tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3701815.post108853321131494605..comments2023-10-20T11:06:56.245-04:00Comments on Rodney Welch: The Blog: Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16762495483918721103noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3701815.post-1088997704506070032004-07-04T23:21:00.000-04:002004-07-04T23:21:00.000-04:00Michael,
Thanks for such a generous response -- I...Michael,<br /><br />Thanks for such a generous response -- I hope I didn't give the impression I was completely clueless as to what postmodernism is, I think I was just a little baffled seeing it applied to Scorsese or the Rolling Stones, who always struck me as sincere traditionalists (whatever their other plusses or minueses), accent on sincere. When I think of postmodernism, and the definitions you supplied tend to buttress it somewhat, I think of a type of art where the awareness of form, and the mockery of it, is a huge part of the design; that there's a kind of deliberate insincerity to it almost, to the point where it seems to become all about form. I think of postmodernism as the auteur saying to the audience: "Let's not kid ourselves -- I'm a bullshit artist. You know it and I know it. In the old days, you submerged yourself into an imaginary story, but that game is up, because both you as a reader (or viewer) and I as an author (or filmmaker) have reached the point where we're both a little too aware of each other -- you're aware I'm trying to pull something off, and I'm aware that you're aware. So why don't we just admit it? Why don't we acknowledge the presence of each other?" The ragged result of all this, I think, to at least some extent, is that movies and novels are now only about themselves, you know? Tarantino is a perfect example of what I think pomo has come to -- his movies aren't really about anything but how much he loves making movies. "Kill Bill" is about his love of staging violent scenes; "Pulp Fiction" is about narrative -- so, twenty years earlier, were Bunuel's "The Phantom of Liberty" and "The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie." <br /><br />I don't want to sound as if I reject all this, exactly, because I like Tarantino's films (and Bunuel's) and I like a number of postmodern novels. I also think it kind of reaches a conceptual dead-end, and that maybe John Updike was right when he said pomo mainly amounts to a kind of "bored playfulness."Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16762495483918721103noreply@blogger.com