We've all been there, I'm talking to the fanboy, the fanboy who's favorite franchise was made into a movie this year, the fanboy, who will be disappointed when the Oscars come around and his movie only comes up for something dumb like best makeup or lighting. The Academy rarely chooses action movies for the awards everyone cares about like best actor/actress or best picture, and that's because of the basic form of movies.
Movies are a visual story, they're moving picture books, and so the Academy likes movies that tell stories. It's true, most action movies have a plot, but did you see Prince of Persia for the plot, no, you saw it so you could get excited by seeing a guy with hippy hair parkour for two and a half hours. Action movies aren't focused around the plot, they're focused around stunts and adrenaline, whereas movies that tell a story can have the ability to change everyone who sees it because they didn't spend all the writing budget on parkour training.
Even when action movies do have good stories, like Spider-Man and Inception, it's either too confusing to have a plot that allows for such hyperbolized fight scenes, or suffers from being tethered to the source material. Not to say there aren't good action movies, one of my favorite movies of all time, Watchmen, is an action movie, but that is an exception from both the confusing story and source material rules.
So that's it, the Academy likes stories, and action movies aren't as much about the story, so enjoy them for what they are, not always masterpieces, but excitement generators, that are fueled by adrenaline and exist to get you pumped for the sequel next summer.
No comments:
Post a Comment