Sunday, November 11, 2007

New Great Era?

Are we experiencing the beginning of a new great era of American movies? Just this fall, we're looking at the Assassination of Jesse James (which I haven't seen yet, but hear is amazing), Into the Wild, Michael Clayton, No Country for Old Men, There Will Be Blood, American Gangster, Darjeeling Limited...

...combined, this is a pretty fine list of films to be discussing. Maybe there isn't a stand out movie like a Chinatown, Godfather 1 or 2, Network, Badlands, Jaws, McCabe, Taxi Driver, or Star Wars...but great movies, I think, come out of a community attitude towards movies where filmmakers are encouraged and feel competition with one another to top in artistic quality (not just box office) and studios/executives provide the right kind of environment for these kind of movies to be made.

Economic uncertainty contributed to the 70s era of American filmmaking. Maybe this writer's strike and issues related to new media can spawn an interesting period of filmmaking.

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