equally impressive list from France, Japan and Czechoslovakia alone (counting the period from '57 to '76 with focus on the new generation coming in, obviously I could have included people like Ichikawa, etc. as well if I had expanded the reach slightly):

Godard
Varda
Resnais
Marker
Rohmer
Malle
Truffaut
Chabrol
Rouch
Rivette
Demy
Robbe-Grillet
Duras
-
Yoshida
Masumura
Okamoto
Suzuki
Oshima
Imamura
Teshigahara
Hani
Wakamatsu
-
Chytilová
Herz
Kachyna
Forman
Uher
Vlácil
Jakubisko
Jires
Menzel
Jasný

We do actually have the tools and capacity to source out long lists of spectacular films. Programmers, critics and more engaged cinephiles have done this for decades - and now there is more access and ways to spread the word than ever before. I would claim that any additional load of cinema is perfectly countered by the ability to spread the word.

I do think you pinpointed the elephant in the room though: Funding. Clearly a large part of the issue is that younger directors seem to struggle far more to be able to consistently put out films and build notable ouvres in a decade.

I used to read a now defunct forum where there was a decently sized group that would seek out new directors as a sole purpose. They had SO MUCH to choose from that it would have been entirely inpossible to make a similar effort without excluding the great, great majority of “best of” lists by critics - because almost all critics are paid to see films that get commercial releases, and the films that get commercial releases are already almost uniformly either middlebrow fare for old people or festival winners and nothing else. I’ve been to arthouse all over the place, and they’re mostly patronized by old people and those people mostly walk out of the good films. Funding is not the problem. The films are getting made. They have no viewership and no outlet. I have still NEVER heard of almost any of the most-praised films from that group anywhere else, and it is through that group that I discovered many of my favorite films from the early 2000s. The idea that the great films will just randomly bubble up in the collective conscience is false, and I can say this because I can name the great films that are still buried 15 years on. It’s probably worse than ever these days with the constant list-making cementing canons quicker than ever before. The TSPDT list is as official as it comes, and comparing to any other period it is boring and tame and awful DESPITE a plethora of better options available. Probably too many options for a poll like that. Amalgamation is the death of idiosyncrasy, after all.

As for your list - I agree with you that taste is an inescapable component of these sorts of discussions. My list is not going to satisfy you, because you have different tastes. Conversely, your list makes me think the rose tinting on your glasses is STRONG. Some of the names may be canon, but I find their work middling at best. Some abysmal. Some merely typical genre fair. Your Czechoslovak New Wave list is especially weak, since even though I love a great number of films from the movement, almost all of the filmmakers failed to produce more than 2 or 3 great films in a lifetime (with or without state influence, depending on the person), and some none at all - and you skipped two of my favorites in Havetta and Juracek.

Overall, I think only 10 of your group would make my list. I’ll agree with Godard’s own opinion on his 60s films, which is not highly positive. Given your list as high water marks, we are absolutely in a golden age of cinema! Such is the way things go trying to send lists back and forth. All I can tell you is that I highly value the filmmakers I listed, and I also feel woefully out of the loop because I know of so many more filmmakers that I have not gotten to and so many films that are not available to buy, stream, or steal that got raves from critics, friends, etc. I don’t disparage your tastes for disagreeing with me, because that’s not how this sort of thing works, but the fact that you like a lot of filmmakers from the 60s doesn’t mean that the current generation is worse if you have ignored or missed the good ones to your tastes. It could be that the filmmakers as a whole are missing the mark for you - but it’s just so hard to even get a picture that’s not clouded by distribution aimed at old people.

Instead of people listing what they like from the 2000s, let’s see a list of films you watched in a given year of the decade. If you don’t even try to find good stuff, then it won’t be any surprise that you don’t think there’s any good stuff available! Now, yes, this will also be a ridiculously arduous process and equally plagued by issues of taste, but hey, it’ll pass the time!

I think you missed the point of my list. This is only a selection of well-regarded names from 3 countries, and only focused on the youngest generation, essentially a gap of about 15 years.

In other words, an attempt to show how just a minuscule fraction of 60s cinema could stand up to your list. Though taste will always be an issue no matter what, you did recognize 10 names of this already small scope.

I was however also attempting to base my list on recognition, not just taste, trying to set some sort of shared benchmark. For instance, I rather despise Wakamatsu, but he is undoubtedly considered an important director and has a major following.

(Keep in mind that your list had no restrictions and included several directors active for 40-50 years. Matching the template, essentially every director considered an all-time great, from Bergman, to Kurosawa, to Fellini, to Kubrick, to Hitchcock, to Pasolini, etc. etc. etc. could be counted in).

Your Czechoslovak New Wave list is especially weak, since even though I love a great number of films from the movement, almost all of the filmmakers failed to produce more than 2 or 3 great films in a lifetime (with or without state influence, depending on the person), and some none at all - and you skipped two of my favorites in Havetta and Juracek.

Juracek only managed to produce 2 films, Havetta only made 3 films, that is also why I did not add him on my list. All the names on my list actually had more extensive outputs, though how many you consider great is, of course, another question.

(Btw, just out of curiosity, in your opinion, does the Berlin school actually hold a candle to Herzog, Wenders and Fassbinder?)

-

There are always an endless amount of films that do not receive recognition and is retroactively discovered or elevated in film communities. Similarly, some films only reached niches. That is, of course, the case today as well. And there may even be more films we are missing.

But if we literally had a New French Wave or similar someone would have said something. We are a small film niche forum, and most of us are on many other forums or involved in other niche activities, follow people who are, etc. If no one has heard of such massive movements or major works these filmmakers really don't want them found, or they have had extremely bad luck. If these massive movements are not taking place, then I don't think this century has a lot of stand on yet - but there is a lot of time left.

[Zulawski]

I do think that one area where genuine progress is being made and where this century so far is more interesting than the earlier is in the museum/video-installation market (perhaps I shouldn't use that word...). Sara Cwynar, Rainer Kohlberger, Elizabeth Price, Takeshi Makino, Richard Mosse, and literally a host of others are all doing experiments that are both distinctly of this era and of, in my opinion, quite rewarding.

[St. Gloede]

I do think that one area where genuine progress is being made and where this century so far is more interesting than the earlier is in the museum/video-installation market (perhaps I shouldn't use that word...). Sara Cwynar, Rainer Kohlberger, Elizabeth Price, Takeshi Makino, Richard Mosse, and literally a host of others are all doing experiments that are both distinctly of this era and of, in my opinion, quite rewarding.

Very interesting note Zulawski, I should explore this market more. Love Matthew Barney (who you did not mention).

[wba]

Yes, we live in strange times, indeed!

Of course one can say who cares about an average film? And I'm not interested in watching average films myself (I always try to see a film cause I think it will be potentially great, and if I myself choose to watch a film it's always in the hope of seeing a new personal favorite). I didn't mean "average" in a derogatory way though, but just regarding the general standard of what's being made and how it is made. As I said, groundbreaking and fascinating films have been produced in every year since the invention of cinema, and will surely get made for years to come. But I don't think that's the way to judge a time period, a decade or whatever one wants to talk about, cause then everything is excellent and fine and one only has to watch the "right" stuff. Groundbreaking work has always been made and will probably always be made. I'd say one should go with the general "average" output of a country, a film movement, a studio and compare that. And in my opinion, if I watch some random 50 films from 1965 and compare them to some random 50 films from 2015, boy oh boy has there been a decline in the quality of filmmaking!

Maybe you would simply disagree, cause your standards are different than mine (and your idea of what is good filmmaking and what makes a great film and such). In my opinion the cinema knowledge has massively declined and the craftsmanship as well. The editing alone is so much worse these days that it's almost not fair to compare how much better the editing was in the past. I'd agree that it has become much much easier to edit a film. And maybe that's part of the problem: the filmmakers and editors have become lazier or simply overwhelmed by the amount of choice and possibilities they have nowadays.

Thus it could be that we are watching different films, and I have seen the "wrong" ones (though that still wouldn't invalidate my argument, which isn't so much that not as many outstanding films get made today, but more simply that the general quality of filmmaking has declined considerably), but it's probably more likely that we might watch the same films from the 21st (and thus probably also from the 20th) century and still come to vastly different judgments and conclusions about them and their qualities.

I skipped this post, but I think it’s worth addressing. Regarding your last paragraph, I disagree entirely that we’re watching the same films now as previously. Bergman’s films were getting big showings in the 60s. I will go months these days without finding anything but middlebrow nonsense aimed at old people. Cinephiles simply don’t go to the cinemas any more, in part because they have so many options and in part because the art houses no longer cater to them, which creates a death-spiral of quality. I think the idea that we have the opportunity to watch the same kinds of films is simply false, and blatantly so. It takes much more effort and skepticism these days because every single element, from festivals to streaming to cinemas has trended toward homogenized Prestige cinema with strong central narratives and little ambiguity or experimentation or artifice.

Secondly, and informed by that statement, your “average film” idea seems odd to me. If you say that you arent impressed by mountains because the average mountain isn’t that tall we would rightly wonder whether you were counting every hill as a mountain and further why you would count hills at all. We love mountains because they are tall and imposing and treacherous, not because they are technically higher than the ground around them. You say that you don’t like films anymore because the average film is worse, but you try not to see the average film? And you only watch what the cinemas are showing, which you know will be Middling because it’s aimed at old people who have no appetite for or interest in the type of cinema you love from the 60s? So you dislike films because of the quality of films you try not to see, average, despite knowing that you’re getting them from a source that only provides average films? To me, this all sounds CRAZY - but, again, I have no idea about your tastes, and I have no idea how thick your rose colored glasses might be!

One root cause of the problem with the current poor canon and “common knowledge”: absolutely shitty critics, and lots of them, and most of them only viewing the same small set of films. That’s like the 30th nail in the coffin, but a big one.

Oh, and, speaking from personal experience, it’s far, far more likely for me to watch something awful these days because of some trailer or some friend’s recommendation or because it’s playing on TV whereas that is not the case for films from the 60s and 70s because I didn’t grow up then and thus stick far more to the films that are exceptional, and that bias goes a LONG way to misrepresenting the “average” film. Plus, I just don’t buy the grass is greener idea. It’s a bunch of people the same ages in the same place doing the same things. History repeats.

Maybe we are talking about different stuff? Or you are misunderstanding me and I am misunderstanding you? I don't know exactly which is the case, cause I don't understand what you are trying to tell me with that mountain analogy and how any of my points is hard to understand...

I'll try again, and keep it simple and concise:

01. [/b]In my opinion[/b] filmmaking standards "in general/on average/looking at stuff from all around the world" have deteriorated considerably during the 21st century. If you take most decades from the 20th century, filmmaking standards were in my opinion much higher from roughly 1920 till roughly 1990 than they have been for the past 20 years. Directors, screenwriters, cameramen, editors, the artists who made films during the 20th century (and some of which continued to make films in the 21st century) had a greater interest in the process and the craft of filmmaking, than the younger generation of filmmakers who came of age during the 80s and 90s and who started making films in the 21st century. The past generations of filmmakers also watched more films, watched them more concentrated (at the cinema, not at home on the TV or on a mobile phone), were generally more knowledgable about all aspects of filmmaking and more curious to make better films.

02. All of this might be because film was much more relevant for society and people in general during the 20th century, while it is pretty irrelevant nowadays (cause there are different audiovisual media and artforms which weren't available to people back then, like video games and stuff). Maybe filmmakers back then were also more interested to express themselves through film as a medium, cause there wasn't that much to choose from or it had much lower prestige. I don't know exactly which is the case.

03. Maybe, I'm simply more moved/stimulated/interested in and by film aesthetics from the past century than I am by the aesthetics of movies nowadays. Whatever it is, I find the aesthetics nowadays (everything most important to me : from mise en scene to camera movement and lighting to editing) much worsethan those of almost any country and any era from before. Heck, I even prefer films from 1885 to 1910 aesthetically to films from 2005 to 2020! So maybe it is just me cause most people seem happy about films and cinema and aesthetic standards and stuff nowadays. I'll admit that sound design in general, sound editing, sound mixing has gotten much better, that set and costume designers seem to have generally more possibilities to be creative, that much of the technology has evolved and the possibilities of how and what one can shoot nowadays are seemingly much higher, better vaster than ever before. But the people using them are either not interested in those possibilities, overwhelmed by them, stupid or just not as talented as previous generations of artists. Especially directors nowadays seem almost incompetent, when compared to creative filmmakers from the past.

04. If I watch 20 random (!!!) films from say 1919 or 1928 or 1933 or 1950 or 1965 or 1988 and compare them to some random 20 films from 2005 or 2012 in my opinion the new millenium sucks. And I do not mean canonical films or aknowledged films or blockbusters.

05. my tastes might be totally different from yours, and we might watch 100 films and come to different opinions on 90 of them regarding their aesthetic merits and the craft behind them and such.

06. I understand that many many many more films get made nowadays when compared to 50 years ago, and I understand that many many many more people direct films nowadays than did 50 years ago, and I understand that it is therefore statistically much more difficult to find and stumble upon films and filmmakers one might enjoy nowadays than those from the past. But still... considering all of this, my evaluation and opinion remains the same (so far).


-------------

I tried to list all filmmakers by which I've seen at least one great or promising film (to me, that is!), who hadn't directed anything before 2000, and my findings are abysmal. Out of roughly 1500 films I've watched from 2000 till 2019, almost all my favorite stuff comes from people who already started in the 20th century.

Here's what my list looks like:

Bruno Sukrow
Corneliu Porumboiu
Olivier Meyrou

3 relatively great filmmakers from the 21st century (One of them is over 80, though).

There is also actor turned director Abdellatif Kechiche, whose first film came out in 2000, when he was 39. Actress turned director Valeria Bruni Tedeschi, who made her first film in 2003 when she was 39. Actor turned director Kang-sheng Lee, who made his first film in 2003 when he was 35. Screenwriter turned director Dan Gilroy, who made his first film in 2013 when he was 54. But I have only seen 2 films by Tedeschi and Lee and merely one by Gilroy...

and then there's people by whom I have seen 1 or maybe 2 promising films, but about whom I cannot say much:

Atiq Rahimi?
Benedek Fliegauf?
Hong-jin Na?
Tizza Covi?
Lucifer Valentine?
Heng Yang?
Ronald Bronstein?
Anup Singh?
Umesh Vinayak Kulkarni?
Isild Le Besco?
Tom Lass?
Helena Klotz?
Virginie Despentes?
Hoon-jung Park?
David Robert Mitchell?
J. C. Chandor?
Hiromasa Yonebayashi?
Jan-Willem van Ewijk?
Kenneth Lonergan?
Lea Mysius?
Jonathan Vinel?
Dan Trachtenberg?

That's all. That's some 40 films that can stand with the better films of past times, and out of those maybe 5 which can stand with the best films from the 20th century.


-------------------

Of course tastes are subjective, but still: where are those hundreds upon hundreds of young filmmakers making great films today. And where are all the thousands upon thousands making watchable decent stuff. I don't see them, I don't know them. Obviously.

Obviously I don't know much about 21st century filmmaking, and I haven't seen most of the great stuff that's out there. But I'd be glad if you could point me in that direction.

PS: "The Berlin School" by the way has been a great movement from the 90s and 2000s and I do enjoy many of their filmmakers and films. But where are some other movements like this? Where is some fresh energy, new perspectives, young filmmakers in love with cinema?

[...]

All of this might be because film was much more relevant for society and people in general during the 20th century, while it is pretty irrelevant nowadays (cause there are different audiovisual media and artforms which weren't available to people back then, like video games and stuff). Maybe filmmakers back then were also more interested to express themselves through film as a medium, cause there wasn't that much to choose from or it had much lower prestige. I don't know exactly which is the case.

This is true, but I don't think you're following through with the implications of this fully. One of the things that's changed is that more filmmakers are able to make movies that aren't devoted to finding the largest commercial audience, which itself points to why many movies today are different and why filmmakers aren't able to build the same kind of body of work that they might have had in a different era.

There are commercial filmmakers, who tend to get denigrated for making commercial films even though that aspect of filmmaking hasn't changed overmuch, more that living through the moment tends to make commercial films of the time feel less meaningful for dealing with watered down versions of things we live through or exaggerated metaphoric handling of the same. The distance of time can give older commercial films a greater feeling of vitality for the tension that comes from that moment having past and the manner of expression no longer feeling "current", which provides interest for how they gain attention in a style that isn't "in the air" of the moment. Commercial filmmaking always adds an element of impersonal construction to the work and broadens the main themes so they can appeal to a wider audience. Removing that necessity means filmmakers can focus their craft on narrower areas of interest, which more often require effort on the part of the audience to "get" in the same way as a more commercial film. The audience, in other words, has to go part of the way to meet the filmmaker rather than having everything delivered to them from the start.

At the same time, the whole point of many current films is in addressing the imbalance created by the impersonal distance of the history of commercial filmmaking because that distance was structured around certain dominant viewpoints that created the illusion of accepted belief even as that accepted belief was limited to a certain range of cultural biases that reigned for most of the history of filmmaking. The basic view points of many "great works" are inherently flawed for coming from this history of bias that ignored or downplayed other perspectives. Even at best it usually meant someone from outside the effected perspective spoke for those affected by translating their lives into the social dominant mode of expression, which is unavoidably weakened for that.

Many filmmakers today are speaking "more personally" and intentionally addressing the neglect of history towards non-dominant or minority perspectives, which both helps explain why those films don't find wide audience acceptance, as people want what they already know or are comfortable in seeing, and why they don't fit the same patterns of craft or meaning as films from earlier eras. Many filmmakers today are saying the old ways were flawed and are right for doing so even if those old films were entertaining or well made in some broad sense. That kills something of the "mythic" quality to many movies and does so by necessity as mythic is so often predicated on archetypes that carry bias and flaws of conception.

In terms of craft, of course there have been great filmmakers from all eras, but the craft of filmmaking is developed over time and can be best seen in hindsight once the developments have taken root and grown into new forms, leaving the contrasts of "then" and "now" easier to see and appreciate. There is no less craft in a Justin Lin Fast and Furious movie than any commercial filmmaking that came before in roughly similar use, the amount of "Innovation" may not be as clearly visible or obvious, depending on what era and films one would use as a counter, since filmmaking like all arts builds on the past, it doesn't erase it, making innovation seem less vital the longer the artform exists, save for moments of radical technical growth and rare moments of major change in "language" that don't happen often or often stick when tried for not having wide application.

Asking for lists of filmmakers who started in the 2000s who compare to those of previous eras is also a mistake based on these same issues. Filmmakers can't easily build the same kinds of bodies of work that filmmakers did in earlier eras because the business model has changed, the way the movies find audiences has shifted and the filmmakers themselves are doing different things. It also doesn't account for the way people found those "great directors" of older eras as they were presorted by time and other movie goers for appreciation in ways that current filmmakers can't be. Pointing to eras like the sixties and asking for the current moment to duplicate that time period misses out on why the sixties played out as they did, requiring a world war and baby boom to happen to get that result, while comparing that winnowed group of known careers to an entire cohort of people still developing their histories. It doesn't make sense as a comparison in anything other than random preference of individual viewing selections.

[St. Gloede]

Asking for lists of filmmakers who started in the 2000s who compare to those of previous eras is also a mistake based on these same issues. Filmmakers can't easily build the same kinds of bodies of work that filmmakers did in earlier eras because the business model has changed, the way the movies find audiences has shifted and the filmmakers themselves are doing different things. It also doesn't account for the way people found those "great directors" of older eras as they were presorted by time and other movie goers for appreciation in ways that current filmmakers can't be. Pointing to eras like the sixties and asking for the current moment to duplicate that time period misses out on why the sixties played out as they did, requiring a world war and baby boom to happen to get that result

I don't understand how it misses the point. From my perspective, you explained, and quite well, why the 21st century is such a poor moment for cinematic expression.

while comparing that winnowed group of known careers to an entire cohort of people still developing their histories. It doesn't make sense as a comparison in anything other than random preference of individual viewing selections.

This is not true, the question was designed to be fair and even give the advantage to the current directors by giving a 30 year career range and freeing the defenders to essentially pick anyone who started to make films even from the 90s and onwards (and compare them to older directors at the same point in their career).

The point was to illustrate what you explained, that less directors have built up impressive ouvres. (At least that we know of).

-

Unlike WBA is think the 21st century is perfectly standard, and don't hate the aesthetics, it just lacks great movements, and a large range of directors delivering top work. We're not in any kind of slump, we're justnot in any kind of high (whuch is impossible without great movements and large amounts of auteurs - at least from my perspective)

[...]

The point is what you're measuring is arbitrary when you use measures that mostly just capture changes in the industry and demographic shifts. The filmmakers of the fifties didn't have the body of work of filmmakers of the thirties, filmmakers of the thirties didn't have the same body of work as those of the teens, those of the seventies not as much as any previous era and so it continues to go as the dynamics of filmmaking change, but of course then you could include videos and that changes it again. It's a measure of how things get made, but not much of a measure of how good. More filmmakers with smaller bodies of work is not inherently lesser than fewer filmmakers with larger bodies of work. When one looks at the commonalities in the eras and between filmmakers within them, the 21st century stands out as more the exceptional case of sheer abundance of options. If your hook is one of established "auteurism", well that too is setting a goal line that predetermines who can cross it.

It's not about "fairness" its about the measures themselves being too limited and therefore faulty for only being able to find what you want to find. That's great for any one of us, but it does nothing to actually speak to the eras beyond personal preference. Doing something more would require more definition and a closer examination of what it is being celebrated and that which is being dismissed. All of which goes back to the other points in my previous post, because these things are all connected, not separate issues.

[St. Gloede]

I strongly disagree. The issue is that we neither have the amount of all time greats, nor a high amount of films produced by the individual all time greats, nor indeed a large quantity of relevant movements.

If we had more fantastic directors, even by personal taste as opposed to acclaim, that could be accounted for. The experiment still works with directors with as little as 2 or 3 films over the last 30 years. Quantity of film production per director was not the focus. Someone could easily list Malick as a great 70s director. But seemingly, regardless of personal preference, even this is hard.

The 60s and 70s especially had both the high amount of directors, and the high amount of great/recognized films from each. They also had a large scope of cinematic movements, on top of standalone artists and commercial cinema matching what we have today.

Just so that there is no confusion: Your argument is that there are so many fantastic films made by unknowns who may never make a film again that they make up for the extreme overkill of the 60s? If so, interesting.

[flip]

i'm not completely following the conversation, but since it seemed some were making lists of filmmakers who worked mostly or entirely in the 2000s and 2010s, i thought i'd see if i could do the same. i was a bit relaxed about including filmmakers who made one or two films in the 1990s (or early short films), thinking that anyone making a similar list for the 1960s wouldn't likely exclude all of rohmer, rivette, chabrol, truffaut and godard. a lot of these are directors from whom i've only seen one film, but one good film (and a couple i haven't seen at all but have polled well at scfz).

this has probably already been said, but it strikes me that one important distinction between the 2000s and 1960s is just the pace of production - it seems it was a lot more common in the 1960s to build, in a ten year period, a really substantial body of work, whereas in the 2000s a filmmaker is lucky to make three or four films in that span of time, at least if that filmmaker is making films for prestige festivals and cinema release.

kelly reichardt
debra granik
lynne ramsay
andrea arnold
alice rohrwacher
sandra kogut
lucile hadzihalilovic
celine sciamma
maren ade
angela robinson
shahram mokri
rafi pitts
vimukthi jayasundara
apichatpong weerasethakul
ruben ostlund
alberto rodriguez
pablo larrain
quentin dupieux
lav diaz
asghar farhadi
jia zhangke
mohammad rasoulof
jonathan glazer
cristian mungiu
andrew haigh
petr zelenka
babak jalali
ihor podolchak
brad anderson
laurent cantet
andrey zvyagintsev
ilmar raag
saman salur
joon-ho bong
yorgos lanthimos
carlos reygadas
nobuhiro yamashita
pjer zalica
lisandro alonso
jiang wen

[Joks Trois]

Greg's argument ignores technology. In the past it often took 10 or more years for people to realise the 'greatness' of a film due to lack of access, not just distance (temporal). That is no longer a concern, and I'd say those examples are more the exception. L'avventura may have got a frosty reception at first, but it didn't take long for it to be viewed as a masterpiece. Certainly not a decade.

I still think WBA is ultimatelly correct about average or even second tier film makers of the past. You just have to compare the use of mise-en-scene. Even Ed Wood had a better understanding of that than many film makers today, and he was considered a joke in his time.

I think Jade overlooks the fact that craft can be lost over time. History repeats, but the details matter. Forms and styles can also become exhausted. Look at rock music. When was the last time anyone did anything seriously inventive there?

If Lanthimos counts as a great film maker, god help us! He is stuck in the 60's and 70's. A common problem with so many contemporary film makers. Recycling old ideas (intellectual and aesthetic) ad infinitum/ad nauseum.

I've also come to the conclusion that most CCC is vacuous bullshit made by complete philistines. Lazy cinema by people who are afraid of doing real work, with few exceptions. e.g Costa, Sokurov etc. These film makers need to stop being nerdy cinephiles and start reading books, visiting galleries etc. Expand their horizons. Start using their imagination.

[flip]

If Lanthimos counts as a great film maker, god help us! He is stuck in the 60's and 70's. A common problem with so many contemporary film makers. Recycling old ideas (intellectual and aesthetic) ad infinitum/ad nauseum.

curious, to what 1960s or 1970s films do you think alps is indebted? and do you think filmmakers in the 1970s weren't often recycling old ideas?

[nrh]

putting sokurov and costa under the same umbrella is a pretty good example of why the "ccc" designation is (at best) so totally useless...

[Joks Trois]

Alps is probably his most original film, but it is still wedded to the old ideas that came out of structuralism. Same with Dogtooth and even The Lobster.

That kind of film making should have ended with Greenaway.

The best directors in Europe of the 60's took advantage of the intellectual boom of their time. They were fortunate, but they also capitalised on it. That is partly what gave their films a sense of 'newness'.

[Lencho of the Apes]

do you think alps is indebted?

I don't know about older movies that it may have drawn from, but the premise of Alps is identical to a Sion Sono from 2005, Noriko's Dinner Table.

[Joks Trois]

putting sokurov and costa under the same umbrella is a pretty good example of why the "ccc" designation is (at best) so totally useless...

Agree. I originally added that but took it out because it is a given around here. but I do think there is a general lazyness among film makers who fit more neatly in thar category.

[JADEreigns]

I think you missed the point of my list. This is only a selection of well-regarded names from 3 countries, and only focused on the youngest generation, essentially a gap of about 15 years.

In other words, an attempt to show how just a minuscule fraction of 60s cinema could stand up to your list. Though taste will always be an issue no matter what, you did recognize 10 names of this already small scope.

I was however also attempting to base my list on recognition, not just taste, trying to set some sort of shared benchmark. For instance, I rather despise Wakamatsu, but he is undoubtedly considered an important director and has a major following.

(Keep in mind that your list had no restrictions and included several directors active for 40-50 years. Matching the template, essentially every director considered an all-time great, from Bergman, to Kurosawa, to Fellini, to Kubrick, to Hitchcock, to Pasolini, etc. etc. etc. could be counted in).

It'll be a much more fruitful discussion if you assume that I'm not an idiot.

a.) No, I didn't miss the point of your list. You gave a list with caveats. I gave two lists, the second one based on a similar time frame with similar restrictions, also with caveats about my own limited viewings in the current era. The 10 that I would have put in a list referred to the more restricted list of only newer filmmakers.
b.) I'm not dumb enough to think that you chose three groups at random to see if a "miniscule fraction" could stand up to my list. The French New Wave is clearly the most well known group of the time frame, and really in the history of cinema as far as groups of related filmmakers go. The Japanese would clearly be second for me in the same time period. Those three make up a healthy chunk of the well regarded films among the young filmmakers of the era.
c.) I fully understand that "matching the template" you could consider "essentially every director considered an all-time great". I also don't consider all of those directors to be great (and, clearly, neither do you). This isn't a problem, though, because i.) There are many all-time great filmmakers from previous eras making films in the current era and ii.) The grass is not greener on the other side of the hill: There are numerous filmmakers who will, in 60 years, be considered "all-time greats", for good reason or for nonsense reasons, working in the current era. It's just common sense regarding human behavior, though, that they will be undervalued in the present period due to various factors like people hesitating to value new films against older "established films" (which is a pure nonsense concept) and due to nostalgia both enhancing older films that don't deserve it and making newer films seem less valuable because they lack that "greatness" that older films are supposed to have even though that sensation is purely nostalgic fantasy.

Juracek only managed to produce 2 films, Havetta only made 3 films, that is also why I did not add him on my list. All the names on my list actually had more extensive outputs, though how many you consider great is, of course, another question.

I've seen most of Jakubisko's films. There is no person on the planet who is going to argue that his films in the 70s and after even hold a candle to his 60s films. Some of the reasons are obvious: Tanks. Some of them are easy to figure out: He got worse with age. The tank situation holds true for many of those filmmakers. For me, Jakubisko is in the top tier, and yet there's no way he belongs any lower than Havetta. Similarly, I find Havetta's peak to be similar to but far, far superior to Chytilová's peak. Juracek was great, and he was singled out and banned entirely after the tanks rolled in, so it's no fault of his that he never made another film.

(Btw, just out of curiosity, in your opinion, does the Berlin school actually hold a candle to Herzog, Wenders and Fassbinder?)

Am I limited to the three "original" members, or am I allowed to add others? I'm not a huge fan of Petzold, myself, despite his popularity.

Fassbinder I love, though his work rate, drug use, and single-take ethos certainly show at times. I find his work hugely uneven, often extremely clumsy and uninteresting with camera work, but his use of mis en scene is often great (especially since he's often reworking staged plays) and the drama itself is often wildly original and psychologically interesting, if wildly unnatural.
Herzog I don't consider a great filmmaker at all, though he is a fascinating figure and his narration is fantastic on its own.
Wenders is wildly uneven, but at his peak perhaps most related to the Berlin School filmmakers. Paris, Texas has a lot in common with the staging, stillness, and patience of Schanelec's features, and even Petzold's, though I find Wenders' films far less schematic than Petzold (though some find that element of Petzold's work to be its best feature, I guess).

Schanelec, for me, is better than all of them.
Petzold I find certainly better than Herzog, though I personally prefer Wenders.
Hochhäusler I haven't even had time for. I often wish I never found the time for Herzog, so we can call it a draw?

Those three are only bunched due to coincidence, though, unlike the three you selected. If we include other filmmakers, like Köhler, Grisebach, Arslan, et al. then you get a more interesting picture. A major difference between the groups, of course, is that the names you mentioned became big international names and their films received funding. Only Petzold has received any visibility at all. Consider Grisebach: She didn't get another feature made for 11 years, and it was released to rave reviews and now finally some attention. Her previous film was actually in comp at the Berlinale, but, despite its quality and great reviews she was ignored and her film received scant distribution.

Interestingly, the president of the German Film Academy attacked German film critics for praising films that nobody watches like Grisebach's previous film instead of bigger German films like Twyker's Perfume. That President was a producer on batshit crazy films that the German public would never watch today, like Fassbinder's films. History is hilarious!

There are always an endless amount of films that do not receive recognition and is retroactively discovered or elevated in film communities. Similarly, some films only reached niches. That is, of course, the case today as well. And there may even be more films we are missing.

But if we literally had a New French Wave or similar someone would have said something. We are a small film niche forum, and most of us are on many other forums or involved in other niche activities, follow people who are, etc. If no one has heard of such massive movements or major works these filmmakers really don't want them found, or they have had extremely bad luck. If these massive movements are not taking place, then I don't think this century has a lot of stand on yet - but there is a lot of time left.

I agree that there is no French New Wave. Thankfully. We have plenty of great films and filmmakers, instead. After all, the French New Wave wasn't as wavelike as you're implying. The Left Bank had little to do with Godard, and Godard's films look childish compared to the thoughtful work of Rohmer. What they did have, though, was self promotion! We don't even have a Berlin School these days - that's all made up, and none of the filmmakers endorse the label. Why do we have a Berlin School? Because critics wanted to stick a false label on a somewhat similar group of filmmakers in order to get them more exposure - promotion! And - it still didn't work, despite their quality. Why, then, would you have heard of other "schools" (that probably don't exist)? And why do we need a named wave? I don't comprehend why that's an issue. I could fake one, though, if you like - The Millennial Wave! There, now we can all rest easily knowing that there is a wave of amazing filmmaking that has swept the globe, and all because - it has a meaningless name!

The idea of me posting in this thread is not to convince anyone else that THEY will find the 21st century films great. That is a fool's errand if I've ever heard one, for so many reasons. All I'm trying to do is state my opinion, and provide some semblance of an explanation so that you can consider whether I'm a complete idiot. If you want something beyond that, or think that I am trying something beyond that, then you're way off base.

[JADEreigns]

Maybe we are talking about different stuff? Or you are misunderstanding me and I am misunderstanding you? I don't know exactly which is the case, cause I don't understand what you are trying to tell me with that mountain analogy and how any of my points is hard to understand...

I'll try again, and keep it simple and concise:

01. [/b]In my opinion[/b] filmmaking standards "in general/on average/looking at stuff from all around the world" have deteriorated considerably during the 21st century. If you take most decades from the 20th century, filmmaking standards were in my opinion much higher from roughly 1920 till roughly 1990 than they have been for the past 20 years. Directors, screenwriters, cameramen, editors, the artists who made films during the 20th century (and some of which continued to make films in the 21st century) had a greater interest in the process and the craft of filmmaking, than the younger generation of filmmakers who came of age during the 80s and 90s and who started making films in the 21st century. The past generations of filmmakers also watched more films, watched them more concentrated (at the cinema, not at home on the TV or on a mobile phone), were generally more knowledgable about all aspects of filmmaking and more curious to make better films.

I don't agree with your sentiment. I also almost never agree with sentiments regarding how people have changed so dramatically from one era to the next because - people don't change. There is absolutely no chance that people nerded out harder on filmmaking int he 1920s or 1960s than people nerd out on filmmaking today. Have you met actual filmmakers, including the people that work in the industry? It's literally impossible that anyone could nerd out on filmmaking more than many of these people. The only sure thing between previous generations and the current generations is that kids could have watched far, far, far more films these days than in previous generation through home video rentals, through libraries, and through streaming services. As for distracted viewings - this is unlikely for people if films are their passion. It just doesn't hold up to real world experience, to me.

Without any specific examples it's hard to discuss this point further, however. The grass is never greener, though.

02. All of this might be because film was much more relevant for society and people in general during the 20th century, while it is pretty irrelevant nowadays (cause there are different audiovisual media and artforms which weren't available to people back then, like video games and stuff). Maybe filmmakers back then were also more interested to express themselves through film as a medium, cause there wasn't that much to choose from or it had much lower prestige. I don't know exactly which is the case.

I know of very few adults that spend a serious amount of time playing video games. In the 60s there were cinema clubs, today there are cinema clubs, and "Netflix and chill" is perhaps the most common activity people do these days. People are getting fatter - they're certainly not exercising more and sacrificing time sitting on their asses watching films!

03. Maybe, I'm simply more moved/stimulated/interested in and by film aesthetics from the past century than I am by the aesthetics of movies nowadays. Whatever it is, I find the aesthetics nowadays (everything most important to me : from mise en scene to camera movement and lighting to editing) much worsethan those of almost any country and any era from before. Heck, I even prefer films from 1885 to 1910 aesthetically to films from 2005 to 2020! So maybe it is just me cause most people seem happy about films and cinema and aesthetic standards and stuff nowadays. I'll admit that sound design in general, sound editing, sound mixing has gotten much better, that set and costume designers seem to have generally more possibilities to be creative, that much of the technology has evolved and the possibilities of how and what one can shoot nowadays are seemingly much higher, better vaster than ever before. But the people using them are either not interested in those possibilities, overwhelmed by them, stupid or just not as talented as previous generations of artists. Especially directors nowadays seem almost incompetent, when compared to creative filmmakers from the past.

Without any specific examples this is impossible to respond to, I think. I see little difference, myself - artists in both eras seem equally interested in their art and equally competent at it.

04. If I watch 20 random (!!!) films from say 1919 or 1928 or 1933 or 1950 or 1965 or 1988 and compare them to some random 20 films from 2005 or 2012 in my opinion the new millenium sucks. And I do not mean canonical films or aknowledged films or blockbusters.

05. my tastes might be totally different from yours, and we might watch 100 films and come to different opinions on 90 of them regarding their aesthetic merits and the craft behind them and such.

06. I understand that many many many more films get made nowadays when compared to 50 years ago, and I understand that many many many more people direct films nowadays than did 50 years ago, and I understand that it is therefore statistically much more difficult to find and stumble upon films and filmmakers one might enjoy nowadays than those from the past. But still... considering all of this, my evaluation and opinion remains the same (so far).

Again, without any specific examples this is impossible to respond to, except to say that you don't watch random films (you said as much), so it's hard to trust you when you say things about random films. I certainly don't watch random films, and so I'm judging "actual films based on similar methods of finding unknown-to-me-films." The processes are the same, the people making the films are essentially the same (as people never change) and, unsurprisingly, the films tend to be roughly the same quality. Fascinatingly predictable, that!


-------------

I tried to list all filmmakers by which I've seen at least one great or promising film (to me, that is!), who hadn't directed anything before 2000, and my findings are abysmal. Out of roughly 1500 films I've watched from 2000 till 2019, almost all my favorite stuff comes from people who already started in the 20th century.

Here's what my list looks like:

Bruno Sukrow
Corneliu Porumboiu
Olivier Meyrou

3 relatively great filmmakers from the 21st century (One of them is over 80, though).

-------------------

Of course tastes are subjective, but still: where are those hundreds upon hundreds of young filmmakers making great films today. And where are all the thousands upon thousands making watchable decent stuff. I don't see them, I don't know them. Obviously.

Obviously I don't know much about 21st century filmmaking, and I haven't seen most of the great stuff that's out there. But I'd be glad if you could point me in that direction.

PS: "The Berlin School" by the way has been a great movement from the 90s and 2000s and I do enjoy many of their filmmakers and films. But where are some other movements like this? Where is some fresh energy, new perspectives, young filmmakers in love with cinema?

All this tells me is that you've got some sort of mental block!

Again, as I said, the only way to answer this would be to take a look at two years in cinema, look at how you respond to the films, and see if your responses to the films make any sense based on what is actually on the screen. I find it impossible that anyone without some crazy amount of bias could watch a selection of actually-expected-to-be-good films from two major eras and actually see much different. But, as I said in my last post -

"The idea of me posting in this thread is not to convince anyone else that THEY will find the 21st century films great. That is a fool's errand if I've ever heard one, for so many reasons."

[JADEreigns]

Greg's argument ignores technology. In the past it often took 10 or more years for people to realise the 'greatness' of a film due to lack of access, not just distance (temporal). That is no longer a concern, and I'd say those examples are more the exception. L'avventura may have got a frosty reception at first, but it didn't take long for it to be viewed as a masterpiece. Certainly not a decade.

I still think WBA is ultimatelly correct about average or even second tier film makers of the past. You just have to compare the use of mise-en-scene. Even Ed Wood had a better understanding of that than many film makers today, and he was considered a joke in his time.

I think Jade overlooks the fact that craft can be lost over time. History repeats, but the details matter. Forms and styles can also become exhausted. Look at rock music. When was the last time anyone did anything seriously inventive there?

If Lanthimos counts as a great film maker, god help us! He is stuck in the 60's and 70's. A common problem with so many contemporary film makers. Recycling old ideas (intellectual and aesthetic) ad infinitum/ad nauseum.

I've also come to the conclusion that most CCC is vacuous bullshit made by complete philistines. Lazy cinema by people who are afraid of doing real work, with few exceptions. e.g Costa, Sokurov etc. These film makers need to stop being nerdy cinephiles and start reading books, visiting galleries etc. Expand their horizons. Start using their imagination.

Your question about music is interesting - With digital distribution of music and free promotion through social media there has never been an easier time to produce music, distribute it, and make a living off of it in the history of the world. How is it that anyone could think that a music style is no longer being reinvented? There are bands literally inventing new instruments in order to play their music. The idea of even trying to keep track of musical genre is almost silly - we've already had post-(insert every genre ever, including rock). You can find an almost endless variety of music being made these days. You will find far more hesitance to find it labeled, though. Do you, personally, spend a lot of time looking for new music? I, personally, do, and find an endless supply and variety. It's overwhelming. It is also a fact that: As people grow older, they buy fewer music albums. They listen to less new music. They don't keep up with the trends. They don't relate to bad-music-by-teenagers-and-20-somethings like they did when they were a teenager and 20-something. Even then, though - don't worry, there are plenty of bands making sophisticated, intricate, experimental, aggressive, placid, minimalist, maximalist, etc. rock music. If you can't find something that interests you it is because you are incapable of being interested. There is no way around it.

Yes, Lanthimos awful - just as awful as whatever filmmaker you love who was recycling ideas from an earlier era! Or, perhaps you don't even recognize the ideas he's working with. Or perhaps you don't like the way he presents his ideas because someone you do like presented those ideas first, or presented different ideas in a similar way first, or maybe you just don't like new music...

Singing competitions on TV are IMMENSELY popular - even if those people are singing new songs that the viewers would NEVER listen to outside of the show and who have probably not bought an album of new music in decades. Why is this a thing? Why? If you can't explain this, then you can't even begin to understand why I'm immensely skeptical of people that think contemporary (anything) is no longer as good as it used to be.

I get the attack on CCC filmmakers. However, no person can attack CCC filmmakers for making vacuous bullshit and being philistines and praise Godard's 60s work, that is just too ludicrous! HIstory - REPEATS!

[JADEreigns]

As for "discovering" filmmakers, there are at least two important things to say:

1. Consider a filmmaker like Schanelec: Her early films were well loved, but ignored, and savaged by the critics - even calling her the "poetess of emptiness". Her newer films, though, have been well received, though still lacking in distribution. Some say that she's getting better, some that she's just continuing to make great work, either immensely realistic or fascinatingly dense or formally sophisticated or all three. Whatever the case, if she continues making great films then people will go back to the early work and realize that she was great all along. That is to say: One of the ways, and perhaps the primary way, that great filmmakers get noticed is because they keep adding to their resume. Should we count the number of filmmakers of the past that this is true for? It would be a lot! Once one film gets noticed in a big way, the rest follow. As such, it's absuuuuuurd to even pretend that we can account for all of the great young filmmakers of today in comparison to the great young filmmakers of another era. Absurd. It makes no sense, because we know that the mechanisms of discovering great filmmakers work in many different ways and some of the primary ones require not just time but sustained activity. Why can't I name every great young filmmaker? Because, unlike the past, I can't also pull from the pool of great middle-aged filmmakers who were also great young unknown filmmakers. The fact that, as a whole, I feel confident comparing the quality of the 2000s to the quality of any other 20 years is a solid sign that - history repeats.
2. Consider a festival like Venice: In the past it awarded a film like Kluge's experimental circus collage which was a meditation on the way an artist could both create interesting work and convey the work and ideas to a receptive audience. This year, there was no experimental circus collage film, but the winner was a clown of sorts. When was the last time a film like Kluge's, excepting Godard's essay films, played in Venice? Or in any major festival? Those films are filled to the brim with many hundreds of submissions every year, but they seem to be selecting fewer and fewer works that could even potentially be interesting. Genre fare and homogeneity are becoming the norm, along with the same kind of social-realist work that has always been at the table. While film festivals are becoming less and less conducive to allowing interesting filmmakers to be discovered, what has taken their place? Nothing. And why, exactly, do we expect the "collective consciousness" to be made aware of these films? It's just not credible that the same breadth of films are known as well.

Also, the idea that we need new "movements" is to me hysterically nonsensical, in all arts. People complain that modern art is terrible, and that art was better in some other period. However, many of those older periods can only be evaluated because retroactive criticism anointed artist as great, recognized and named retroactive trends, etc. Many of the great works from years' past only came to light after they were removed from private collectors' hands and placed into public display - and the primary way artists made work was through commission. Furthermore, we look at 50 different Renassaince painters as amazing because they worked in a popular style, but not someone who today makes work in a similar style of equal quality? It's not as if all 50 of those similar painters were blazingly original. Originality is a fraught term, and exists on many levels. The fact is that what is often considered great only because it is considered "cutting edge" is not that cutting edge, and while it may not be any less great - the work that comes after it that is just as lacking in being "cutting-edge" is actually as great as the older work is, even though both are considered lesser for erroneous reasons. In general, people doth protest too much. Furthermore, if a film is found great but uncommercial or, even worse, experimental, how would people see it? Well, it would need a distributor. Word of mouth is not enough, and as festivals get more conservative the distributors know that they won't even be able to get future sales from these new filmmakers later films drawing attention. It's just a dead end. There are some critics that make a list of the best films of the year, and the best films of previous years seeking distribution, and even though the lists tend to be narratively focused, semi-commercial films they stay in the list for years and years... Let's not ring the bell quite yet on the death of cinema due to ignorance. If anything, this might be the last great era, since there are at least way too many films to distribute. Once the films stop getting made then we can know for sure that it's dead.

[St. Gloede]

Alps is probably his most original film, but it is still wedded to the old ideas that came out of structuralism. Same with Dogtooth and even The Lobster.

That kind of film making should have ended with Greenaway.

Why?

If you never enjoyed it I perfectly understand, but if you actually like a specific set of cinematic touches, experiences, etc. why would you not want more of them.

Looking at Lanthimos specifically I can certainly agree that the comparison to the artists of the 70s in terms of focus/area exploration is apt. But why is that a negative (especially as the focus of structure and form that evolved from or became more widespread in the 60s and 70s has so much to offer, and in many ways can be described as genres upon themselves).

And that stated, I don't at all feel like he is living in the past. Films like Dogtooth, The Lobster, Killing of a Sacred Deer are simply darkly comedic, somewhat minimalistic, somewhat surrealistic and quite clinical films (that to me are a joy to watch).

[St. Gloede]

It'll be a much more fruitful discussion if you assume that I'm not an idiot.

[a.) No, I didn't miss the point of your list. You gave a list with caveats. I gave two lists, the second one based on a similar time frame with similar restrictions, also with caveats about my own limited viewings in the current era. The 10 that I would have put in a list referred to the more restricted list of only newer filmmakers.
b.) I'm not dumb enough to think that you chose three groups at random to see if a "miniscule fraction" could stand up to my list. The French New Wave is clearly the most well known group of the time frame, and really in the history of cinema as far as groups of related filmmakers go. The Japanese would clearly be second for me in the same time period. Those three make up a healthy chunk of the well regarded films among the young filmmakers of the era.
c.) I fully understand that "matching the template" you could consider "essentially every director considered an all-time great". I also don't consider all of those directors to be great (and, clearly, neither do you). This isn't a problem, though, because i.) There are many all-time great filmmakers from previous eras making films in the current era and ii.) The grass is not greener on the other side of the hill: There are numerous filmmakers who will, in 60 years, be considered "all-time greats", for good reason or for nonsense reasons, working in the current era. It's just common sense regarding human behavior, though, that they will be undervalued in the present period due to various factors like people hesitating to value new films against older "established films" (which is a pure nonsense concept) and due to nostalgia both enhancing older films that don't deserve it and making newer films seem less valuable because they lack that "greatness" that older films are supposed to have even though that sensation is purely nostalgic fantasy.

I never assumed that you were an idiot, what a strange continuation of the above conversation. I do apologize if it appeared I was talking down to you, but we still appears like we are having two very different conversations. Perhaps there has been a misunderstanding somewhere?

I never said that they were drawn at random. I thought it was very obvious they were picked exactly because they were three of the most fruitful areas at the time. We repeatedly went over them as highlights.

That does not change the fact that it is a miniscule fraction. We are talking 3 countries, with very specific restriction in the most fruitful decade(s) of cinematic history (from my perspective).

Your point C also makes zero sense to me. Of course legions of filmmakers working today will be seen as all-time greats.

My point was that there are less.

This is why I consistently pointed to how the "new directors" from just 3 (of the best at the time) countries could take on almost the entirety of new filmmakers today.

I don't understand why you keep bringing up rose-tinted glasses or how the grass is greener. That is irrelevant. I can easily point to the 40s and say the current decade is better, and the 00s could easily rival the 80s. I am not making the case that the past was better, only that the 60s/70s had a web of respected filmmakers and movements that the current era (nor any other era for that matter) can match.

(I missed the list following the restrictions. Tried to scroll back looking for it, but couldn't find it).

(Btw, just out of curiosity, in your opinion, does the Berlin school actually hold a candle to Herzog, Wenders and Fassbinder?)

Am I limited to the three "original" members, or am I allowed to add others? I'm not a huge fan of Petzold, myself, despite his popularity.

Fassbinder I love, though his work rate, drug use, and single-take ethos certainly show at times. I find his work hugely uneven, often extremely clumsy and uninteresting with camera work, but his use of mis en scene is often great (especially since he's often reworking staged plays) and the drama itself is often wildly original and psychologically interesting, if wildly unnatural.
Herzog I don't consider a great filmmaker at all, though he is a fascinating figure and his narration is fantastic on its own.
Wenders is wildly uneven, but at his peak perhaps most related to the Berlin School filmmakers. Paris, Texas has a lot in common with the staging, stillness, and patience of Schanelec's features, and even Petzold's, though I find Wenders' films far less schematic than Petzold (though some find that element of Petzold's work to be its best feature, I guess).

Schanelec, for me, is better than all of them.
Petzold I find certainly better than Herzog, though I personally prefer Wenders.
Hochhäusler I haven't even had time for. I often wish I never found the time for Herzog, so we can call it a draw?

Those three are only bunched due to coincidence, though, unlike the three you selected. If we include other filmmakers, like Köhler, Grisebach, Arslan, et al. then you get a more interesting picture. A major difference between the groups, of course, is that the names you mentioned became big international names and their films received funding. Only Petzold has received any visibility at all. Consider Grisebach: She didn't get another feature made for 11 years, and it was released to rave reviews and now finally some attention. Her previous film was actually in comp at the Berlinale, but, despite its quality and great reviews she was ignored and her film received scant distribution.

Interestingly, the president of the German Film Academy attacked German film critics for praising films that nobody watches like Grisebach's previous film instead of bigger German films like Twyker's Perfume. That President was a producer on batshit crazy films that the German public would never watch today, like Fassbinder's films. History is hilarious!

And thank you for your view. I really need to start exploring the Berlin School.

I partially agree on Fassbinder, though I am very forgiving about the lesser work as he did about 40 films in 16 years, and honestly having seen all but Nora Helmer (which I really need to get around to) and honestly, he essentially just merged the highs and lows of the average 50 year career into one. I suppose his on the fly style also makes me more forgiving, as it fits the aesthetic. Your take regarding mise-en-scene being better than his cinematography certainly rings true for many of his films and is quite an astute observation. I also agree on Wenders post Germany, I am not too interested in his latter work, this actually even applies to Herzog to a slight extent - I vastly prefer his "fiction" over his documentaries, and there have just been less and less of the former.

And yes, Grisebach is without a doubt one of the most promising newer directors (but her issue with getting films made highlights my big issue with the current century - I hope it will turn around again, and I'm sure it will).

[

quote="St. Gloede" post_id=11247 time=1568879359 user_id=136]There are always an endless amount of films that do not receive recognition and is retroactively discovered or elevated in film communities. Similarly, some films only reached niches. That is, of course, the case today as well. And there may even be more films we are missing.

But if we literally had a New French Wave or similar someone would have said something. We are a small film niche forum, and most of us are on many other forums or involved in other niche activities, follow people who are, etc. If no one has heard of such massive movements or major works these filmmakers really don't want them found, or they have had extremely bad luck. If these massive movements are not taking place, then I don't think this century has a lot of stand on yet - but there is a lot of time left.

I agree that there is no French New Wave. Thankfully. We have plenty of great films and filmmakers, instead. After all, the French New Wave wasn't as wavelike as you're implying. The Left Bank had little to do with Godard, and Godard's films look childish compared to the thoughtful work of Rohmer. What they did have, though, was self promotion! We don't even have a Berlin School these days - that's all made up, and none of the filmmakers endorse the label. Why do we have a Berlin School? Because critics wanted to stick a false label on a somewhat similar group of filmmakers in order to get them more exposure - promotion! And - it still didn't work, despite their quality. Why, then, would you have heard of other "schools" (that probably don't exist)? And why do we need a named wave? I don't comprehend why that's an issue. I could fake one, though, if you like - The Millennial Wave! There, now we can all rest easily knowing that there is a wave of amazing filmmaking that has swept the globe, and all because - it has a meaningless name![/quote]

Most waves are not penned by the directors themselves, that includes the Japanese New Wave, which was essentially studio made (ironically). I'm not interested in any kind of manifestos or cohesive movements, only the output. Of course the New Wave in particular was exceptional at promoting themselves, the half that actually had a real connection literally had their own magazine, that could easily be done today as well. But many lesser waves had no such tools, and are still held up and respected.

(If you can frame a "Millenial Wave" to something real, i.e. a large set of directors/films that would be very exciting).

The idea of me posting in this thread is not to convince anyone else that THEY will find the 21st century films great. That is a fool's errand if I've ever heard one, for so many reasons. All I'm trying to do is state my opinion, and provide some semblance of an explanation so that you can consider whether I'm a complete idiot. If you want something beyond that, or think that I am trying something beyond that, then you're way off base.

I think essentially everyone here, with a few possible exceptions, will agree 21st Century Films were great. The films from every decade and period are great. There is only a question of amount, type and degree.

[St. Gloede]

Yes, Lanthimos awful - just as awful as whatever filmmaker you love who was recycling ideas from an earlier era! Or, perhaps you don't even recognize the ideas he's working with. Or perhaps you don't like the way he presents his ideas because someone you do like presented those ideas first, or presented different ideas in a similar way first, or maybe you just don't like new music...

Singing competitions on TV are IMMENSELY popular - even if those people are singing new songs that the viewers would NEVER listen to outside of the show and who have probably not bought an album of new music in decades. Why is this a thing? Why? If you can't explain this, then you can't even begin to understand why I'm immensely skeptical of people that think contemporary (anything) is no longer as good as it used to be.

I get the attack on CCC filmmakers. However, no person can attack CCC filmmakers for making vacuous bullshit and being philistines and praise Godard's 60s work, that is just too ludicrous! HIstory - REPEATS!

Ha, very different tastes here for sure.

Personally, I think Lanthimos is the best new director of the 21st century and that Godard is the greatest filmmaker of all time.

[JADEreigns]

I never assumed that you were an idiot, what a strange continuation of the above conversation. I do apologize if it appeared I was talking down to you, but we still appears like we are having two very different conversations. Perhaps there has been a misunderstanding somewhere?

I never said that they were drawn at random. I thought it was very obvious they were picked exactly because they were three of the most fruitful areas at the time. We repeatedly went over them as highlights.

That does not change the fact that it is a miniscule fraction. We are talking 3 countries, with very specific restriction in the most fruitful decade(s) of cinematic history (from my perspective).

Your point C also makes zero sense to me. Of course legions of filmmakers working today will be seen as all-time greats.

My point was that there are less.

This is why I consistently pointed to how the "new directors" from just 3 (of the best at the time) countries could take on almost the entirety of new filmmakers today.

I don't understand why you keep bringing up rose-tinted glasses or how the grass is greener. That is irrelevant. I can easily point to the 40s and say the current decade is better, and the 00s could easily rival the 80s. I am not making the case that the past was better, only that the 60s/70s had a web of respected filmmakers and movements that the current era (nor any other era for that matter) can match.

(I missed the list following the restrictions. Tried to scroll back looking for it, but couldn't find it).

Well, with you ignoring my list and claiming I didn’t understand yours when I went to the effort of explaining and caveating mine it read like dismissiveness - plus it’s the internet, so, you know. Apparently it was an innocent oversight and I totally overreacted - life imitating Fassbinder imitating Sirkian melodrama? Also, you seem to be the only one giving the 2000s any credit at all, and I guess I missed that. Another poster can only name three filmmakers worth mentioning in 20 years! It seemed like I was way out to sea. But that’s because I too can’t read. C’est la vie!

I might love the 80s more than the 60s, myself. What a wild, wildly uneven but somehow still great decade!

Let’s avoid that discussion, though, nobody will take me seriously at all.

And thank you for your view. I really need to start exploring the Berlin School.

I partially agree on Fassbinder, though I am very forgiving about the lesser work as he did about 40 films in 16 years, and honestly having seen all but Nora Helmer (which I really need to get around to) and honestly, he essentially just merged the highs and lows of the average 50 year career into one. I suppose his on the fly style also makes me more forgiving, as it fits the aesthetic. Your take regarding mise-en-scene being better than his cinematography certainly rings true for many of his films and is quite an astute observation. I also agree on Wenders post Germany, I am not too interested in his latter work, this actually even applies to Herzog to a slight extent - I vastly prefer his "fiction" over his documentaries, and there have just been less and less of the former.

And yes, Grisebach is without a doubt one of the most promising newer directors (but her issue with getting films made highlights my big issue with the current century - I hope it will turn around again, and I'm sure it will).

Germany seems singularly plagued with a lack of funding, though, due to the relationship the country has with film. See below:

Most waves are not penned by the directors themselves, that includes the Japanese New Wave, which was essentially studio made (ironically). I'm not interested in any kind of manifestos or cohesive movements, only the output. Of course the New Wave in particular was exceptional at promoting themselves, the half that actually had a real connection literally had their own magazine, that could easily be done today as well. But many lesser waves had no such tools, and are still held up and respected.

(If you can frame a "Millenial Wave" to something real, i.e. a large set of directors/films that would be very exciting).

Intriguingly, in writing about the Berlin School Hohhausler wrote (you can find the piece online as a preview of a book dedicated to the Berlin School) that he thought that it made more sense to group filmmakers from around the world more influenced by filmmakers from other countries than those from their own (especially Joe, Hou, Yang, Thai, et al) into one group, since all of the Berlin School filmmakers shared those influences far more than any German influences. He also said two other interesting things: a.) He thinks the “Berlin School” has some utility for ease of reference, and he has used it himself with some reservations, but he thinks that it should have an expiration date since the filmmakers have grown so different with age and no longer exhibit the same shared influences. This would certainly make sense with the immense divergence in styles of the French New Wave, as well. b.) He says film is not very well respected in Germany, and so nobody cares how well a film does unless it does well on tv. Conversely, it seems that one of if not the most respected arthouse-style director in Germany is Graf, but his films are almost impossible to find because international markets rarely release foreign tv shows. He has made a few features, but it makes a lot of sense why he’s so well regarded and yet so hard to explore.

[JADEreigns]

Yes, Lanthimos awful - just as awful as whatever filmmaker you love who was recycling ideas from an earlier era! Or, perhaps you don't even recognize the ideas he's working with. Or perhaps you don't like the way he presents his ideas because someone you do like presented those ideas first, or presented different ideas in a similar way first, or maybe you just don't like new music...

Singing competitions on TV are IMMENSELY popular - even if those people are singing new songs that the viewers would NEVER listen to outside of the show and who have probably not bought an album of new music in decades. Why is this a thing? Why? If you can't explain this, then you can't even begin to understand why I'm immensely skeptical of people that think contemporary (anything) is no longer as good as it used to be.

I get the attack on CCC filmmakers. However, no person can attack CCC filmmakers for making vacuous bullshit and being philistines and praise Godard's 60s work, that is just too ludicrous! HIstory - REPEATS!

Ha, very different tastes here for sure.

Personally, I think Lanthimos is the best new director of the 21st century and that Godard is the greatest filmmaker of all time.

I really love The Lobster, and all of the others are just really to my tastes so I don’t get too surprised when others don’t like him. He certainly did himself no favors in defending himself as a true original with the full-on Kubrick aping in Sacred Deer, but everyone has their foibles!

[St. Gloede]

Yes, Lanthimos awful - just as awful as whatever filmmaker you love who was recycling ideas from an earlier era! Or, perhaps you don't even recognize the ideas he's working with. Or perhaps you don't like the way he presents his ideas because someone you do like presented those ideas first, or presented different ideas in a similar way first, or maybe you just don't like new music...

Singing competitions on TV are IMMENSELY popular - even if those people are singing new songs that the viewers would NEVER listen to outside of the show and who have probably not bought an album of new music in decades. Why is this a thing? Why? If you can't explain this, then you can't even begin to understand why I'm immensely skeptical of people that think contemporary (anything) is no longer as good as it used to be.

I get the attack on CCC filmmakers. However, no person can attack CCC filmmakers for making vacuous bullshit and being philistines and praise Godard's 60s work, that is just too ludicrous! HIstory - REPEATS!

Ha, very different tastes here for sure.

Personally, I think Lanthimos is the best new director of the 21st century and that Godard is the greatest filmmaker of all time.

I really love The Lobster, and all of the others are just really to my tastes so I don’t get too surprised when others don’t like him. He certainly did himself no favors in defending himself as a true original with the full-on Kubrick aping in Sacred Deer, but everyone has their foibles!

Oh, sarcasm. My bad.