Have you ever gone to the theater and realized how truly great the movie was? You just walk out of the darkroom with your friends or significant other as the credits roll past and you can’t keep your jaw in place. It just falls to the floor after every try you make to bring it back up. Once you do reattach it, though, you can’t help but yammer on about your favorite everything that was the movie. You’ll talk about how great the acting was, the visual effects, the storytelling, and the character that made you laugh but was totally unneeded, however served a purpose as comedic relief and thus gave everything a bit more character. But, for some people, you may also go on about the subtleties. The kinds of stuff that caught you off guard and made you think a bit harder. Made you think that there was something else being told. It wasn’t just the action or monster that made the movie, it was the underlying theme that brought it out into the realm of truly great. I sometimes do this, especially for movies that really catch my eye. When this does happen I’ll tend to say “you know, this would have made a great book.” Not just an adaptation of the movie in book form but an actual literary novel. Those are the movies I truly enjoy.
A “literary Movie”, as I now call them (just as I’m writing this in fact), are few and far between. I’ve seen plenty of great movies but not so many that fall into the category of “literary.” For instance, I think Mad Max is a great series of movies (except for Thunder Dome, you don’t need to see Thunder Dome) but I wouldn’t call them meaningful, more action packed and a good ride. Sure, I would say Fury Road is a great movie that everyone should see and I boast about its cinematography and acting every time its brought up, but I wouldn’t go so far as to say its filled to the brim with symbolism. The kinds of movies that I would say are “literary” have exactly what these lacked. Symbolism that has a meaningful impact on the world around us. But not just the kind that reflects the times. It needs to hook onto the past, present and even the future.
I’ve had the idea of movies being books for a long time. But it’s only recently that I really thought about it as a whole. I just recently saw Get Out directed, written and produced by Jorden Peele. This is what sparked my talkative brain. As I sat there watching it I noticed the little things a lot. The underlying meaning is what’s most striking. It’s obviously a horror movie about a man and his girlfriend going out to see her parents and then learning that the parents are really evil. That’s the long and the short of it. But there’s something underlying about it, like a shark swimming just under the surface of the water ready to grab onto the unsuspecting victim. That shark is the struggle of colored people in modern day society. It’s not exactly a big surprise that this is what it’s about. I think the trailers could be read easily as that but never would I have guessed the actual symbols used in the movie. For instance, when Chris is put into a trance he feels as if he’s in this dark sunken world. We see this in the movie as essentially a black pit that Chris floats in. This could be used as a metaphor for the feeling that colored people may feel that the whole world is against them merely because of their color. Another example would be when Rose is eating her milk separate from her Footy Loops. A clear metaphor for the separation of whites from people of other races. I could go on for a long while about the other hidden meanings but I only have so many words to work with (800 as imposed by the website) so I’ll leave it at that. I’m fairly certain that if this was written as a novel it would be sold out in days because I believe it holds much more merit beyond its brilliant acting just as The Great Gatsby holds value beyond its excellent writing.
The movies that go above and beyond the computer editing and camera hold a special place in my heart. While I do say that a movie should be visually striking it must grip onto me with much more than that. It’s the writing that I say is more important. When the writing is the most amazing thing about the movie then I think an award is in order! When you treat your movie as if it were a novel I firmly believe great things can happen.
