What makes a great movie?

I recently had a lively email "conversation" with my brother, Leo, who raised some interesting issues about the movie industry and movie quality:

I'm happy to watch a movie about Christianity, love, murder, whatever. I just have a generally jaundiced view of the industry at this point, and don't trust "them" to do anything other than pander to the lowest common denominator in the name of money. The few movies I get to hit about 50/50 in this area.

I understand and enjoy the fact that 85% of all art is crap. How else could we recognize masterpieces? But this is different somehow. I think it's the fact that there's so much money involved that it can't help but create conflicts of interest that don't have much to do with the normal incompetence, ego, bad luck and whathaveyou which foils so many creative
visions.

It's like Apocalypse Now, Heart of Darkness, and A. Redux. Thank God for film editors and spouses with cameras. Two of the greatest movies ever, and the one that lived inside the creator's heart until that moment of release (of Redux) was absolute tripe. This is a view of the artistic process which makes it all worth while. I wish we could see something together (like Capote).

My response:

I guess I have a different attitude about movies. I really like going to the movies, even more than watching them at home. I approach them with a strong willingness to suspend disbelief and I go into the theater ready to be thrilled, no matter what the movie is (and of course I'm frequently disappointed!!) While I appreciate a visually beautiful/artistic movie, it's more important to me that the movie be a satisfying visceral or emotional experience and that it be a good story. I understand that film is a form of art, but it's also a form of entertainment, and it's important that it succeed on that level too. I saw Capote, and it's a totally beautiful film, but I didn't find it a very satisfying movie experience. I felt the same way about Million Dollar Baby -- I could appreciate that it was a beautifully made movie, and it was certainly true to the creator's artistic vision, but I thought the story was maudlin and frankly, a waste of the talents of the performers (especially Morgan Freeman and Hilary Swank). I was quite unsatisfied when I left the theater.

I know a lot of money is wasted making crap, but it's their money. And just because a movie is "pandering" doesn't mean that the creator's artistic vision was compromised. Maybe their vision was to pander and to make money (Wedding Crashers anyone???) Or maybe their vision was to create a really great "popcorn" movie, like Peter Jackson was doing with his remake of King Kong. In general, I just try to avoid movies that I think I won't enjoy, whether they cost a lot of money to make or not, and regardless of the intentions of the filmmakers. I've seen lots of artsy, independent, low budget movies (that were presumably true to the creator's artistic vision) that I thought were crap too (Brown Bunny anyone?). I rushed out to see Charlotte Rampling in The Swimming Pool (a couple years ago) because the critics raved about her, and about the movie, and I thought it was boring, and I thought the big twist at the end was more of a big cheat.

I thought Apocalypse Now was a magnificent movie, but I don't know that I would call it one of the greatest films ever made. It's certainly a reflection of a startling and original artistic vision, but also a megalomaniacal one. I actually liked Francis Ford Coppala's film, The Cotton Club, much better, but the critics savaged that movie and it completely tanked at the box office. I don't think I've ever met anyone who's heard of it, let alone seen it (and I talk it about it all the time when the topic of movies come up). Probably my favorite movie of all time is Ordinary People (also a favorite book). I think that movie was true to the artistic vision of the creator, and it was utterly involving and emotionally wrenching for me. So I left the theater devastated and totally satisfied.

I do believe that such a variety of movies, including lots of "crap," allows plenty of room for individual taste. When I went to my favorite website, imdb.com, recently, they have the (ongoing) results of their user poll of the "best movies of 2005." I only saw one of the top 10 (Mr. and Mrs Smith, which I thought was crap, but relatively entertaining crap) and maybe half of #11-25, and I wouldn't call any of them the "best" movie of the year. It gets me thinking about what people look for in a movie and what their criteria is for "best." Clearly entertainment value is dominant in these voters, as opposed to artistic value (or artistic vision), at least that's how it seems to me. I don't know if these voters would say, "I loved this movie because it told a great story and it told it well." That's my criteria, and it may be theirs, but the lists that result from applying this standard may look very different from each other.