NamvM74 wrote:
Id be curious as to what exactly makes a work of art good in your eyes.
I love art that is invigorating, intriguing, dense, exciting, new, that opens my eyes and feelings toward something, that provides me with an unique experience. Yes, this is a rather personal interpretation of the qualities of good art, but as far as I'm concerned, the inherently subjective experience of art makes it a valid idea. And I've personally never understood all these arguments that an artwork should do this or that in order to be good-why should it? All these arguments for "proper structure", "truthful character development" and so on are for me arguments that are for artworks being limited in their capability to experiment and do whatever they want simply so that they could adhere to someone's entirely subjective idea of what constitutes a good work.
I've been like this for as long as I can remember and that's the reason I don't particularly care for such arguments-in my mind, if a work is bad, there are other valid reasons to dislike it without immediately accusing it of not doing things "the right way", despite the fact that "the right way" is always a subjective, arbitrary opinion rather than any kind of lasting guideline. Maybe I'm like this also because I've often noticed such statements popping up when people criticize works for being new and different instead of wondering what the author's intention was.
Even though I agree that Jo isn't well paced, being more like a TV series in its internal structure rather than an actual film, I don't think good pacing and structure are still necessary to be good. Ha is bad because it's supposed to be bad in my view and when it comes to Q, why is it even necessary for other characters to have more character development? There is still Shin and NTE has never exactly hidden the fact it's more focused on Shinji than anybody else.
I also find the idea that NTE doesn't have good visuals blatantly false. The animation quality is great most of the time and has only gotten better with time (Shin appears downright beautiful), while Q especially used animation to give off the vibes of a post-apocalyptic bizarre weirdo world extremely well, to the point I have to wonder whether those same aesthetics could ever have been achieved through live-action.
Axx°N N. wrote:
I've often humored the idea that Ha was intentionally off of a certain mark, but that always seemed like I was trying to justify it in some way and attribute Anno with more foresight than is deserved.
I'm open to changing my mind, but I'll stand with my current idea for now.
As for your criticisms of Q, I feel you might be mistaking your own dislike toward a few idea with the film being more commercial. Shinji and Kaworu's relationship is different from NGE's because that's necessary for Anno's themes (and there's a good discussion to be had on how much a relationship perfect at first glace, rather one-sidedly manipulative and one that enhances the negative qualities of each participant on a deeper viewin, really is commercial, especially with NGE!Kaworu being, while consistently otherworldly and mysterious, still someone who could be genuinely expected to have good wishes), Shinji's vertiginous walk didn't work for you and you thought they're too direct, but that seems more like your own personal preference than an instance of NTE being genuinely more commercial in that regard. Even if NTE is more commercial in the sense it focuses more on one character and has slightly less of an interest in otherworldly and mysterious stuff, I still find it a bit of a stretch to therefore say that it's more commercial or that Anno's interest in these new films is very much influenced by commercial interests. The only thing those two losses of NGE qualities hint at is a different story, really.
Shin isn't going to be paced like a Tarkovsky film, but it's reportedly a lot calmer than the previous films, but only in its first half. I haven't seen the film, so take it all with a healthy grain of salt, though.
As for your reply to chee, I do actually think there's a certain amount of anti-escapism to be found in NTE, but with what I know of Shin, it seems it's not as relevant as what I'd previously thought and it might be more tied to NTE's seemingly grander themes of growing up, maturing and moving on. Once again, though, the film must be seen for a better understanding.
Jäeger wrote:
It's the meta thing gonna be the excuse for every Anno's flaw?
Is any legitimate argument about why Anno might not be a bad filmmaker going to be waved away by you with strawmanning it into "you refuse to accept Anno's capability to be a flawed director"?
I mean, I am unironically sensing a certain amount of "I personally dislike NTE, so I'm going to dismiss it in its entirety and argue there's no way it can ever be good". If somebody criticizes your views, maybe it's because they'd rather wait for the final 155 minutes or because they don't think that NTE is that bad? None of what you're saying is really objective truth here, it's all opinions. Of course, the same goes for my pro-NTE arguments, but I don't act like my opinions are reality in anyone's world but mine.
Apologies if you think I'm being harsh here, but this is what I feel you're doing here.
