“I don’t mean to say that storytelling is overrated (then again, maybe that’s exactly what I mean), but we know it's not necessarily the most important thing in a movie — even a mainstream studio picture. How it feels will always be more significant than the tale it spins. Because it's a movie.” And thus Jim Emerson takes a waffling shot (http://blogs.suntimes.com/) at cinematic storytelling, the view that everything in a movie is meant to serve the “story.” Quoting Roger Ebert, “A movie is not about what it is about. It is about how it is about it,” and pointing to the formulaic nature of many movies, he piles it on:
“And it seems to me that we don’t take the storytelling — not the contortions of the plot, but the shot-by-shot construction of a movie (the telling that is the movie) — seriously enough most of the time. To put it in literary terms, I wish people would concentrate more on ill-formed (sloppy, repetitive) sentences and paragraphs and less on plot holes or improbabilities. Story is optional; style is what’s there, on the page or on the screen, from moment to moment.”
Yet does this really correspond to how people watch movies, or even why? Style for the sake of style is akin to a techie geeking out over hardware while everyone else says, “sure, that’s a pretty computer, but what software does it run?” Similarly, the shot-by-shot construction might be technically accomplished, but unless it has a purpose beyond itself, it’s merely a parade of pretty, shifting photographs. As pattern-seeking animals, we look for meaning. Even in those films that challenge the ability to assign meaning – one of Emerson’s readers brings up the surrealist classic “L’Age D’or” as an example – there is more going on than what we see. It’s not necessarily something intrinsic to the movie, a reflection of the moviemaker’s intentions, but the necessary result of the interaction between a movie and a viewer. In this land of unfixed signifiers, where anything can mean anything or nothing at all, a film is always open to interpretation. Style influences that interpretation, of course, but that’s the whole point: style doesn’t occur in isolation.
The end result is, to put it in Emerson’s literary terms, that many readers are willing to overlook ill-formed sentences and typos if the plot is consistent and engaging, if the characters stir the passions, if a compelling meaning can be constructed. A movie isn’t simply a collection of shots, but a collection of shots that exist in a particular context and in a relationship to viewers. Considering the story – the grander meaning assignable to a movie, abstract in the experimental sense or Hollywood-style concrete – is part and parcel of film criticism. A great story with poor execution, a bad story with great execution, a mediocre story with mediocre execution: it is the relationship between a movie’s meaning and its method that defines success.
Cinematic Craft + Great Story =
For proof, there’s Disney-Pixar’s “Wall*E”, a film at risk of being overpraised into the lofty and counterproductive realm of hype, but entirely deserving of all the superlatives a dictionary can spit out. Cinematically, it is a flawless work of animation, graced by awe-inspiring images from desolate post-apocalyptic vistas to futuristic space ships. Andrew Stanton’s direction yields marvelously composed scenes, chock-full of detail and fully integrated with smooth, very smooth animation. Pixar has consistently been the leader in computer animation; the crown upon its head is safe.
But all the animated wizardry in the world wouldn’t matter if it weren’t for a reason to make the movie in the first place: the story or, in other words, what the film “is about.” Simplicity hides wealth, as is often the case in Pixar films. The romance between Wall*E, a cuter, squatter No. 5, and the sleek Apple-inspired EVE, has all the conviction and depth of the best romances, layered atop a robust sci-fi cautionary tale that is uncompromising in its vision of the future yet hopeful. It’s a marvel of a movie, with subtle characterizations often revealed without much dialogue but through imaginative sound effects. Slick character design comes by way of industrial design, and the sheer variety of unique, memorable characters is impressive.
Call it robot love and a topical message. Call it a smashing good movie, with gentle humour, top-notch cinematic craft and superb storytelling. Call it the reason why we go see movies at all.
Entertainment Value: ** (out of two)
Technical Quality: ** (out of two)
Gold Star Awarded!
Walt Disney/Pixar presents a film directed by Andrew Stanton. Written by Stanton and Jim Reardon. With the voices of Benn Burtt, Elissa Knight, Fred Willard, Jeff Garline, Jon Ratzenberger and Sigourney Weaver. 97 minutes. Rated G.
Discuss the film and more at Frédérik's blog and MySpace page.