Films You SHOULD Like

Recently, I saw Paul Thomas Anderson’s new film The Master. I thought it was alright, nothing as great as a lot of the glowing reviews have suggested. It’s certainly not a bad film; it just didn’t set my world alight. Yet, PTA is a filmmaker whose films always leave me with this nagging feeling; a feeling that I’m somehow wrong for not loving his films. That for whatever reason, I should like them. For no other reason than this director commands my respect.

There are a few other filmmakers that give me this feeling, the most prominent among them being the Coen Brothers. I have seen most of their film output and can honestly say I wouldn’t rate any of them with anything more than an average score. I really do not understand the love for The Big Lebowski. Aside from a few weird characters and an admittedly endlessly quotable script, I don’t rate it as a cult classic or even that good of a movie.

Not me.

Now I don’t consider myself a cineaste at all. I watch, like and review a lot of films, but I’m not steeped in film knowledge, so maybe there’s something that I’m missing with these directors and their films. I get that Lebowski is a pastiche to the noir films of old, but just because there are homages to that genre while the director has also put his own spin on it, doesn’t make it a good film. Can someone tell me why they think it’s a good film? I’m actually asking here.

Closer to me.

Are the back catalogues of these directors too niche? Or at least too niche for my tastes? Other directors that can be considered artistes would be Fincher and Nolan. I love nearly all of their films, but when you look at them all you realise they for all their attempts to be art, they’re still very commercial at heart, and in particular Nolan’s Bat Trilogy, they’re downright blockbusters. Admittedly, not blockbusters in the Transformers mould, but blockbusters nonetheless. Is it this that I miss from the films of PTA and the Coen’s? A commercial bent. Perhaps it is, as my favourite Coen Brothers film is Intolerable Cruelty, easily the most accessible of their filmography.

So, is it my fault? Am I wrong? I understand that film is a subjective medium and all, but general consensus is that I am. Completely 100% wrong.

Then again, I love Darren Aronofsky. So maybe I’m just awkward.