The Cinema of Surfaces
On the Aesthetics of Film in the Eighties, by Jürgen Müller & Steffen Haubner. Excerpt of the book 'Movies of the 80s', by Jürgen Müller
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The need for self-transcendence is reflected even more clearly in a number of films that deal with the topic of metamorphosis. In Woody Allen's Zelig (1983), a human chameleon develops a desire to identify his true self. In Sidney Pollack's Tootsie (1982), the protagonist played by Dustin Hoffman can only achieve self-realization by disguising himself as a woman. Penny Marshall's Big (1988) is a fairy-tale take on the transformation theme: a mechanical fortuneteller at a carnival grants a young boy's wish to grow up immediately.
The unexpected is seen not only as an opportunity but also as a threat. A diffuse feeling of menace haunted the Eighties. Domestic politics stagnated while the atomic superpowers held each other at bay, and a dramatic rise in epidemics culminated in the plague of AIDS. Politicians called for a return to the traditional values of home and family. Yet interestingly-and perhaps strangely in such a climate of social and political tension-the unexpected was increasingly felt to be lurking in the most intimate refuge we possess: in our very selves. Alan Parker's Angel Heart (1986) showed a particularly chilling voyage of negative self-discovery in which the protagonist is forced to realize that his identity is an illusion and that he is nothing more than an instrument of the devil.
Searching for the lost secret
It's astonishing how decades so recent can yet seem centuries away. Weren't the Eighties thoroughly anti-classical-and less secure than the Seventies in matters of taste? And don't the Eighties now seem naïve and colorful compared to the cool, elegant decade the Nineties tried so hard to be? More emphasis might well be placed on just how conservative the decade was, more space might be devoted to noting how reactionary so many films were, and how indelibly the Eighties were marked by the presidency of Ronald Reagan.
Rambo (First Blood, 1982), Aliens and Top Gun (1985) are some of the prime examples that come to mind. Still, it would be unfair to reduce the Eighties to this. Instead of harping on the baleful influence of political stagnation-a perspective on the decade that would force us to see the films as mere compensation mechanisms-we should embrace the escapism, take pleasure in the anarchy and thoroughly enjoy the paranoia.
Maybe the decade's finest achievement was its mistrust of any claim to absolute truth, and its self-liberation from the stranglehold of ideologies. For were the 80s not a decade for adventurers, both real and imaginary, in the vestiges of Don Quixote and Columbus? And what did these films accomplish, if not reendow reality with its inherent mystery?
Page [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6]
Page [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6]
The need for self-transcendence is reflected even more clearly in a number of films that deal with the topic of metamorphosis. In Woody Allen's Zelig (1983), a human chameleon develops a desire to identify his true self. In Sidney Pollack's Tootsie (1982), the protagonist played by Dustin Hoffman can only achieve self-realization by disguising himself as a woman. Penny Marshall's Big (1988) is a fairy-tale take on the transformation theme: a mechanical fortuneteller at a carnival grants a young boy's wish to grow up immediately.
The unexpected is seen not only as an opportunity but also as a threat. A diffuse feeling of menace haunted the Eighties. Domestic politics stagnated while the atomic superpowers held each other at bay, and a dramatic rise in epidemics culminated in the plague of AIDS. Politicians called for a return to the traditional values of home and family. Yet interestingly-and perhaps strangely in such a climate of social and political tension-the unexpected was increasingly felt to be lurking in the most intimate refuge we possess: in our very selves. Alan Parker's Angel Heart (1986) showed a particularly chilling voyage of negative self-discovery in which the protagonist is forced to realize that his identity is an illusion and that he is nothing more than an instrument of the devil.
Searching for the lost secret
It's astonishing how decades so recent can yet seem centuries away. Weren't the Eighties thoroughly anti-classical-and less secure than the Seventies in matters of taste? And don't the Eighties now seem naïve and colorful compared to the cool, elegant decade the Nineties tried so hard to be? More emphasis might well be placed on just how conservative the decade was, more space might be devoted to noting how reactionary so many films were, and how indelibly the Eighties were marked by the presidency of Ronald Reagan.
Rambo (First Blood, 1982), Aliens and Top Gun (1985) are some of the prime examples that come to mind. Still, it would be unfair to reduce the Eighties to this. Instead of harping on the baleful influence of political stagnation-a perspective on the decade that would force us to see the films as mere compensation mechanisms-we should embrace the escapism, take pleasure in the anarchy and thoroughly enjoy the paranoia.
Maybe the decade's finest achievement was its mistrust of any claim to absolute truth, and its self-liberation from the stranglehold of ideologies. For were the 80s not a decade for adventurers, both real and imaginary, in the vestiges of Don Quixote and Columbus? And what did these films accomplish, if not reendow reality with its inherent mystery?
Page [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6]
Still from 'Aliens', USA, 1986
Still from 'First Blood', USA, 1982