Movies are meant to entertain. That is it. They are not paintings. They are not meant to challenge or be though-provoking. They are meant to entertain. The best movies do that and challenge you, but things that are so avant garde and artsy fartsy that they become moving paintings stop even being movies. They do not entertain.
Juxtapose the experimentation of the French New Wave with Italian Neorealism. The French understood that a movie should entertain. It should be about being a movie. Italian neorealists were depressed because the war had just ended, so they started making films that were depressing and pointless.
Go watch The Bicycle Thief. It's boring as fucking hell. Yes, yes, it was groundbreaking and has had a generations-long effect on cinema all around the world. That doesn't change that it is tearfully boring. Anyone who says otherwise is lying to sound intelligent. I respect it. I comprehend it. I appreciate it. I still say it's barely a movie.
I mean for Christ's sake, the films were so pointless and depressing (and that was the point) the government told them to stop making them. Compare this to Schindler's List. It's depressing, moving, heart-wrenching, but also entertaining. It fills us with emotion and tells us a story with a beginning, middle, and end.
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