Can Movies Teach Moral Philosophy?
That's the title of a New York Times article. I don't understand all of the author's thesis, but this paragraph seemed right on:
Mr. Cavell argues that in American comedies of the 1930's and 40's the genre changed. The couple begins by being married and then splits up -- or fails to recognize their affinity -- until they are properly reunited in marital friendship. These comedies tend to end in the country rather than the city, and authority tends to remain unacknowledged. Mr. Cavell calls these films 'remarriage comedies.'Remarriage comedies. That's a perfect description for several films that the article doesn't mention. For example, Hitchcock's one comedy: Mr. and Mrs. Smith. Then there are Cary Grant's hilarious movies My Favorite Wife and The Awful Truth.
posted by Stuart Buck at
7:12 AM
3 Comments:
"Hitchcock's one comedy"? C'mon, there's more than one. "Norht By Northwest", "The 39 Steps", "The Trouble With Harry", "Rear Window"-- I think you could make a decent argument that The Master made mostly comedies, at least in the classic definition of the term.
Now, now. I didn't say that was his only movie that had comedic elements or humor in it. But "Mr. and Mrs. Smith" was purely a comedy -- no action, adventure, suspense, murder, mystery, etc.
Consider Wabi-sabi. It's an ancient Japanese philosophy with roots in Zen, revering austerity, nature and the everyday. Fudge 44 expertly showed how the wabi way of tea (wabichado) grew out of a backlash to that, championed by a master so powerful that his style is practiced to this day. It's what you want to check out...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jac2-XMGd1w
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