Post by Primemovermithrax Pejorative on Jul 5, 2017 0:57:18 GMT
But when art abandons teaching moral messages, that contributes to society becoming morally anchorless and losing its scope of what's right or wrong. No, this definitely is not an argument about "violent movies influence violence in real life" or anything of the sort - it's not about what is portrayed, but how it is portrayed. And morality seems to have been sacrificed by many filmmakers on the altar of realism, with both public and critical acclaim embracing this with both arms.
I would call it anti-social. The goal of Hollywood (owned by Wall Street) is to create agitprop.
They are not trying to be moral or truthful or relevant to the audience. I don't think a banker on Wall Street would know art if it hit them in the face (in fact, I read Wall Street bankers bought a Damian Hirst piece consisting of decapitated sheep carcasses in a classroom--that's their idea of art).
They want to attack it--globalism is good, working class people are bad, white people are potential slavers, white men are terrible fathers and husbands, black people are all wise and moral, Islamic fanatics are your friends, all Christians are eeeevil (since I am not Christian I dont really care-but I can see how the demonization with religion cuts only one way).
For the non-hostile approach you have to go back to Walt Disney or the early days of RKO (Merian Cooper) or some lower budget companies like Hammer, AIP etc.
Hammer in the 60s is a great example of art being done without any AFAIK meddling from the Hollywood majors (MGM and Columbia were not considered majors, and they tended to be less anal about control of message, thus Harryhausen and a few others were able to make socially responsible films).
It has nothing to do with telling people what to believe--quite the contrary, it is reinforcing widely accepted notions in the society or getting people to think differently with those same beliefs. But the message has to be truthful.
We are seeing film as an art form in decay because we have a Western European art form where anybody but Western Europeans are encouraged to make it. That makes as much sense as promoting Norwegians as sumu wrestlers in Japan.
But only people who watch a lot of movies from different decades and can see the changes will understand.
I pity those who only watch modern Wall Street movies and think agitprop is sincere art.