Yes, Millar, it really was that easy.
A whole bunch of you guessed correctly, and for maybe the first time since we've been doing the poster close-ups, I don't think there were any wrong answers.
But someone has to be first, fastest on the keyboard, and this week it was Jim, followed closely by Jason Henderson, and our new perpetual redblog quiz placer Richie Rich in third. Congrats, all!
This was the clue:
I don't think anyone needs a second hint, but here you go anyway:
No problem, right? See the whole poster over the jump!
Yep, pretty easy. And while I normally don't tie the poster quiz into new releases, I have the past two weeks simply because I had these poster images in the bin and figured what the heck. But also this week because there are a lot of things I could say about Titanic that I think also apply to Avatar.
I saw Titanic three or four times in the theaters that winter of 1997-8. Mostly because of that amazing last hour and the incredible visual and dramatic impact of a giant sinking ship. But also partly because I loved being swept up in the event of seeing Titanic, of being part of that worldwide phenomenon–an excitement that goes beyond just what's on the screen.
But in the years after, each time I watched Titanic on VHS (remember those?!) or later DVD, it would diminish a bit. Yes, partly because it was made to be seen on a big screen, but mostly because with Titanic James Cameron proved himself a master of cinematic spectacle, and a ham-handed cheeseball (mmm, ham and cheese…) of the highest order when it came to melodramatic characters and situations.
Although he burst into film as a techno-action maestro, after Aliens, Cameron began wearing his heart on his sleeve, whether it was the anti-nukes messages of Terminator 2 and The Abyss, or the effective, over-the-top emotions of the latter's reborn-love story. With Titanic Cameron finally found a way to perfectly merge the two: a giant, very melodramatic love story plus really powerful action spectacle. And that combo of course is why Titanic became the biggest box-office film of all time: its something-for-everyone mix of romance, history, and a really huge ship sinking. Over the years–and this is going to be true of Avatar as well–the stunning visual action spectacle still holds up in Titanic, while the film's corny blunt-object melodrama turns out to have a pretty short shelf life. Bottom line, spectacle, Oscars and box office aside, Titanic is not really that great of a film. But at some point that doesn't really matter.
The word "subtle" (or "humble") is nowhere in Cameron's dictionary, but since the mid-'90s, his broad, roundhouse emotional punches (and flat, stereotypical characters) work well in concert with his big, fearless, blow-you-away action and imagery. The result is huge movies designed to for broad appeal, that become as much events as films. And if a decade later we find ourselves perhaps only ever re-watching the last hour of Titanic (and I'm guessing, in coming years, only the last hour of Avatar), well so be it. Even the biggest, best cheese doesn't keep forever…
Posted on December 17, 2009 at 12:48 pm
Okay, having said that, how would you compare him to Michael Bay?
Posted on December 17, 2009 at 2:09 pm
I will admit it, I didn’t know the answer. When I saw the clue the first thing I thought was, “Were Ace and Gary from the Ambiguously Gay duo in a movie that I dont know about?” I thought it might be a close of the front of there vehicle.
At least I got that it was the front tip of some sort of transportation.
Posted on December 17, 2009 at 2:50 pm
Wow…the first time I’m not watching, and it’s an easy one!!!
*sigh*
Posted on December 17, 2009 at 3:17 pm
I have to admit, Titanic was my first thought, but then I started to doubt myself. No…it couldn’t be THAT easy…maybe Ghost Ship???
But then I confirmed it and posted too late…
Posted on December 17, 2009 at 3:40 pm
I knew it was Titanic!
The cutest love story in history, Kate Winslet as Rose Dewitt-Bukater and Leoardo DiCaprio as Jack Dawson. This movie is twelve years old!
Posted on December 17, 2009 at 3:54 pm
A comparison of Cameron and Bay would make a pretty fascinating essay… okay, maybe only fascinating to me…
For starters, think about the Great Chain of Being for action directors:
Hitchcock inspired Spielberg, Spielberg inspired Cameron, Cameron inspired Bay… and frankly the cinematic gene pool gets a little watered down with each generation…
Cameron is a cheeseball–he has a big, dumb heart and goes in for more classic storytelling and fairly cardboard-but-effective characters.
Bay is a sleazeball–it’s not his HEART he’s leading with. And he has no real interest in characters or storytelling. (Bay’s idea of characterization is to simply hire a Big Charismatic Star…which DOES work about half the time.)
Aside from things like pacing and editing style, let’s call it the difference between Cameron’s love of SPECTACLE and Bay’s love of SENSATION. Cameron wants to give you the whole package–story, character, theme, big old-school, big-screen movie making. Bay wants to simply jar and shock and batter you into submission.
For the record, Cameron’s Aliens is one of my all-time favorite action films (along with Jaws and Die Hard) and that tells you a lot about where I come from generationally. But on the other hand, I’ve always defended Bay as a savant who is a moron when it comes to storytelling, but a genius when it comes to visual dynamite and orchestrating mayhem. My biggest problem with the Transformer films isn’t so much their nonsensical plots, but that Bay seemed to have lost his ability to create action scenes that were both stunning AND visually coherent.
With Avatar, Cameron proves that while his story and character ideas may be getting a bit stale and cliche, he can still put together a mind-blowing (and pleasingly cohesive) action scene.
Posted on December 17, 2009 at 4:32 pm
Interesting… It’s like playing telephone…
Posted on December 17, 2009 at 5:44 pm
Yep, like “Telephone,” each “generation” of filmmakers (or in this case, about 10-year “half generations”) focuses more on the most salacious and visceral elements of its predecessors’ work and little by little strips away the quieter, more thoughtful and in-depth things that made it all work. Eventually the message is lost in the noise.
You can also factor in shortening attention spans over the decades thanks to things like television, music videos, video games, and the fact more and more people (including film makers) read fewer and fewer books.
But the good news is, it’s not always a chronically degenerative disease — just as things always slide downward toward more sizzle, less substance, every generation also produces a couple wunderkinds who shake off the creative atrophy and addiction to sensation and pump new life and meaning into the action genre.