Screw It, Let's Go See "Smokin' Aces"

We're giving this another go. I'm gonna try to post twice a week from here on out, on Sunday/Monday and on Wednesday/Thursday, depending on how my commitments stack up. Here endeth the announcement.

So - I watched the fan-TAS-tically critically acclaimed The Death of Mr. Lazarescu last night, and, when taken together with A.O. Scott's article about independent film distribution in last Sunday's Times, it made me scratch my head a little. For the record, I think the film is brilliant, and infuriating, and an astonishing work of scathing cynicism in the face of dire conditions. It's a gem, and if you can face the fact that you'll essentially be watching a 2 1/2 hour documentary-style movie about the Romanian health-care system, it's incredibly rewarding.

But Scott - whose criticism I deeply admire - bemoans the fact that The Death of Mr. Lazarescu made only $80,000 at the box office; that it got no wide-spread art-house release; and that, despite its placement on so many top-ten and awards lists and a shower of critical acclaim, it failed to attract even a small following with American audiences. I can't imagine why Scott thinks it could be any different. During the most vibrant periods of the American art house, the films that dominated the theaters were innovative and shockingly outside of the mainstream, for sure - but they were also viscerally exciting, or stunningly beautiful, or announced their themes in no uncertain terms.

Scott cites La Strada and Jules and Jim as examples of works that made "moviegoing a serious American cultural pursuit." He's got to see a difference, though, between these two decidedly unsubtle, powerfully visual and dramatic movies and the anti-aesthetic concern for minutiae that characterizes Mr. Lazarescu. I know that it's disheartening to honestly believe a movie is among the best films of the year, and then to see it fail to find an audience. I find it disingenuous, though, to scold your readers for not seeing it when there has never been a time when this sort of work has found a sizeable audience.

This isn't to rag on Scott's supposition that there's something wrong with film distribution in America; and he's right that art-houses seem to be filling up with what's really modestly budgeted Hollywood fare rather than true independent cinema. The films that were - in my view - the truly great American independent films of the last two years, Half Nelson and Me and You and Everyone We Know, made $2.7 million and $3.9 million respectively at the box office. Me and You played in 160 theaters at most; Half Nelson ended up in a measly 106. In their own way, each of these movies gave us something almost wholly new, while still being funny, accessible, and relevant works of art. So it seems somewhat baroque to me to ask why we ignore the avant-garde cinematic voices in other countries when the forward-looking films in our own country receive such a tiny piece of the pie to begin with.