Sunday, February 27, 2005

Watched MASH Saturday night, instead of being intrepid and bundling up the Pikapie to see Montréal en Lumière.

Oh, sure, it's a heck of a movie all right. It takes you somewhere you've never been and introduces you to some funny, strange, compelling characters you've never met.

But would it really have been a worse movie if it had had a plot and a central character? The way, say, Catch-22 did?

Sometimes I feel like Scrooge when I watch these things. (Or at least Scrooge McDuck.) I just wanna get in there and hang all these brilliant characters and situations off a plot that adds up to something. I felt really thrown when all of a sudden for no reason at all I was in a football movie for twenty minutes.

I guess the idea is it is all somehow supposed to build up to a feeling or an emotion. But honestly, not so much.

I guess it must have been a huge break with the Hollywood films of the fifties and early sixties. But now that we've seen pictures where it all does, amazingly, come together, the sheer chaos of it doesn't impress so much.

1:03 PM

3 Comments:

dude you didn't like mash?

By  gatsby, at 4:37 PM  

And, uh, the movie of Catch-22 kinda sucked.

I looked at the book again a year or two ago. It's a fascinating mess that should've been trimmed by a third. But great bits, y'gotta admit. Great bits will save you sometimes.

By  Will Shetterly, at 12:41 AM  

Alex,

Applying tired plot theories to MASH would be like putting ketchup on Beef Wellington. Sure, it might taste okay, but it just wouldn't be the Beef Wellington experience.

MASH is a beloved, classic. Rather than trying to be smarter than the movie, and determine what's wrong with it. Look for what's right with it, and learn from that.

It's unlikely you'll ever make a movie as great or beloved as MASH. Watch it again, and this time stop trying to make it YOUR movie, and understand the movie that it is.

You still might find yourself not liking the movie, but you'll get more out of it. You'll learn more.

Seriously, watch it again.

By  Robot Porter, at 11:05 AM  

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