I don't have a discerning eye for cinematic quality. At least I don't think I do. Or is it that critics are pompous blowbags who give a movie four stars simply because the movie would be unintelligible and obtuse to the common moviegoer? I don't know anymore.
I do know that last night I watched "Walkabout." A 1971 movie which received rave reviews from such as the New Yorker, Time Magazine, and the like. In fact, a five-star review came from local movie reviewer (San Diego Reader), Duncan Shephard, a man widely reviled here in SD for being a pompous blowbag. Duncan rarely gives rave reviews to ANYTHING (example: for "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon," he had this to say: "The talky script, the uninflected unpunctuated narrative line -- a bore. And although Ride with the Devil may have proven that Lee can handle action, it did not prove he could make something credible and compelling of fight scenes in which the combatants go at it like Peter Pan. Nor does this one prove it. We might have hoped that the act of hommage, the ancient milieu, and the self-conscious mythicality would render the action more acceptable, more "aesthetic, " than that of a John Woo burlesque.") Dang! I thought that was a good movie. Apparently, I lack the discerning eye (and the ability to use words like "milieu" conversationally).
Back to Walkabout. In their reviews, critics were bandying about such phrases as "stunningly eerie and beautifully alluring," "heartfelt directorial passion," and "hauntingly spectacular." In fact, Duncan Shephard (the man who hates everything) liked it enough to say, "Edward Bond's screenplay -- two school children, accustomed to crisp uniforms and transistor radios and such things, find themselves marooned in the Australian outback -- possibly is more complex in its ideas about a cultural misalliance than is readily apparent. No matter. Nicolas Roeg's bright, clear, airy images create a wonderland of surreal encounters, altered perspectives, magnifications and diminutions."
What this means, is that there were a lot of jerky camera movements, strange angles, obvious juxtapositions (flash to a kangaroo beaten to death in the Outback, then to a butcher shop where a man prepares meat for his customers), lots of unanswered questions, and hard-to-understand dialogue. What does this signify? I think the movie must have had a lot to say about the conflict between an urban lifestyle and a natural one, but it was so overtly obvious that it seemed elementary. And I should have appreciated the angle, the jerks, the juxtaposing, because it enhanced the theme. But I didn't.
But I did like "The Others." And, Duncan kinda liked it too (3 stars)...so maybe I'm getting there.