I want to open up a debate today regarding who is today’s most significant director. Obviously the answer is open ended and very opinion based, ranging from choosing your favorite director based on a favorite movie vs. his style. But I want to narrow it down by choosing a director who’s currently still making the best movies. I do appreciate out of the box answers like, Stanley Kubrick and his influence on the style and heavy music moments in Nicholas Winding Refn, and I questions just how movie savvy you are if you can make that connection. I am not a film major, so the lines aren’t as clear as some of you who are, but that doesn’t mean I can’t have an opinion, so I challenge those who are intimidated by these notions to take a chance and stand by your choice.
In my honest opinion, I think today’s most consistently good director is without a doubt Christopher Nolan. He’s distinguished himself over and over again with his blockbuster movies that are more than just blind action movies. I understand that some directors after a big action movie with a production company breathing down their necks would want to take a break and do an artsy and less demanding film, but Christopher Nolan’s break from The Dark Knight was Inception and we both know how amazing that was. His track record is near flawlesss with Memento and Insomnia as his relatively underappreciated beginnings [neither films got as much attention as they did until Nolan did The Dark Knight]. And he continued to build upon them with the genius of The Prestige.
I also respect him as a private man, who values the magical sense of his movies. Seriously, no one knew what the hell Inception was about until they sat down at a movie theater and watched Leo break down dream hunting to them. Now-a-days, he’s become a household name and his name attached to anything warrants the public to go see what he’s up to. When he wraps up his Batman trilogy, the man will be unrestrained again to do what he likes, and I’ll sure as hell be lining up at the theaters to shell out for whatever he produces. And I think that mentality is what makes me believe he’s the most significant director out there today, a man who, no matter what the material is about, we line up for because of his name attached to a film.
And now I truly want your opinion. I know I haven’t really been making a community of Banana Feed recently, leaving comments unreplied or unthanked, and I’m honestly trying to fix that. These discussion threads are meant to spark debate that I would gladly have with any of you. Just be sure to observe common courtesy to myself and others on this site.
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My Favorite Comedy and Why: Tropic Thunder
Posted in Articles, Movies, tagged Ben Stiller, Commentary, Director, Jack Black, Movies, Robert Downey Jr, Tropic Thunder, War on November 10, 2011| 3 Comments »
When people ask me what my favorite movie of all time is, I give them a look of stupidity and pretension and then go into an arrogant monologue saying that I’ve seen so many movies that you’d have to divide them up into genres to truly tell you what my favorite from each one. It’s usually at that point where they’re so taken back by my blind arrogance that they default to the only genre they can relate to: comedy.
Lol, jk, that actually doesn’t happen as much as I let on, but what I mean to aim at is when people ask me what my favorite comedy is and more than often I’ll always say Tropic Thunder. Tropic Thunder delivers itself as a comedy in two different ways, based on its audience. To the eyes of a culturally ignorant, Tropic Thunder is decent comedy with its most memorable moment is Jack Black saying he’ll suck Brandon T. Jackson’s dic* if he cuts him down from the tree. Hardee-f*cking-Har. To the eyes of those who have a decent understanding of the Hollywood industry, Tropic Thunder is a pinata full of scathing satire, irreplaceable performances, and deep, well-thoughtout jokes. After the jump lies a breakdown of how this movie literally splits my sides every time I watch it and how moments that might have seemed confusing and irrelevant are actually this movie’s brightest gems.
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