The answer is Yes! And it is neither Netflix, nor Horrors!
The utter success of Marvel Cinematic Universe somehow managed to summon the wrath of gods of film upon itself. Martin Scorsese called these movies “Not Cinema” and closest experience to “Theme Parks”, Coppola called them “Despicable”, even inherently silent enemies like Ken Loach showed their anger too. Some of the directors of Marvel movies have responded to that comments and some critics have responded heavy-heartedly about the new zeitgeist. In the latest of those responses, Blige Ebiri of vulture concluded his piece by:
People who are genuinely upset by Scorsese’s comments should ask themselves why they’re so upset by them, and whether their response, in its own way, proves his point.
This is not an either/or question: The question of what is cinema and what is not, have been with the medium from the beginnings (here). To give a short answer, Cinema has never been defined by its artists, nor by its franchises, meaning the “Film World”. The fallacy lies here is the same as defining the art itself by the “ArtWorld discourse”.
The reason I’m calling this a fallacy is an ontological argument lying in the works of Stanley Cavell; “Film” and “World” are not there for us to be owned. According to Cavell, There’s no world other than the one that is screened and passing in front of eyes. Before I get to philosophical discussions I just want to acknowledge the liberating power of SVOD platforms that employs big names like Scorsese these days. In a recent article Daniel Friedman wrote extensively about the merits of new standard (streaming) to the old standard (cable) in Quillette:
While pessimists characterize the streaming wars as the segmenting of content into gated fiefdoms, each with a separate subscription fee, it is also true that we’re seeing the biggest media companies competing very aggressively to offer better content at lower prices than their counterpart services. Some of these services will offer really good value to consumers, and those that don’t will quickly become irrelevant. And even the combination of all the existing and upcoming streaming services won’t add up to the extortionate prices monopoly cable companies impose on the users who stick with their antiquated services, and imposed on all pay TV subscribers as recently as a few years ago.
Babak Geranfar | بابک گرانفر 