Peggy Noonan On The Oscars, And George Clooney In Particular

Here's the article. I agreed with a lot of her points, but it still annoyed me.

The first half of the article is about The Oscar broadcast, and how the multiplication of award shows has diluted its unique impact. I've never been a big fan of watching it (maybe because I've never won a lot of contests myself, so I'm not a big fan of competition), but I agree there's way, way too much of this sort of thing.

The second half is about her take on Hollywood Now, which she says is "politically and culturally to the left of America, and it often seems disdainful of or oblivious to its assumptions and traditions". I think that's true. It's a pretty large creative community, and I would think that the initial group - the folks who picked up and moved across the country to make movies - weren't a traditional sort of bunch. I know that people will do a lot of things for a steady job, but I'd imagine that non-traditionalists made up a lot of the cinematic pioneers. Creative, political, sexual, whatever kinds of non-traditionalists.

I also don't imagine that a lot of these early filmmakers were all that accepted in the places where they came from, which I would imagine would make that big move a little easier. Hollywood being a lot of younger folks (as it can be), they probably hadn't sorted out a lot of the ambivalence (or disdain) for the mainstream culture of the heartland. I imagine that's true to some degree today as well.

As filmmakers and performers get more powerful, they also can become more isolated from the mainstream, and many of their experiences do come from the media. It can certainly lead to finger-wagging preachiness, as we've seen from Mr. Robbins, Ms. Sarandon, Madonna, and much of the rest of the 'cast' of Team America. To be honest, I think Mr. Clooney is a lesser example. With all the press he's had to give over the years, he seems surprisingly grounded.

Ms. Noonan then bemoans that "Hollywood isn't making the kind of movies that compel people to leave their homes and go to the multiplex." Which in this article doesn't seem to mean bad, as many modern movies are, but preachy political tracts, like Mr. Clooney is guilty of. Personally, I think this sort of film is still in the minority - there are good, entertaining films to see (like The 40 Year Old Virgin, Napoleon Dynamite, or Wallace And Gromit: The Curse Of The Were-Rabbit) that seem connected to modern culture with nary a finger wagged.

Since Good Night, And Good Luck and Syriana didn't win much at the Oscars, I suppose this is more about Mr. Clooney's general attitude in interviews (and in his films) lately. I'm not sure the best response to a filmmaker who annoys you by behaving as if you don't know very much is to write "let me tell you how little he knows".

She feels that Mr. Clooney makes films as if he's experienced mostly media, and not real life, that he's "read an article and now wants to tell us the truth, if we can handle it". It's not a predominent theme in the film, but part of the story does concern media - the transition from radio to television. She finds his current films flat, condescending and artificial, and insinuates that the events chronicled in Good Night, And Good Luck aren't accurate. It's not clear exactly what Ms. Noonan believes the truth to be. I guess we're supposed to take her word for it.

The only example of a film that "serves the audience" she hints at is The Chronicles Of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch And The Wardrobe. If given the choice, personally I'd rather see an eloquent response to political intimidation than, say, a call to arms for children to fight evildoers for Santa Claus. American Idol serves its audience. Even if films like Good Night, And Good Luck fail, I'd still rather see filmmakers aiming a little higher, risking a wagging finger, even if it's just at Oscar time.