tips on radiance

ive thought so much about cinema and high vs low culture and what we value and what the directors role is the past few weeks more than i ever have before and its completely changed the way i view and approach things. what i dont think is the director has any responsibility to condemn a character or have a hero unless the express purpose of the film is to have you sympathize with them and that just because we follow a character for most of a story doesn't mean we necessarily have to or are expected to like them altogether (this is different from "good" characters with "bad" traits who we ultimately want to see triumph). i do think a film can be judged negatively if a horrible character IS someone were expected to sympathize with and the director nudges us in that direction via manipulation of the audience bcs thats just abusive in some cases, but too often we expect a protagonist/antagonist structure and empathize straight off instead of actually looking for any cues that give us cause to. also, ive been trying to put more weight on the element of surprise and spectacle in films after seeing a conversation on tumblr about this. people like to be snobby about the role of aesthetics in film as second to the story but they're extremely and often equally important as what happens within the film. if a film doesn't introduce new visuals and nothing surprises you either plot-wise or emotionally, that has to be taken into account. cinema began with spectacle and for all but the highest classes - the "intellectual elite" - its still what most audiences are looking for. this doesn't mean ignore everything else in the film if it entertains people, that's stupid (*cough* argo/zero dark thirty/whtevr), but these aspects have to really be considered when assessing filmic "value" in general. i fuck with a lot of shit that's probably boring as hell to most people which is fine, liking things that provoke a more """intellectual"""/analytical reaction isnt the problem, its valuing the cinematic elements these films employ above all others that's dependent on a hegemonic, fundamentally capitalistic, system of taste.