Hating Hamlet

I recently watched 2001: A Space Odyssey for kind of the first time; I had already seen several scenes and thought I had good grasp of the general narrative because of parody/montages/general cultural awareness. I thought the opening scene with the apes was a prologue to the story about HAL 2000 taking over a ship in a nearly perfectly executed Sci-Fi thriller. Clearly I inferred too much from my general pop culture knowledge as it is surprisingly hard to capture surreal existential symbolism in a 3 minute montage that also attempts to summarize The Godfather and Star Wars. Though I expected a completely different film 2001 exceeded my expectations. It was intellectually and viscerally stimulating in a way that most art is incapable of and is a technical masterpiece. As I was watching the movie I was given a lot of time to think (which tends to happen when you watch long scenes of satellites orbiting the earth to a score of classical music), but a couple thoughts were persistent, specifically "What the fuck is going on?", "How did Kubrick get that shot without CGI?" and "There is no way in the hell this movie would ever get made today."

The latter is not the precursor to hifalutin anti-populist rant, about movie studios inability to discern quality,* but a matter of fact. I doubt many largely plotless, dialogueless expensive movies are getting greenlit and for good reason; they will likely lose money. However 2001 did get made in spite of it's lack of commercial viability and it is considered one of the best films of all time and it has become part of the canon(and therefore is shown in montages). Despite this cultural consesus as I watched 2001 I felt very confident that most people would hate this film. They would not hate it in a reactionary way like the recent Avatar backlash or on moral grounds or because it offended their basic sensibilities, they just wouldn't find it captivating. Without the cultural awareness of its greatness I think most people would stop watching the movie within 30 minutes and aggressively warn people to never see it. With cultural context 2001's reputation supersedes most negative reactions from people who actively dislike it or would dislike it as they assume it is a "quality" film and criticizing it would be like criticizing Dickens or Shakespeare and seen as a pillar of ignorance.**

*well I hope it isn't.

**Note that exception for this is among hipsters who can sincerely argue things like Christopher Marlowe is better than Shakespeare in an attempt to express their individualism through knee-jerk contrariness.

It takes time before for any art to gain classic status; in the present we are more inclined to judge it solely on it's transient merit. In the present the illusion of quality seems more significant than actual quality, which makes speculating about current films timelessness difficult. In 1996 The English Patient won 9 Oscars, the DGA and The Golden Globe for best drama; Seinfeld made an episode where Elaine became a social leper for not instantly loving this film. It was tangibly the best film from 1996. 15 years later it seems like the lasting legacy of The English Patient is that Seinfeld episode, while movies like Fargo and Jerry Maguire are much more culturally significant.* Granted this may have occurred because the proliferation of cable channels have made those two movies ubiquitous, but I think a large reason for this was because The English Patient dominance in major award categories gave it an illusion of quality.

* It seems like I know no one who has seen The English Patient. I can very loosely prove this by the fact I haven't seen a single person mention that Sayid from LOST had a large supporting role in it.

Earlier I mentioned that a lot of people wouldn't be entertained or even like 2001 if it didn't have its reputation and while I cannot prove this, I can compare it to relatively similar films that don't have its pedigree. When There Will Be Blood was released I talked to a lot of people who hated it one even derisively (and cleverly!) referred to it as There Will Be Bored. Obviously TWBB is not a clone of 2001 but it has a lot of similar elements, such as long dialogueless sequences that focus on barren landscapes. However it is much more accessible because of an incredible performance by Daniel Day Lewis and because its subtext is unambiguous. One word I frequently heard from TWBB detractors was pretentious, which has slowly morphed from an adjective into a brand. It is the one word that can destroy the illusion of quality. It used to say the only people that like this movie are smug overly analytical intellectuals of which I don't belong. Calling these people pretentious indiscriminately allows people to rationalize their own taste when they disagree with experts, who they will gladly defer to when share opinions.* Words like pretentious are rarely used to describe 2001 and instead are replaced by words like confusing or forward thinking.

*Sort of like how comedy is only described as misogynistic or racist when people don't find it funny.

The illusion of quality benefits accessible films in the present. After it was nominated for best picture and Sandra Bullock won best actress at the Oscars. The public started to believe The Blind Side was "good". When they watch it they aren't enjoying a shallow feel good Disney film they are enjoying an Oscar-worthy film. 10 years from now people will be surprised that it won all these awards, but for a short period of time it was considered a quality film. Conversely 2001 is a very inaccessible film, but as time and passes less people see it.* As less people see the movie its pretension will slowly morph into merit or importance. Older people who grew up with the film will likely only remember scattered details, but they will want to support their generation's art so they will fondly remember it even if they actually found it ponderous. The younger generation will grow up seeing 2001 in the list of best films of all time from the day they are born and never have a sufficient reason to dispute that claim. In the meantime films like There Will Be Blood are scrutinized, since a lot of people have seen the film recently enough to remember specific details and it has yet to reach a canonical status that makes it above reproach.

*It wouldn't surprise me that much to discover that more people have already seen Iron Man 2 then 2001

I don't think that is unfair; timelessness is an important quality when judging art and instantly anointing anything one of the greatest films of all time would probably be premature. However what if the greatest film of all time were released tomorrow? How long would it take for that to become cultural consensus? I suspect it would take at least 30 years and this is what intriguing about the dichotomy between TWBB and 2001. The elements that people hate about TWBB aren't acknowledged by those same people when they watch 2001, because of 2001's reputation. There is an anti-recency bias that effects how art is viewed, I noticed this on a smaller scale when I read best of the decade lists last year. These lists had a disproportionately small amount of films from 2009 on the list and while 2009 may have just been a weak year for movies; I think it is a reflection of society's reticence to prematurely add something to the canon. Films are in canonical purgatory are subject to more criticism by the public and this lack of consensus causes best and favourite tend to converge in the present, but once these films leave purgatory they evolve from best to Best and valid or not most people don't want to criticize Hamlet.