Of all the surprising twists that have appeared on my road since the time I left home, the rise of television has been the most pleasing, at least from an aesthetic standpoint. Unfortunately, the rise of television as a source of artistry and compelling stories has corresponded with the decline of movies as a robust form.
Coming out of the 1990s, movies had all the momentum. Television had a few good shows, which has been its modus operandi since the first waves were beamed out to the first rabbit ears - to invest in precisely the amount and level of quality necessary to keep us all hooked through the antifreeze commercials. There was Ally McBeal, ER, The Simpsons and The West Wing, along with a much buzzed about but little watched (by comparison) HBO show called The Sopranos. Film, on the other hand, had ambitious directors coming out of its independent scene (q.v. Quentin Tarantino, Steven Soderbergh, Wes Anderson) and Hollywood mainstays who were able to spend gobs of money producing work that was both artistically challenging and commercially successful (q.v. Steven Spielberg, David Fincher, Michael Mann). There was every reason to suspect that film was going to continue its enduring and expanding campaign to become the most popular art form the world has ever known. 1999 saw the release of American Beauty, magnolia, Being John Malkovich, Eyes Wide Shut, Fight Club and The Insider. All of those movies were made with substantial budgets and the majority of them made money. It was a wonderful time to be a cinephile.
Now that the Aughts have closed, is there any doubt that television is the more artistically fecund medium? Here's an off the top of my head list of totally amazing shit on Howard Beale's ultimate revelation from the past decade: Angels in America, Generation Kill, The Wire, The Sopranos, Deadwood, Curb Your Enthusiasm, The Office, Arrested Development, Breaking Bad, Mad Men, do I really need to go on? All tolled, that adds up to some 300 hours of funny, moral, political, aesthetically interesting and quite daring content. In order for film to equal that total, we would need to pick some 150 movies that are equally satisfying. I am aware that all of these shows (and The Sopranos most egregiously) have hours and plotlines that fail miserably. I am equally aware that many great movies devote far greater proportions of their running time to padding/bullshit than any of these series.
At the same time, it is shocking what passes for a good movie these days. Take The Town, Ben Affleck's boringly-titled paint-by-numbers Boston heist thriller that was considered by some to be a Best Picture contender. I'll allow that it was generally considered a weak year for film and that The Town has a few effective grace notes, but the fucking thing got at least a positive review from 94% of the critics who saw it. Let's do a quick checklist of The Town: is there a protagonist who wants to go on one last score before he retires? Yes; is his ability to pull off said score compromised by his reckless partner? Yes; is the structure of the movie neatly divided into three acts, with each act containing a notable heist setpiece? Yes; do the editing, cinematography and score owe a substantial debt to Heat? Yes.
For the record, I like The Town. I am a sucker for location cinematography, tales of people attempting to escape the environs they were born to, fatless scripts and fine supporting performances (Jeremy Renner destroys everyone he comes in contact with here), but at the same time I like some originality along with my pathos. It says a great deal about the state of moviemaking these days when a story as trite and cliched as that of The Town qualified as the most original film I could see at the time (everything else was a remake, reboot, sequel or adaptation - also, The Town is an adaptation, but it was at least an adaptation of a novel no one had read). I guess what I'm saying is, God Bless Television? [Excuses self to shower.]
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