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> Why, my Chinese students asked, will we read this? Because you need to prepare for American university classes, I replied. But more importantly: because this

> Why, my Chinese students asked, will we read this? Because you need to prepare for American university classes, I replied. But more importantly: because this book might just change your life! I said this without apology or awkwardness. I believed it! Ultimately, if a great work of history and literature does not have the potential to change a student’s life, to shape their character or transform their worldview, there is no point in teaching it! Love the boldness and clarity here. Whenever a classic movie is showing in the theaters that my wife has not seen, I tell her "we gotta watch this." It's not that I even enjoy or think of these movies as my favorites. It's that there is something in the movie that might stick with her and change her (and me).

jncfhnb 3y ago
Does this not apply to any film?
- lolinder 3y ago
  The day after watching The Last Jedi in theaters people asked me and my wife how we liked it. There was an awkward pause as both of us simultaneously realized that we barely remembered anything from the movie—the only response we could give was that it was forgettable. So, if "it's weird that I didn't remember it at all one day later" counts as something that sticks with me and changes me, then yeah, I guess so?
  - jncfhnb 3y ago
    Ok, but that’s just a bad film…
    - lolinder 3y ago
      Right, but your question was: > Does this not apply to any film? Most films are bad, so "any film" definitely includes bad films.
  - thfuran 3y ago
    The main thing I remember from the Iliad is how boring the listing of the ships was.
    - senderista 3y ago
      If you're trying to reconstruct the Mycenaean Greek world from very paltry contemporary sources it's fascinating.
    - lolinder 3y ago
      And meanwhile my wife and I have three Iliad translations on our shelf, which come down regularly as part of everyday conversation. If you last read it as a teenager it would be worth trying again—Emily Wilson's is very accessible!
      - jdshaffer 3y ago
        Thanks for the recommendation. I've been wanting to read the Iliad for awhile, but always wondered which translation might be approachable.
    - lupire 3y ago
      The Bible is the source materials for some of the greatest movies and shows in history, but also has some boring listings of people's ancestors.
      - petesergeant 3y ago
        wtf is a begat
      - anthk 3y ago
        The Bible itself it's a rehash on older folk tales and myths.
  - ryandrake 3y ago
    Nice observation. kind of off-topic for an article on literature, but I've been trying to put my finger on what's been so wrong with movies and TV lately, and I think you've nailed it: It's that there really aren't many that are memorable anymore. I've watched a bunch of new movies in the last few years, and more and more often, I sit there an hour later and think "I can't remember anything all that interesting happening in the movie." I mean, there was action and conflict, protagonists and antagonists, and I can tell you the movie's genre and describe a few of the characters. But the dialog was bland and mumbly, the cinematography was all gray and washed out, the setting was kind of standard for that sort of movie, there were no interesting character arcs or twists, and it all kind of played out exactly as you'd expect a movie like that to play out. Willing to consider that maybe it's just old age and cognitive decline, but I feel something is just off about a lot of recent movies.
    - jncfhnb 3y ago
      The mainstream trash of today is just as forgettable as the mainstream trash of yesterday.
    - yterdy 3y ago
      I dunno. Everything, Everywhere, All At Once was widely praised, and I saw it twice in theaters; and while I can remember a few key moments, I couldn't tell you the full plot from beginning to end. I still feel like I took something away from the experience of watching it (particularly the second time, with my mother). I'm beginning to think that there is an overemphasis on the breaking-down, atomizing, and overanalysis of fictional works. There's a place for that, of course, and such endeavors can bring you great insight. But maybe a work is an experience unto itself. You can take away something useful and meaningful from just being there and engaging with it as a viewer and reader as it streams through your sensory experience, and sitting with the emotions it brings afterwards. If that aspect of it didn't matter - wasn't of principal importance, even - wouldn't you be better off just saving time by reading Cliff's Notes/watching CinemaSins/a Youtube Essay, where the Important Parts are chopped up and fed to you in a most palatable manner?
      - vkou 3y ago
  - bnralt 3y ago
    Yeah, but people often don't remember or aren't moved by classics as well. The response is usually to lament their lack of attention span, or tell them that they didn't get it. It ends up becoming an example of The Emperor's New clothes, where it's been decided ahead of time that if a layman disagrees, it's merely a sign of ignorance.
    - boppo1 3y ago
      I think it's that people often aren't presented classics in the right context. I LOVED Moby Dick, but it's because I played Dishonored and wanted more of the whaling theme. But if I had to read it for school? I would have hated it.
      - lupire 3y ago
        A lot of very good books are ruined by throwing them at kids who aren't in the same mindset that the author is targeting. Meanwhile great literature for children gets ignored because adults don't respect it.
    - daseiner1 3y ago
      Just as common in my experience is the layman deciding ahead of time that some classic “isn’t for them”.
      - lupire 3y ago
        Everyone has their own blinders. And not every movie is for everyone. Shouldn't really expect that a movie (or a book, or a scroll) from 50 years ago or 5000 miles away is speaking to the modern local audience. The world is diverse and it changes.
      - bnralt 3y ago
        I actually think if someone has a deep understanding of a classic, they have a good idea who would enjoy it and who wouldn't. For just about everything else, we accept that different people have different tastes, and just because something can be great to one group of people doesn't mean that it's going to be great for another. I can guess which people I know would like a movie like Jaws, and which wouldn't. If you really understand a piece of media, understand what the author is trying to accomplish, what choices are being made narratively and stylistically, what narrative tradition the author is consciously or unconsciously following, etc., then you should have a pretty good idea of who this work would appeal to and who it wouldn't appeal to. If someone comes away from a classic with the mindset "everyone should like this if they're smart enough/presented with it in the right way", it suggests they have a very shallow understanding of the classic.
  - boppo1 3y ago
    When people ask me about The Rise of Skywalker I tell them it was fucking awesome. It had: - mecha-zombie palpatine - a daft-punk sniper lady - a crazy sith-goth-senate - lightsaber fight on some craggy rocks in the water - a big bad spaceship (I think) All you need to really appreciate the genius of the film is to day-drink 2/3 a bottle of single malt then nurse a double of black label during the movie to keep the buzz going.
    - andrekandre 3y ago
      > All you need to really appreciate the genius of the film is to day-drink 2/3 a bottle of single malt admittedly, this is how i got through the film as well...
  - mixmastamyk 3y ago
    Consider yourself lucky. The Star Wars movie for folks that hate it. When the preferred agenda finally landed on me I got angry.
    - vundercind 3y ago
      I was a giant Star Wars fan as a kid—watched them on vhs so many times I could re-play the trilogy in my head, every line, every cut, every musical cue; games, comics, way too many novels (seriously, in hindsight any is too many, even the “good” ones were bad—yes, even those). Toys. That crappy CCG. All of it. Lapsed after AOTC, but, still, quite a fan. I definitely don’t hate Star Wars. I’d rank The Last Jedi as the 3rd best Star Wars movie and my 4th favorite. I was very surprised at the Internet reaction to it—came out of the theater like “oh wow, that was kinda almost good, people will be so happy!” LOL.
      - hnbad 3y ago
        I think the mistake is that after the original trilogy most fans just seem to want "more of the same" because they don't see the original trilogy as three separate films but rather "a thing". Spoilers from here on out. The Last Jedi made perfect sense for what it was meant to be in the context of its trilogy. Yes, it had many faults but that is hardly a new thing for a Star Wars movie (except enough time has passed since the prequels that the kind of people complaining TLJ was "too woke" are more than likely to find reasons to argue that the prequels were actually great because they're comfortable handwaving their many weaknesses). Most fans expected "another Star Wars adventure" following the common formula seen in so much Star Wars media: a chosen one finding their hidden power and overcoming obstacles to come out on top at the end with maybe a hint at a greater evil to be defeated the next time around. But that's not the story of a second movie in a Star Wars trilogy, that's the story of any episode in an episodic TV show. Trilogies have narrative arcs. And the second movie in a Star Wars trilogy is where The Empire Strikes Back, the mentor dies to give way to the underprepared hero, evil triumphs and all hope seems lost. The movie did that. Luke Skywalker stalled the big bad long enough to give the unprepared Rey a chance to escape as he sacrificed himself the same way Obi Wan stalled Vader before allowing himself to be struck down. The rebels were decimated and forced to flee and regroup. All of this was very much beat-by-beat what The Empire Strikes Back did before. But it was also a new movie in a new trilogy and it had to carry the universe forward rather than merely rehash what had been done before. The first trilogy had given many the idea that Jedi powers were entirely tied to bloodline, like a royal claim to the throne. The second had expanded on this with literal blood tests for Jedi powers, showing the Jedi to take kids with the right blood results out of their families to raise them under their watch and then demonstrating the futility and pointlessness of this approach as Anakin single-handedly murders all the younglings and wipes out most of the Jedis. It also showed the Jedi system as being contradictory and too obsessed with regulations while being not only incapable to defend its own but also mostly disinterested in preventing the rise of the Empire by eschewing politics. The third trilogy allowed a fresh take on the Jedis: Luke's attempt to recreate the system that had allowed his father to become Darth Vader failed again by bringing forth Kylo Ren, his own fear of failure ruining any chance to save Kylo Ren from turning to the Dark Side. Meanwhile Rey, like Anakin a complete nobody with no noteworthy lineage, turned out to be uniquely talented with the force, punching above her weight even when confronted with the "classically trained" (but lacking serious guidance now completely undisciplined) Kylo Ren at least long enough to survive the outmatched encounter in the first movie. The second movie of the new trilogy did what had to be done: Luke realizes the folly of trying to adhere strictly to the sacred texts and destroys them. Yes, this was not strictly necessary but the act was primarily symbolic as we hadn't directly seen much of them before: as Luke had to learn and Yoda tried to teach him before, being a Jedi was not about learning from books and only doing the right thing but about failure and confronting your fears and weaknesses not to simply defeat them but to learn from them. This is why Anakin fell for the dark side and why Luke failed to save Kylo Ren: rather than learn to acknowledge his fear and to see failure as an opportunity for growth, the fear had corrupted them. This is also why the ending scene with random kids using the force mattered: yes, it was very much on the nose but the point was that the force does not spring from the Jedi's sacred texts, the force comes from within and becoming a Jedi means growing as a person, not just getting better at using the force. But that would have meant allowing Star Wars to evolve and that's not what many fans wanted, especially not when they were so deeply afraid of "politics" entering their allegory for a communist rebellion defeating the overwhelming American empire - err, sorry, I meant very serious apolitical sci-fi franchise. After all, they were already being forced into uncomfortable conversations about rooting for the genocidal ethnostate (not an ethnostate! they stopped using clones some time in the original trilogy but also it's woke identity politics that the storm trooper defector had to be played by a Black guy) wearing the sci-fi equivalent of Waffen-SS uniforms (there we go again calling everyone you don't like a nazi). If you paid attention, the original trilogy was always more about the triumph of compassion over brute force and of friendship overcoming what a lone individual can not. Luke being potentially the most powerful force user would have meant nothing if he wouldn't have had Uncle Ben and Yoda helping him master his potential, his friends give him the emotional strength to continue and the rebels (and Ewoks) give him the opportunity to challenge Vader - and then Anakin's suffocated love for his own child winning against the Emperor's conditioning and allowing him to save Luke and defeat the Emperor. And then Skywalker came out and threw all of that away in order to give us more slop and even bring back the Emperor so we could have a big fight scene with Kylo Ren randomly deciding to switch sides. Even if you disliked TLJ for the blue-haired girlboss blueballing our fighter hero or the Asian chick getting too much screentime or Luke being a pacifist or the gambling planet being a socialist soapbox or whatever complaint about politics you want to level at it, I challenge you to defend Rise of the Skywalker as a dignified Star Wars sequel rather than a hurriedly strewn together fan service shlock fest that completely flies in the face of both the trilogy and the larger narrative and thematic arcs altogether. Sorry for ranting. I'll now step off my soap box again.
  - sdwr 3y ago
    I liked the underground hall of mirrors, and kylo ren struggling to live up to darth vader's legacy.
- mensetmanusman 3y ago
  yes, but the likelihood of it being life changing increases as you watch older movies that have been filtered by time over many suggestions by word-of-mouth.
  - jncfhnb 3y ago
    I mean, not if you actually try to watch good films.
- Meerax 3y ago
  Any movie (or generally any artistic creation) can change the audience. But Snakes on a Plane might not hit the same as say The Wages of Fear. Wikis for those not familiar https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wages_of_Fear https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wages_of_Fear https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snakes_on_a_Plane https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snakes_on_a_Plane
  - pstuart 3y ago
    Wages of Fear now added to my "one of these days" list. Thank you!
    - wfleming 3y ago
      Sorcerer (1977) directed by William Friedkin (known for The Exorcist and The French Connection) is adapted from the same novel and is also great.
      - genghisjahn 3y ago
        I saw Sorcerer on the big screen a month ago in Philly. Amazing. Made me wonder what I’ve been watching for the last 20 years.
      - engineer_22 3y ago
        The Exorcist is the worst film I have ever seen, bar none. I was not surprised to find out it was hopelessly behind schedule and over budget. I was surprised to learn it was (still is) incredibly popular.
    - gumby 3y ago
      In general you're better off reading the book when the film is just an adaptation, as the book can give more context, inner dialogue etc than a film can, simply due to the medium. There are of course exceptions. Famously, Palahniuk has said the Fight Club film captured his intent better than his novel did. I also think film of The English Patient, which covers only a tiny section of what I consider a forgettable novel, is quite good, but even if you disagree I think almost anyone would say the film is better. And of course plenty of films aren't novel adaptations. Regardless, if you're looking for a "story that could change my life" you're likely to get much more from the text than the adaptation. The strengths and weaknesses of the two media are just too different.
- coldtea 3y ago
  No. It doesn't apply "equally" to the Ant-Man 3 and Citizen Kane.
  - jncfhnb 3y ago
    Sure. But the reason it doesn’t apply “equally” is not because citizen Kane is a classic, but because ant man 3 is mainstream blockbuster trash. People who frame marvel as the height of films today are just so… intellectually lazy. I’ve shown quite a few people citizen Kane and, aside from a musing discomfort at the parallels of post modern trump like media manipulation (FRAUD), it really doesn’t resonate with people nearly as much as, say, Parasite, despite them probably being culturally closer to Kane. Tl;dr if you’re going to show someone a “life changing film” pick something new that is similarly ambitious. Classics require too much effort to enjoy. It often doesn’t work.
    - allturtles 3y ago
      Well I think citizen kane is powerful and parasite is terrible. So what have we proved? Taste is indisputable, I guess.
      - jncfhnb 3y ago
        If taste is indisputable then appealing to classics as a must watch cohort makes even less sense
        allturtles 3y ago
        I was responding to your tl;dr not the GPs point. I think people who love Citizen Kane should encourage other people to try it, and people who love Parasite should encourage other people to try it, and we shouldn't make broad pre-judgements like "because you are younger than X years you won't like this movie that's more than Y years old." Obviously if we know someone else's particular taste we might be able to guess that they will strongly like or dislike a particular movie (e.g. my mom dislikes any violence, she would hate Parasite).
- karaterobot 3y ago
  It does in theory, but passing through many layers of curation and standing up to the tests of time increases the likelihood of classics being more successful compared to a randomly sampled movie. Not that wild of an idea.
  - makeitdouble 3y ago
    On the other side, a movie that never got struck down at any point in history won't be dramatically subversive nor give something you wouldn't have got from any of the thousands of area optimized mixed-up versions that emerged from the classics. As a modern viewer you won't get much more from Romeo and Juliet than from the Titanic. In that respect, randomly sampling movies is underrated and should be the go to if you're trying to change your life.
    - defrost 3y ago
      IIRC Titanic doesn't open with a joke about raping virgins.
    - Al-Khwarizmi 3y ago
      Titanic isn't just any random 1997 movie... it may well be considered a classic some decades from now.
- ZoomZoomZoom 3y ago
  Good news, postmodernism is overcome, you don't have to ask questions like this anymore!
  - actionfromafar 3y ago
    That's a very postmodern take.
- Exoristos 3y ago
  Of course not.
genman 3y ago
I completely get your point. Still I would advise to be careful. Movies don't follow the same scrutiny than say, academic papers. Deliberate inaccuracies are common. Obviously, of course. Why I'm saying this then? First it can of course create a false understanding of the past events (if of course the movie was set into some historical context). This by itself might be not dangerous, but it may lead to drawing completely wrong conclusions. What requires even more care is a deliberate psychological manipulations by the director to bypass critical rational thinking. As it is with every content, I ask three most important questions: what? who? why? What is exactly showed to me? Who is showing it to me? Why is it showed to me?

jncfhnb 3y ago

Does this not apply to any film?

lolinder 3y ago
The day after watching The Last Jedi in theaters people asked me and my wife how we liked it. There was an awkward pause as both of us simultaneously realized that we barely remembered anything from the movie—the only response we could give was that it was forgettable. So, if "it's weird that I didn't remember it at all one day later" counts as something that sticks with me and changes me, then yeah, I guess so?
- jncfhnb 3y ago
  Ok, but that’s just a bad film…
  - lolinder 3y ago
    Right, but your question was: > Does this not apply to any film? Most films are bad, so "any film" definitely includes bad films.
- thfuran 3y ago
  The main thing I remember from the Iliad is how boring the listing of the ships was.
  - senderista 3y ago
    If you're trying to reconstruct the Mycenaean Greek world from very paltry contemporary sources it's fascinating.
  - lolinder 3y ago
    And meanwhile my wife and I have three Iliad translations on our shelf, which come down regularly as part of everyday conversation. If you last read it as a teenager it would be worth trying again—Emily Wilson's is very accessible!
    - jdshaffer 3y ago
      Thanks for the recommendation. I've been wanting to read the Iliad for awhile, but always wondered which translation might be approachable.
  - lupire 3y ago
    The Bible is the source materials for some of the greatest movies and shows in history, but also has some boring listings of people's ancestors.
    - petesergeant 3y ago
      wtf is a begat
    - anthk 3y ago
      The Bible itself it's a rehash on older folk tales and myths.
- ryandrake 3y ago
  Nice observation. kind of off-topic for an article on literature, but I've been trying to put my finger on what's been so wrong with movies and TV lately, and I think you've nailed it: It's that there really aren't many that are memorable anymore. I've watched a bunch of new movies in the last few years, and more and more often, I sit there an hour later and think "I can't remember anything all that interesting happening in the movie." I mean, there was action and conflict, protagonists and antagonists, and I can tell you the movie's genre and describe a few of the characters. But the dialog was bland and mumbly, the cinematography was all gray and washed out, the setting was kind of standard for that sort of movie, there were no interesting character arcs or twists, and it all kind of played out exactly as you'd expect a movie like that to play out. Willing to consider that maybe it's just old age and cognitive decline, but I feel something is just off about a lot of recent movies.
  - jncfhnb 3y ago
    The mainstream trash of today is just as forgettable as the mainstream trash of yesterday.
  - yterdy 3y ago
    I dunno. Everything, Everywhere, All At Once was widely praised, and I saw it twice in theaters; and while I can remember a few key moments, I couldn't tell you the full plot from beginning to end. I still feel like I took something away from the experience of watching it (particularly the second time, with my mother). I'm beginning to think that there is an overemphasis on the breaking-down, atomizing, and overanalysis of fictional works. There's a place for that, of course, and such endeavors can bring you great insight. But maybe a work is an experience unto itself. You can take away something useful and meaningful from just being there and engaging with it as a viewer and reader as it streams through your sensory experience, and sitting with the emotions it brings afterwards. If that aspect of it didn't matter - wasn't of principal importance, even - wouldn't you be better off just saving time by reading Cliff's Notes/watching CinemaSins/a Youtube Essay, where the Important Parts are chopped up and fed to you in a most palatable manner?
    - vkou 3y ago
- bnralt 3y ago
  Yeah, but people often don't remember or aren't moved by classics as well. The response is usually to lament their lack of attention span, or tell them that they didn't get it. It ends up becoming an example of The Emperor's New clothes, where it's been decided ahead of time that if a layman disagrees, it's merely a sign of ignorance.
  - boppo1 3y ago
    I think it's that people often aren't presented classics in the right context. I LOVED Moby Dick, but it's because I played Dishonored and wanted more of the whaling theme. But if I had to read it for school? I would have hated it.
    - lupire 3y ago
      A lot of very good books are ruined by throwing them at kids who aren't in the same mindset that the author is targeting. Meanwhile great literature for children gets ignored because adults don't respect it.
  - daseiner1 3y ago
    Just as common in my experience is the layman deciding ahead of time that some classic “isn’t for them”.
    - lupire 3y ago
      Everyone has their own blinders. And not every movie is for everyone. Shouldn't really expect that a movie (or a book, or a scroll) from 50 years ago or 5000 miles away is speaking to the modern local audience. The world is diverse and it changes.
    - bnralt 3y ago
      I actually think if someone has a deep understanding of a classic, they have a good idea who would enjoy it and who wouldn't. For just about everything else, we accept that different people have different tastes, and just because something can be great to one group of people doesn't mean that it's going to be great for another. I can guess which people I know would like a movie like Jaws, and which wouldn't. If you really understand a piece of media, understand what the author is trying to accomplish, what choices are being made narratively and stylistically, what narrative tradition the author is consciously or unconsciously following, etc., then you should have a pretty good idea of who this work would appeal to and who it wouldn't appeal to. If someone comes away from a classic with the mindset "everyone should like this if they're smart enough/presented with it in the right way", it suggests they have a very shallow understanding of the classic.
- boppo1 3y ago
  When people ask me about The Rise of Skywalker I tell them it was fucking awesome. It had: - mecha-zombie palpatine - a daft-punk sniper lady - a crazy sith-goth-senate - lightsaber fight on some craggy rocks in the water - a big bad spaceship (I think) All you need to really appreciate the genius of the film is to day-drink 2/3 a bottle of single malt then nurse a double of black label during the movie to keep the buzz going.
  - andrekandre 3y ago
    > All you need to really appreciate the genius of the film is to day-drink 2/3 a bottle of single malt admittedly, this is how i got through the film as well...
- mixmastamyk 3y ago
  Consider yourself lucky. The Star Wars movie for folks that hate it. When the preferred agenda finally landed on me I got angry.
  - vundercind 3y ago
    I was a giant Star Wars fan as a kid—watched them on vhs so many times I could re-play the trilogy in my head, every line, every cut, every musical cue; games, comics, way too many novels (seriously, in hindsight any is too many, even the “good” ones were bad—yes, even those). Toys. That crappy CCG. All of it. Lapsed after AOTC, but, still, quite a fan. I definitely don’t hate Star Wars. I’d rank The Last Jedi as the 3rd best Star Wars movie and my 4th favorite. I was very surprised at the Internet reaction to it—came out of the theater like “oh wow, that was kinda almost good, people will be so happy!” LOL.
    - hnbad 3y ago
      I think the mistake is that after the original trilogy most fans just seem to want "more of the same" because they don't see the original trilogy as three separate films but rather "a thing". Spoilers from here on out. The Last Jedi made perfect sense for what it was meant to be in the context of its trilogy. Yes, it had many faults but that is hardly a new thing for a Star Wars movie (except enough time has passed since the prequels that the kind of people complaining TLJ was "too woke" are more than likely to find reasons to argue that the prequels were actually great because they're comfortable handwaving their many weaknesses). Most fans expected "another Star Wars adventure" following the common formula seen in so much Star Wars media: a chosen one finding their hidden power and overcoming obstacles to come out on top at the end with maybe a hint at a greater evil to be defeated the next time around. But that's not the story of a second movie in a Star Wars trilogy, that's the story of any episode in an episodic TV show. Trilogies have narrative arcs. And the second movie in a Star Wars trilogy is where The Empire Strikes Back, the mentor dies to give way to the underprepared hero, evil triumphs and all hope seems lost. The movie did that. Luke Skywalker stalled the big bad long enough to give the unprepared Rey a chance to escape as he sacrificed himself the same way Obi Wan stalled Vader before allowing himself to be struck down. The rebels were decimated and forced to flee and regroup. All of this was very much beat-by-beat what The Empire Strikes Back did before. But it was also a new movie in a new trilogy and it had to carry the universe forward rather than merely rehash what had been done before. The first trilogy had given many the idea that Jedi powers were entirely tied to bloodline, like a royal claim to the throne. The second had expanded on this with literal blood tests for Jedi powers, showing the Jedi to take kids with the right blood results out of their families to raise them under their watch and then demonstrating the futility and pointlessness of this approach as Anakin single-handedly murders all the younglings and wipes out most of the Jedis. It also showed the Jedi system as being contradictory and too obsessed with regulations while being not only incapable to defend its own but also mostly disinterested in preventing the rise of the Empire by eschewing politics. The third trilogy allowed a fresh take on the Jedis: Luke's attempt to recreate the system that had allowed his father to become Darth Vader failed again by bringing forth Kylo Ren, his own fear of failure ruining any chance to save Kylo Ren from turning to the Dark Side. Meanwhile Rey, like Anakin a complete nobody with no noteworthy lineage, turned out to be uniquely talented with the force, punching above her weight even when confronted with the "classically trained" (but lacking serious guidance now completely undisciplined) Kylo Ren at least long enough to survive the outmatched encounter in the first movie. The second movie of the new trilogy did what had to be done: Luke realizes the folly of trying to adhere strictly to the sacred texts and destroys them. Yes, this was not strictly necessary but the act was primarily symbolic as we hadn't directly seen much of them before: as Luke had to learn and Yoda tried to teach him before, being a Jedi was not about learning from books and only doing the right thing but about failure and confronting your fears and weaknesses not to simply defeat them but to learn from them. This is why Anakin fell for the dark side and why Luke failed to save Kylo Ren: rather than learn to acknowledge his fear and to see failure as an opportunity for growth, the fear had corrupted them. This is also why the ending scene with random kids using the force mattered: yes, it was very much on the nose but the point was that the force does not spring from the Jedi's sacred texts, the force comes from within and becoming a Jedi means growing as a person, not just getting better at using the force. But that would have meant allowing Star Wars to evolve and that's not what many fans wanted, especially not when they were so deeply afraid of "politics" entering their allegory for a communist rebellion defeating the overwhelming American empire - err, sorry, I meant very serious apolitical sci-fi franchise. After all, they were already being forced into uncomfortable conversations about rooting for the genocidal ethnostate (not an ethnostate! they stopped using clones some time in the original trilogy but also it's woke identity politics that the storm trooper defector had to be played by a Black guy) wearing the sci-fi equivalent of Waffen-SS uniforms (there we go again calling everyone you don't like a nazi). If you paid attention, the original trilogy was always more about the triumph of compassion over brute force and of friendship overcoming what a lone individual can not. Luke being potentially the most powerful force user would have meant nothing if he wouldn't have had Uncle Ben and Yoda helping him master his potential, his friends give him the emotional strength to continue and the rebels (and Ewoks) give him the opportunity to challenge Vader - and then Anakin's suffocated love for his own child winning against the Emperor's conditioning and allowing him to save Luke and defeat the Emperor. And then Skywalker came out and threw all of that away in order to give us more slop and even bring back the Emperor so we could have a big fight scene with Kylo Ren randomly deciding to switch sides. Even if you disliked TLJ for the blue-haired girlboss blueballing our fighter hero or the Asian chick getting too much screentime or Luke being a pacifist or the gambling planet being a socialist soapbox or whatever complaint about politics you want to level at it, I challenge you to defend Rise of the Skywalker as a dignified Star Wars sequel rather than a hurriedly strewn together fan service shlock fest that completely flies in the face of both the trilogy and the larger narrative and thematic arcs altogether. Sorry for ranting. I'll now step off my soap box again.
- sdwr 3y ago
  I liked the underground hall of mirrors, and kylo ren struggling to live up to darth vader's legacy.
mensetmanusman 3y ago
yes, but the likelihood of it being life changing increases as you watch older movies that have been filtered by time over many suggestions by word-of-mouth.
- jncfhnb 3y ago
  I mean, not if you actually try to watch good films.
Meerax 3y ago
Any movie (or generally any artistic creation) can change the audience. But Snakes on a Plane might not hit the same as say The Wages of Fear. Wikis for those not familiar https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wages_of_Fear https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wages_of_Fear https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snakes_on_a_Plane https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snakes_on_a_Plane
- pstuart 3y ago
  Wages of Fear now added to my "one of these days" list. Thank you!
  - wfleming 3y ago
    Sorcerer (1977) directed by William Friedkin (known for The Exorcist and The French Connection) is adapted from the same novel and is also great.
    - genghisjahn 3y ago
      I saw Sorcerer on the big screen a month ago in Philly. Amazing. Made me wonder what I’ve been watching for the last 20 years.
    - engineer_22 3y ago
      The Exorcist is the worst film I have ever seen, bar none. I was not surprised to find out it was hopelessly behind schedule and over budget. I was surprised to learn it was (still is) incredibly popular.
  - gumby 3y ago
    In general you're better off reading the book when the film is just an adaptation, as the book can give more context, inner dialogue etc than a film can, simply due to the medium. There are of course exceptions. Famously, Palahniuk has said the Fight Club film captured his intent better than his novel did. I also think film of The English Patient, which covers only a tiny section of what I consider a forgettable novel, is quite good, but even if you disagree I think almost anyone would say the film is better. And of course plenty of films aren't novel adaptations. Regardless, if you're looking for a "story that could change my life" you're likely to get much more from the text than the adaptation. The strengths and weaknesses of the two media are just too different.
coldtea 3y ago
No. It doesn't apply "equally" to the Ant-Man 3 and Citizen Kane.
- jncfhnb 3y ago
  Sure. But the reason it doesn’t apply “equally” is not because citizen Kane is a classic, but because ant man 3 is mainstream blockbuster trash. People who frame marvel as the height of films today are just so… intellectually lazy. I’ve shown quite a few people citizen Kane and, aside from a musing discomfort at the parallels of post modern trump like media manipulation (FRAUD), it really doesn’t resonate with people nearly as much as, say, Parasite, despite them probably being culturally closer to Kane. Tl;dr if you’re going to show someone a “life changing film” pick something new that is similarly ambitious. Classics require too much effort to enjoy. It often doesn’t work.
  - allturtles 3y ago
    Well I think citizen kane is powerful and parasite is terrible. So what have we proved? Taste is indisputable, I guess.
    - jncfhnb 3y ago
      If taste is indisputable then appealing to classics as a must watch cohort makes even less sense
      - allturtles 3y ago
        I was responding to your tl;dr not the GPs point. I think people who love Citizen Kane should encourage other people to try it, and people who love Parasite should encourage other people to try it, and we shouldn't make broad pre-judgements like "because you are younger than X years you won't like this movie that's more than Y years old." Obviously if we know someone else's particular taste we might be able to guess that they will strongly like or dislike a particular movie (e.g. my mom dislikes any violence, she would hate Parasite).
karaterobot 3y ago
It does in theory, but passing through many layers of curation and standing up to the tests of time increases the likelihood of classics being more successful compared to a randomly sampled movie. Not that wild of an idea.
- makeitdouble 3y ago
  On the other side, a movie that never got struck down at any point in history won't be dramatically subversive nor give something you wouldn't have got from any of the thousands of area optimized mixed-up versions that emerged from the classics. As a modern viewer you won't get much more from Romeo and Juliet than from the Titanic. In that respect, randomly sampling movies is underrated and should be the go to if you're trying to change your life.
  - defrost 3y ago
    IIRC Titanic doesn't open with a joke about raping virgins.
  - Al-Khwarizmi 3y ago
    Titanic isn't just any random 1997 movie... it may well be considered a classic some decades from now.
ZoomZoomZoom 3y ago
Good news, postmodernism is overcome, you don't have to ask questions like this anymore!
- actionfromafar 3y ago
  That's a very postmodern take.
Exoristos 3y ago
Of course not.

genman 3y ago

I completely get your point. Still I would advise to be careful. Movies don't follow the same scrutiny than say, academic papers. Deliberate inaccuracies are common. Obviously, of course. Why I'm saying this then? First it can of course create a false understanding of the past events (if of course the movie was set into some historical context). This by itself might be not dangerous, but it may lead to drawing completely wrong conclusions. What requires even more care is a deliberate psychological manipulations by the director to bypass critical rational thinking. As it is with every content, I ask three most important questions: what? who? why? What is exactly showed to me? Who is showing it to me? Why is it showed to me?