Why do people always complain whenever a big, dumb action movie comes out? I mean yeah, they're stupid, but I honestly don't understand what the problem is. Usually when you see the trailer for these kinds of movies, you can pretty much tell what they're going to be like. They're going to be full of explosions, cliches, boobs, and not much else. They will also be AWESOME.
I mean, don't we sort of need movies like this? First of all, they fill a very important niche. Every now and then, you really do just feel like turning your brain off and watching something vapid and stupid. Is it artistic? No. Intellectual? Of course not. But it's fun. If watching a deep, thought-provoking film is reading a piece of classical literature, then watching a stupid action movie is reading the newspaper comics. And sometimes, that's perfectly fine.
More importantly, they also provide a fantastic contrast with movies that have complex storylines. If we don't have stupid stuff like this, there isn't anything to compare them with that makes them great. For someone to be on top, someone else has to be on the bottom.* This is sort of a nice variation of the "There has to be evil for there to be good" idea. This is more along the lines of "There has to be stupid, mindless crap for there to be philosophical pretentiousness".
*No. Get your head out of the gutter.
So pop exists so that we can scoff at it and listen to the Beatles contentedly?
ReplyDeleteNot quite. A stupid action movie is still fun to watch. Pop music is just bad. A better comparison would be stupid, mindless metal like Dragonforce. It's dumb, but it's entertaining.
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