4 ms·

There's a blithe decadence in insisting that the details of movie-making fantasy conform exactly to your expectations. It's also suspicious that the complaint i

There's a blithe decadence in insisting that the details of movie-making fantasy conform exactly to your expectations. It's also suspicious that the complaint is aimed at mainstream movies, rather than, for example, pornography for a male audience. Would the author want more realism in porn? Should there be more dates in porn? Awkward moments where the conquering male can't decide whether or not to pull his date's chair out for her? An inner monologue wherein he wonders if she's hot enough, chides himself for being so shallow, and then unconvincingly reassures himself that he's not that shallow and he still finds her attractive even though he's in the mood for larger breasts? Of course not, because porn is fantasy that has as a crucial element the affirmation of male power, validity, and competence. Those elements of "realism" would detract from the purpose of the medium. It's the same with movies. In the climactic scene where the protagonist is on the cusp of capturing the Macguffin, what the plot needs--and what needs therefore to be quickly, visually, and unambiguously communicated to the audience--is that the protagonist or the protagonist's allies have been granted access to the god-like computer system that unlocks the whosywhatsit. "ACCESS GRANTED" does this. Is it realistic? No. Does it matter? Nope! Like an exploding car or a space fighter that banks like an F-16, it communicates to the audience in a way that is immediately recognizable and plausible on a time-scale consistent with the pacing of the action. Complaining about the lack of realism of coding sequences in movies certainly does not identify you as a "nerd" or "smart person above pop culture." It emphatically identifies you as an unimaginative dork and a boring pedant.

icebraining 12y ago
(Not the author, obviously, these are my own opinions) Would the author want more realism in porn? Yes, please! Should there be more dates in porn? Awkward moments where the conquering male can't decide whether or not to pull his date's chair out for her? (...) You're confusing "realism" with "boring stuff nobody cares about". A biography is no less realist because it doesn't include the person going to the bathroom. In fact, I'd say the best porn out there is less shitty because it does away with some of the unrealism that permeates the industry: it allows the performers to acknowledge that they're doing a porn video instead of forcing them to act on a grotesque script written by the directors cousin, all the while sounding like morons because they're told to never shut up. it communicates to the audience in a way that is immediately recognizable and plausible on a time-scale consistent with the pacing of the action Good directors can do that without making its audience to be idiotic. By the way, I'm not saying realism is above everything; like in your space fighter example, I think disregarding realism to achieve a particular stylistic effect is perfectly valid. But it should be a deliberate and well reasoned choice, not something bred out of ignorance and negligence.
- quotient 12y ago
  The trouble is that the line between "realism" and "boring stuff nobody cares about" is a thin one that the film-maker has to tread carefully, and this is an exceedingly difficult task, as this line varies from person to person: it is highly subjective. Film is a mass medium, so it is difficult for the film-maker to 'get the balance right' for all (or even just the majority of) the viewers. Moreover, when you say that "the best porn out there" is characterized by a particular description, you have to remember that this is your own, highly nuanced, subjective view on this. There are other people who probably hold an opinion that is a direct inversion of yours.
vezzy-fnord 12y ago
What's more is that expecting realism from Hollywood productions is, quite aptly, unrealistic. Hollywood films aim at targeting large masses of people. As such, their medium is in creating exaggerated escapist fiction with intense SFX and formulaic plots that do not require thought to follow, but can instead be passively consumed. If you want realism, then start watching more art films and start supporting the independent film industry.
DavidAdams 12y ago
As the article explains, though, including some realism in the way a movie depicts computing achieves the very same goal as the noisy explosion in space or banking starfighter. If there's too much physics realism in a space movie, people will notice that it looks "fake" and their suspension of disbelief will be disrupted. Space movies have dogfights because war movies have dogfights, so people know what to expect, and the plot is advanced. Back in the 1960s when computers were unknown quantities, you could put whatever bullshit you wanted up on the screen and that was fine. But now that the majority of the movie-watching public has a pretty good idea of how computers work, having a "hacker" enter some kind of 3d virtual reality world to hack the NSA is perceived as ridiculous, even for Joe Sixpack, as if the movie depicted a scene in a McDonald's wherein the characters talked to a Maitre'd and ordered Steak Tartare and Chicken Tikka Masala. We all know enough about restaurants to know that's bullshit, even someone who's never eaten in a four star restaurant.
- brazzy 12y ago
  > Back in the 1960s when computers were unknown quantities, you could put whatever bullshit you wanted up on the screen and that was fine. Oh could you ever. Except back in the 60s, blinkenlights, tape reels and noisy dot matrix printers were more likely to be featured than screens. I distinctly remember a 60s (probably, can't remember the name) movie where the con man lead character gets himself hired as head of a bank's computer division despite having no technical expertise whatsoever, and one technician explains that the computer is totally secure and this is indicated by a specific red light - as long as that light is on, it's secure!
  - tmzt 12y ago
    Fast-forward to today when the red light has been replaced with a picture of a padlock.
- theothermkn 12y ago
  This is an easily-pierced trope of this kind of discussion. "But now that the majority of the movie-watching public has a pretty good idea of how computers work, having a "hacker" enter some kind of 3d virtual reality world to hack the NSA is perceived as ridiculous..." Are we in the future? Or, are we trying to destabilize the audience's expectation of what's possible? Or, are we trying to communicate to the audience that computing is so ubiquitous and so disposable that society has spent its resources on superfluous displays? Is the protagonist a fish-out-of-water invited into an enclave of super-advanced geniuses situated in otherwise present-day America? Narrative is craft, and it's subject to expedience. The question to answer, in any given instance, is not, "Is this use of technology realistic?," but, "How does this element of technological unrealism operate within the wider context of the (obviously unrealistic) fantasy world of the movie?" Anyone can come up with an instance of how this has failed in a movie, but the title of the article is "Coding the Movies: Don't Fake It." This person wants code to look real in movies, and that's a profoundly stupid generalization to insist on. It's worth noting, too, that the author's "blog post" is really an advertisement for his consulting service. In a Habermassian sense, we would be suspicious that this element of the Lifeworld, this Communicative Action, has been colonized by the System, namely his need to get work. Be sure to drink your Ovaltine.

icebraining 12y ago

(Not the author, obviously, these are my own opinions) Would the author want more realism in porn? Yes, please! Should there be more dates in porn? Awkward moments where the conquering male can't decide whether or not to pull his date's chair out for her? (...) You're confusing "realism" with "boring stuff nobody cares about". A biography is no less realist because it doesn't include the person going to the bathroom. In fact, I'd say the best porn out there is less shitty because it does away with some of the unrealism that permeates the industry: it allows the performers to acknowledge that they're doing a porn video instead of forcing them to act on a grotesque script written by the directors cousin, all the while sounding like morons because they're told to never shut up. it communicates to the audience in a way that is immediately recognizable and plausible on a time-scale consistent with the pacing of the action Good directors can do that without making its audience to be idiotic. By the way, I'm not saying realism is above everything; like in your space fighter example, I think disregarding realism to achieve a particular stylistic effect is perfectly valid. But it should be a deliberate and well reasoned choice, not something bred out of ignorance and negligence.

quotient 12y ago
The trouble is that the line between "realism" and "boring stuff nobody cares about" is a thin one that the film-maker has to tread carefully, and this is an exceedingly difficult task, as this line varies from person to person: it is highly subjective. Film is a mass medium, so it is difficult for the film-maker to 'get the balance right' for all (or even just the majority of) the viewers. Moreover, when you say that "the best porn out there" is characterized by a particular description, you have to remember that this is your own, highly nuanced, subjective view on this. There are other people who probably hold an opinion that is a direct inversion of yours.

vezzy-fnord 12y ago

What's more is that expecting realism from Hollywood productions is, quite aptly, unrealistic. Hollywood films aim at targeting large masses of people. As such, their medium is in creating exaggerated escapist fiction with intense SFX and formulaic plots that do not require thought to follow, but can instead be passively consumed. If you want realism, then start watching more art films and start supporting the independent film industry.

DavidAdams 12y ago

As the article explains, though, including some realism in the way a movie depicts computing achieves the very same goal as the noisy explosion in space or banking starfighter. If there's too much physics realism in a space movie, people will notice that it looks "fake" and their suspension of disbelief will be disrupted. Space movies have dogfights because war movies have dogfights, so people know what to expect, and the plot is advanced. Back in the 1960s when computers were unknown quantities, you could put whatever bullshit you wanted up on the screen and that was fine. But now that the majority of the movie-watching public has a pretty good idea of how computers work, having a "hacker" enter some kind of 3d virtual reality world to hack the NSA is perceived as ridiculous, even for Joe Sixpack, as if the movie depicted a scene in a McDonald's wherein the characters talked to a Maitre'd and ordered Steak Tartare and Chicken Tikka Masala. We all know enough about restaurants to know that's bullshit, even someone who's never eaten in a four star restaurant.

brazzy 12y ago
> Back in the 1960s when computers were unknown quantities, you could put whatever bullshit you wanted up on the screen and that was fine. Oh could you ever. Except back in the 60s, blinkenlights, tape reels and noisy dot matrix printers were more likely to be featured than screens. I distinctly remember a 60s (probably, can't remember the name) movie where the con man lead character gets himself hired as head of a bank's computer division despite having no technical expertise whatsoever, and one technician explains that the computer is totally secure and this is indicated by a specific red light - as long as that light is on, it's secure!
- tmzt 12y ago
  Fast-forward to today when the red light has been replaced with a picture of a padlock.
theothermkn 12y ago
This is an easily-pierced trope of this kind of discussion. "But now that the majority of the movie-watching public has a pretty good idea of how computers work, having a "hacker" enter some kind of 3d virtual reality world to hack the NSA is perceived as ridiculous..." Are we in the future? Or, are we trying to destabilize the audience's expectation of what's possible? Or, are we trying to communicate to the audience that computing is so ubiquitous and so disposable that society has spent its resources on superfluous displays? Is the protagonist a fish-out-of-water invited into an enclave of super-advanced geniuses situated in otherwise present-day America? Narrative is craft, and it's subject to expedience. The question to answer, in any given instance, is not, "Is this use of technology realistic?," but, "How does this element of technological unrealism operate within the wider context of the (obviously unrealistic) fantasy world of the movie?" Anyone can come up with an instance of how this has failed in a movie, but the title of the article is "Coding the Movies: Don't Fake It." This person wants code to look real in movies, and that's a profoundly stupid generalization to insist on. It's worth noting, too, that the author's "blog post" is really an advertisement for his consulting service. In a Habermassian sense, we would be suspicious that this element of the Lifeworld, this Communicative Action, has been colonized by the System, namely his need to get work. Be sure to drink your Ovaltine.