Eva Yojimbo wrote:This is all genuinely interesting to me. Even though I haven't played/experienced any visual novels myself, I've always been fascinated by on-the-fringe mediums and art-forms that feel like they either haven't quite reached their potential or are on the verge of getting there with maybe a handful of works that are masterpieces or verging on that status. It's a big reason why I was initially drawn to anime and comic books... hell, it's a big reason I've even been drawn to porn and other "erotic art." All of these mediums feel like they're handicapped and stigmatized as either being juvenile or somehow innately less artistic than other mediums or genres, and I guess I like an underdog.
I dunno how many VN's are on the fringe exactly (Perhaps more pornographic ones are still), though I think they've grown in popularity over the years. Like Kentucky Fried Chicken of all companies has produced a VN about dating Colonel Sanders or something. Its wild.
Lot of VN's have been adapted as successful anime too, though sometimes adaptations don't come until years after the fact (Even for relatively popular titles like Muv-Luv Alternative).
It's really funny about you making the visual novel-porn connection, because I have been thinking more again recently about the stigma surrounding porn as art... partially because I recently saw the very-lauded Teenage Lesbian by Bree Mills (which has both an uncut "porn" version and a feature-length non-porn version)
Which is also case with a lot of visual novels with sex scenes, come to think of it. If "ero game" becomes popular enough all-ages version is released for console ports and such eventually that cuts down out sex scenes and maybe replaces them with something else. Even happened with Fate/stay night eventually, leading to debate among fans whether the porn scenes were better for the story or not, why the game had porn scenes to begin with and why they were cut etc.
--but it's not so vastly inferior the wealth of other indie films out there to make it "not art" just because it happens to have lengthy sex scenes, and it makes me wonder what it is about the sex that automatically makes people want to pitch it (and similar stuff) into the non-art trash.
Film Twitter seems to erupt into debates about sex scenes in mainstream films every few weeks, and these are some of the following arguments I've seen on there in some form:
1)Objectification of women is bad/male gaze/reinforces rape culture/etc.
2)Plot goes on hold for sex (The most lmao of takes)
3)"I'm an asexual person so I don't relate to sex scenes"
4)"Why don't you just watch porn instead. Its just a click away lol"
5)"I don't want to watch sex scenes with my parents in the room"
6)Sex scene looks fake/bad/etc.
7)Straight sex scene is used to reinforce hetero/cisgender-normative culture
8)Sex scene is empty pandering/wish-fulfillment/escapism/fanservice etc.
9)Sex scene was created through exploiting actresses, actresses wouldn't do nude/sex scenes if they had a choice etc.
10)Sexual politics of film make me uncomfortable etc.
And so on. Some of these views are more sympathetic than others.
Of course this is mainly about mainstream films as I said, without getting into erotica films or whatever really. If people just don't like sex scenes or erotic works or whatever then okay I guess, but yeah the criticisms can be a bit much. For whatever reason, standards people have for even mere existence of sex scene in a work seem to be much higher than action scene or music scene and so on.
EDIT: 11)I forgot my favorite take: "Masturbation opens a portal to the Devil". I can't find link to where I first read this, but at least one brave hero counters this false notion by recognizing that
"your body is not a website".
Even with run-of-the-mill porn that make no pretensions towards art or even being "mediocre indie films," surely there's some art to how it's shot, edited and performed, since even a cursory comparison with amateur stuff shows a pretty huge gap in the talent/skills of those involved. I've also found it kinda humorous how porn is basically identical to other artistic mediums in that innovators will come along with a new idea, and then that idea will get copied endlessly until people get tired of it until another new-something comes along to take its place.
For Americans at least, I blame the Puritans.
The Puritans don't get enough shit.
Anyway, I hope it's not TOO weird I just went off on a tangent about porn! LOL I'd actually probably be interested in some of the visual novels that were more erotic in nature... not that I wouldn't be interested in non-erotic ones too if they're good or interesting.
Well I'm certainly not complaining lol.
If you ever play a VN let me know. I haven't played too much of the purely pornographic ones, but stuff I have enjoyed like Fate or Tsukihime or Muv-Luv tended to be more similar to case of that film you described above.
I don't know if it's that kids are becoming more puritanical or if people are just becoming more polarized: more puritanical reactionaries responding to more sexually liberated media.
When puritanical reactionaries are like 16 and using "woke" language to make their case though, it makes me wonder.
Like when I was a teenager was 50 year old religious weirdo conservatives making that case and pretty much everyone online hated them. It just feels odd to see similar types of arguments now coming from ostensible left-leaning people.
I dunno maybe I'm just an old fogey, already irrelevant. I think also just don't have much patience or interest in "culture war" stuff anymore, especially since it seems to be taking forms I'm not sure I even understand anymore. I rather just want to talk about the things I like and am interested in without having to do weird mental gymnastics to justify my interests to whatever rando online.
Yeah, I understand that reaction as I have it to music a lot. I get tired hearing my favorite songs from my favorite bands so when I revisit their albums I tend to find myself appreciating the more obscure stuff that nobody plays/knows about because I haven't heard them a billion times. I imagine it could be the same with TV shows and episodes.
Yeah, and in case of TV shows these episodes might have odd details overlooked that can change how you look at a character or something.
I also always appreciated the variety of NGE's MOTW battles. I remember commenting on that in the very first review I wrote for the series and posted on Amazon. It's perhaps an aspect that a lot of people really underrate when it comes to the series: even the more "mundane" aspects are still much more imaginative than most shows of its type.
Yeah, its surprisingly easy aspect of the series to take for granted.
I think so, but it's tricky answering questions like that because it's very much a subjective "feel" thing. There's a balance between letting a shot play long enough so that you can wring all the emotion/feeling/atmosphere out of it, including the added stuff by LETTING it linger for that extra time, and then letting it go past the point where you're just trying to wring blood from a stone. If that scene goes past that point I don't think it does by much, but I'm often a fan that of films that loves lingering on static shots of nothing (or not much) happening because I love immersing myself in an atmosphere that can only be done via spending enough time being there. That scene isn't really going for the same/similar thing, but the principle is still similar.
For me most surprising thing is that I just forgot about the shot, and that it doesn't have meme status that elevator shot does.
Might be worth checking out. I think we've been over my ambivalence about Critical Theory before, but it can be occasionally insightful.
If you do choose to read it I would also recommend companion/rival book "Beautiful Fighting Girl" by Saito Tamaki. Its also from Lacanian perspective unfortunately and some similar flaws, but it makes the case that the same cultures that Azuma criticizes are good. I think the first edition technically it came before Azuma's book, but they both take potshots at each other anyways through various newer editions and rerelease notes and such, all of which should be included in English translations. Books really could be read in any order.
EDIT: If you ever watch Otaku no Video it pairs wells with these books too, not only because of its general themes but also because Toshio "OtaKing" Okada is a guy both books use as an important reference point.
Yeah, all of this sounds pretty bad, which is a shame given how insightful I remember Anime: Or Something Like It was. Doubly a shame since he seems to be one of the few academics discussing NGE that's available to be read in the west. I mean, postmodernism may have killed grand narratives for the artists that are immersed in and concerned with continuing the traditions of art history, but that only accounts for a small amount of artists out there to begin with. There are tons of people making art as if Modernism/Potmodernism never happened, and still making "unifying grand narratives" of their own apparently oblivious to the Critical Theorists' belief that they can't be doing what they've done. I mean, sure, it's interesting as a commentary and analysis on art history, but actual history is itself more complex than the narratives we make up about it afterwards.
Yeah with Azuma its really "Americanization" of Japan in wake of World War II he seems mad about with this, but well again that's not exactly something that wasn't already happening.
Like as much flack as Kurosawa got for being "Japanese rip off of John Ford" or whatever, Ozu himself (The more "Japanese" director according to Godard in one of his more hilariously bad takes) was just as influenced by American Hollywood. Maybe even moreso for all I know.
I'm morbidly curious to hear if he has any arguments about how/why prostitution/porn are ruining society. I've heard this a lot lately from a variety of people and I haven't been able to extract any coherent arguments from any of them. AFAICT, most of it is just them exercising instinctual adaptations for ancestral environments (small-ish tribes in very hostile envirionments) that bear very little resemblance to our current reality.
I'm a little tired ATM but I'll hunt through my copy of Azuma's book again in the morning to find exactly what he says.
Will probably watch these whenever I get around to finally watching the fourth/final film. I do remember thinking each one was better than the last, with 3.33 really being a mind-fuck perhaps on part with the best of OG NGE.
Unfortunately last Rebuild has been delayed yet again because of covid, but at least it is finished. They're just sitting on it right now, and probably preparing Shin Ultraman.
Shame you didn't like this more. It's been one of my top 20 favorites for a long time. To me, I don't think any actual "Christmas Movie" captures the season better, despite being a pretty small part of the film in general. I think the cinematography is extraordinary, and the whole sequence of them putting out the candles/lights is one of my favorites in the history of film. The whole film just exudes this warm, lush, comfortable atmosphere that reminds me of of what it felt like being with family/loved ones at Christmas, even during the scenes that aren't about Christmas. I also appreciate how low-key episodic it is, and part of the film's magical nostalgia might be in how it feels like we remember childhood being, and I think the Halloween scenes really standout in that respect. It's strangely one of those films I always think I've underrated when I look back at my "Favorite Films" list, but every time I've even seen parts of it on TV I'm immediately enraptured by it all over again, so, yeah, I pretty much think it's an absolute masterpiece.
Hmm, you kind of want to make me rewatch it with some of this in mind. Maybe I'll try and do that next Christmas season.
I need to rewatch this as the original version I saw was pretty terrible picture-quality wise. I remember appreciating Welles's visual style (as always) but it was hard to really enjoy it with the terrible transfer.
Criterion blu is gorgeous, though that DVD from several years back wasn't that bad either.