Comment by bshimmin | Hacker News Reader

Comment by bshimmin | Hacker News Reader

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This is an interesting but problematic idea.

Firstly, I'm not certain of how the economics would play out: the "marvel or transformers nonsense" (and boy is it nonsense) tends to cost a lot of money to make, because they feature famous actors and they're end-to-end expensive CGI; arthouse films tend to be a lot cheaper because they feature less CGI, and sometimes the actors involved will work for less money because the films are more "worthy", or they like the director. More people watch the superhero drivel than the arthouse films, for sure, so perhaps it would all balance out, but it's unclear.

Secondly, while I broadly love Terrence Malick, if I'd paid £20 for "Knight of Cups" (which was dire), I would have to think very, very hard about parting with another £20 for his next film unless the notices were very good. I think you'd end up with a minuscule audience if you started marking up arthouse films in this way.

Unrelatedly, I have to admit that "Mank" sounds really boring and I'm not eager to watch it, even though I have a Netflix subscription and I've enjoyed many of Fincher's previous films (hell, I even liked "Alien 3").

If you are a fan of Citizen Kane and the whole mythos around this movie, you might enjoy Mank. If not, you will probably find it quite boring and pointless.

Fincher is certainly no art house director. He makes big-budget movies with stars like Brad Pitt or Ben Affleck. He is kind of like Steven Spielberg - a director so talented in the craft he elevates rater middlebrow material to be uniquely enjoyable. Fincher just gets a bit more respect because he is "dark". But dark does not mean deep. For example Seven is really quite silly and contrived, but his excellence at directing makes us forget that.

> Fincher [..] is kind of like Steven Spielberg [..] just gets a bit more respect because he is "dark"

So he's a great director like Spielberg - but he's in a different genre and willing to tackle less family friendly subjects. Sorry was this meant to be a criticism?

They're both great. Get off your high horse. Great cinema is great cinema. If you can't appreciate them both, there's something wrong with your taste in movies. Sounds like you don't like them just because they're popular, which is lame.

Of course Fincher isn't "art house" - although Mank is moving in that direction. But he's certainly not a multiplex pleaser. There's a lot of different genres and a fan base for all of them. The challenge is finding a model that makes this work.

It's like we read different comments. goto11 called one an excellent director and the other talented. I get the impression they like both and that their comment wasn't...whatever you thought it was.

Hm. Maybe I imagined it but I got a definite negative undertone. Eg:

> dark does not mean deep

Well I thought The Social Network and Zodiac were thoughtful and at least somewhat deep. I guess this can just turn into a "deepness" competition but eh, I liked them.

Wasn't the Zodiac brutally simple, the typical Fincher-like precision, almost sterile presentation of the story, with almost perfect linearity? I mean, I love that movie, but I love it especially because it's not "deep". (It doesn't mean there are no interesting questions/plotlines, of course there is the whole who-was-really-the-killer question. Of course there's the whole personal drama of the main character.) But compared to Seven - I think - there's a lot less abstract/social commentary and symbolism. (Even though it's full of the killer's code symbols.)

I do like them both very much, and find both incredibly talented. Sorry if my comment came of as negative towards them. (But I also like Marvel movies, for what it's worth.) Just wanted to point out Fincher is not art cinema as the top comment suggested. (And Spielberg is not just family friendly subjects either.)

I don't know about "multiplex pleaser" - Gone Girl, Finchers previous movie, "topped the box office for two consecutive weekends" according to Wikipedia.

> Get off your high horse

> there's something wrong with your taste in movies

Ironically, your comment is the only condescending one in this thread. Thanks for throwing a minor fit over one person's shared opinion.

Just watched The Game last night. Very silly and contrived, but for my son... who’d not seen it before, it was riveting before the ending. He tried to make sense of it, and I assured him, aside from Easter eggs, trying to make the movie make sense would be folly. As an example of a film maker in command though, it’s a good example of the director playing the audience like a fiddle.

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