From a musical and visual and film perspective as far as what I've done personally, I think limitation is ESSENTIAL to good art, whether self imposed or otherwise. Not in avoiding the letter E when writing a novel or whatever but in keeping a sense of scope to things. It's easy to get carried away as a creator.
For me, some of the biggest disappointments in entertainment came from unfettered glorified "auteurs" given insufficient pushback. Aliens was an excellent film largely because of the friction behind the scenes, wheras Ridley Scott's Prometheus films were... not.
Gonna nitpick. Aliens was James Cameron. Alien was Ridley Scott. Behind Kubrick, he's probably my second most hated director behind Kubrick who still has great films (same with Kubrick to be clear, I just despise their approach). I love Alien, it's a top 5 movie of mine but Dan O'Bannon, Hr Giger, the actors etc. made it what it was. Ridley Scott directed but he it wasn't like His Vision. Blade Runner's best version is the theatrical release but you edit out the voiceovers. Deckard being maybe a recent himself distracts from the point of the film and the source material and everyone except involved except Ridley Scott agrees with me on this. Director cut of kingdom of heaven was dope but...it's one of those ones that I would have done more accurately and still had the same effect... the rest of his output is mid at best.
There are directors I hate a lot more than any of the above, most of them being :libertarian-alert: types that spent decades being creepy and being rich and famous for it, and even if I could separate art from artist (I generally don't), some directors are just bad to me, such as JJ "break all the borrowed toys and scribble his name on them with magic marker" Abrams.
As someone who has done some amateur directing and stuff, it's shitty technique as well. As far as like how shots are framed and stuff sometimes I'm generally a simple John Carpenter Boi who maybe like French new wave a bit too much and is maybe too in love with how a straight shot looks when you change it to a DIAGNONAL shot. But there's thst side and working with actors. For thst David Lynch is my guy. I'd love to come close in other aspects, but as far as respecting, collaborating and being on the same team as the actors he is surprisingly top tier despite the content of his films. He depicts some next level sexual violence and every woman who has worked those scenes has praised how he handled it and the environment of it and they came out feing proud as actors that they had a chance to do such vulnerable stuff in a fulfilling way. Even in a scene of one thing that I wouldn't wanna spoil to those who hadn't seen it he didn't want an actor who was a mother to do a second tske of pretending her kid died cause she went so hard to first time he didn't wanna make her do it again. Good dude who does way more fucked up shit than most directors but proves you can do these things well. Treat a production like a really huge band where you're keeping things in line but not really in charge and acknowledge everyone else involved is also an artist and might know better sometimes (not always, you still gotta direct, but being collaborative really helps stuff)
David Lynch plays with fire and his stuff is rather close to the precipice, but he seems to have some integrity as far as I can tell compared to the trust fund predators that coerced and creeped on Emilia Clarke (among others) and almost drove her out of acting entirely.
He is playing with fire, but like, actors are artists as well and according to every female actor that did anything duoer vulnerable or exploit (including literally mistreating on set for mullhulland drive) was pushed that far not because Lynch insisted but because he worked with the actors very closely on even scenes they weren't in and they at least knew what the scene was getting across and several actually have said it was very positive. There is a way to make weird and disturbing shit without harming people and Lynch is the guy to look to. Also you're the director, if you're abusing the actors you're not doing the job right
Edit: was the playing with fire a tein Peaks pun? If so good job. If not, eh. Still worked for me.
David Lynch is one of my favorite directors of all time. As far as I know he hasn't been a creep, sex pest, or actually abusive to those he worked with but I will be sad if I find out otherwise. He does heavy stuff but does it with grace and tact.
I thought you made it on purpose. And yeah, a big part of why he's my favorite director as someone who has directed stuff and also as an audience guy is that he did stuff like Twin Peaks , blue velvet and mullhulland drive and the wo.rn who acted out some really harsh stuff ended out taking away a positive experience from it and feeling empowered. He let them sort or lead those scenes and as I've said, they actors and having the chance to explore those areas of emotion or performance which can be triggering. From everything I've heard with all the really explicit stuff Lynch has done with women, he made sure they were not only okay with it but part of the creative end of it, saw the merit of it and were enthusiastic participants who either saw it as no biggie or a very comfortable environment to artistically express those dark things as an actor.
From a musical and visual and film perspective as far as what I've done personally, I think limitation is ESSENTIAL to good art, whether self imposed or otherwise. Not in avoiding the letter E when writing a novel or whatever but in keeping a sense of scope to things. It's easy to get carried away as a creator.
Agreed.
For me, some of the biggest disappointments in entertainment came from unfettered glorified "auteurs" given insufficient pushback. Aliens was an excellent film largely because of the friction behind the scenes, wheras Ridley Scott's Prometheus films were... not.
Gonna nitpick. Aliens was James Cameron. Alien was Ridley Scott. Behind Kubrick, he's probably my second most hated director behind Kubrick who still has great films (same with Kubrick to be clear, I just despise their approach). I love Alien, it's a top 5 movie of mine but Dan O'Bannon, Hr Giger, the actors etc. made it what it was. Ridley Scott directed but he it wasn't like His Vision. Blade Runner's best version is the theatrical release but you edit out the voiceovers. Deckard being maybe a recent himself distracts from the point of the film and the source material and everyone except involved except Ridley Scott agrees with me on this. Director cut of kingdom of heaven was dope but...it's one of those ones that I would have done more accurately and still had the same effect... the rest of his output is mid at best.
There are directors I hate a lot more than any of the above, most of them being :libertarian-alert: types that spent decades being creepy and being rich and famous for it, and even if I could separate art from artist (I generally don't), some directors are just bad to me, such as JJ "break all the borrowed toys and scribble his name on them with magic marker" Abrams.
As someone who has done some amateur directing and stuff, it's shitty technique as well. As far as like how shots are framed and stuff sometimes I'm generally a simple John Carpenter Boi who maybe like French new wave a bit too much and is maybe too in love with how a straight shot looks when you change it to a DIAGNONAL shot. But there's thst side and working with actors. For thst David Lynch is my guy. I'd love to come close in other aspects, but as far as respecting, collaborating and being on the same team as the actors he is surprisingly top tier despite the content of his films. He depicts some next level sexual violence and every woman who has worked those scenes has praised how he handled it and the environment of it and they came out feing proud as actors that they had a chance to do such vulnerable stuff in a fulfilling way. Even in a scene of one thing that I wouldn't wanna spoil to those who hadn't seen it he didn't want an actor who was a mother to do a second tske of pretending her kid died cause she went so hard to first time he didn't wanna make her do it again. Good dude who does way more fucked up shit than most directors but proves you can do these things well. Treat a production like a really huge band where you're keeping things in line but not really in charge and acknowledge everyone else involved is also an artist and might know better sometimes (not always, you still gotta direct, but being collaborative really helps stuff)
David Lynch plays with fire and his stuff is rather close to the precipice, but he seems to have some integrity as far as I can tell compared to the trust fund predators that coerced and creeped on Emilia Clarke (among others) and almost drove her out of acting entirely.
He is playing with fire, but like, actors are artists as well and according to every female actor that did anything duoer vulnerable or exploit (including literally mistreating on set for mullhulland drive) was pushed that far not because Lynch insisted but because he worked with the actors very closely on even scenes they weren't in and they at least knew what the scene was getting across and several actually have said it was very positive. There is a way to make weird and disturbing shit without harming people and Lynch is the guy to look to. Also you're the director, if you're abusing the actors you're not doing the job right
Edit: was the playing with fire a tein Peaks pun? If so good job. If not, eh. Still worked for me.
David Lynch is one of my favorite directors of all time. As far as I know he hasn't been a creep, sex pest, or actually abusive to those he worked with but I will be sad if I find out otherwise. He does heavy stuff but does it with grace and tact.
:side-eye-1: :side-eye-2:
I thought you made it on purpose. And yeah, a big part of why he's my favorite director as someone who has directed stuff and also as an audience guy is that he did stuff like Twin Peaks , blue velvet and mullhulland drive and the wo.rn who acted out some really harsh stuff ended out taking away a positive experience from it and feeling empowered. He let them sort or lead those scenes and as I've said, they actors and having the chance to explore those areas of emotion or performance which can be triggering. From everything I've heard with all the really explicit stuff Lynch has done with women, he made sure they were not only okay with it but part of the creative end of it, saw the merit of it and were enthusiastic participants who either saw it as no biggie or a very comfortable environment to artistically express those dark things as an actor.