After reading Meh’s recent 8 New & Upcoming Masters of Horror editorial and reading some of the comments, it got me thinking. As horror fans, do we put too much stock in who does or doesn’t direct a film? Theres a lot of factors that can cause a a film to be considered great, mediocre or down right horrible. Acting, Directing, Writing, Costumes, Soundtrack, Budget, FX…etc all can contribute to the “success” of film in genre fans eyes but the one thing I notice right away is the comments we make before a film comes out just based on the Director attached. Yes, the Director is the one who brings all of these elements together but are we too quick to anoint a movie the next big thing or something to stay away from before we so much as see a few seconds of a trailer?
The thing is as hardcore genre fans, our Bias takes over before a film is even put together. If we see a new film coming from M. Night Shyamalan or Uwe Boll, we pretty much write it off. If we see a film by Rob Zombie or Wes Craven, it’s a must see. Now granted, these are extreme opposites of the barometer for quality directors but one thing we must remember is with each film a director does they start with a blank slate. Every film is going to be different film then the previous one from the director and despite a good or bad track record I think we are too quick to form opinions however warranted they are.
The problem with having such strong convictions for or against a director can really alter a perception of a film. As an example I am going to use Rob Zombie and Halloween 2. Before Halloween 2, RZ had a pretty good track record with House of 1000 Corpses, The Devils Rejects, and Halloween. So with the release of Halloween 2, there was a lot of high praise before the film came out. So what happened when the film finally came out? Well depending on what genre fan you ask, it was either the greatest film Rob Zombie has ever done or an absolute pile of garbage that doesnt deserve to have his name attached. Pretty different reactions from lots of people who were supposed to be “dying” for the film to come out because they were such big Rob Zombie supporters.
The problem is we get too caught up in the “name” of a director, which automatically means it is going to be compared to every other work they have previously done. With Halloween 2, some fans praised it and said it was the perfect Rob Zombie sequel that picked right up on the success of the first. Other Rob Zombie fans felt that it was too mainstream, not violent enough, or just downright not what they were expecting from a Rob Zombie film. While we all know that we can agree to disagree, this just shows how based on a Directors name alone it can cause a film to be praised or trashed by fans of our genre. Groups of fans who loved it because it was Rob Zombie and groups of fans who hated it because it wasnt up to par with other Rob Zombie films…hmmm interesting how fans of RZ and have two completely opposite reactions but it all comes back to him.
However, there are still plenty of Rob Zombie fans, that despite thrashing Halloween 2 will be excited for whatever his next announced project is. So at what point does a director begin to get written off? Is it one bad film? Three? Five? Despite having a great early track record with The Sixth Sense, Unbreakable, Signs and for some even The Village, M. Night has begun to get written off by fans with a few bad efforts with The Happening, The Lady in the Water, and Airbender. Unfortunately this appears to be a case of “what have you done for us lately” approach by fans, leading to negative perception of upcoming films.
The problem with getting too caught up in perceptions of Directors is when their name gets attached to a film they have very little involvement with. We see it all the time, Directors names like Quentin Tarantino, Guillermo del Toro, or Eli Roth being slapped on promo material followed by “Presents”. The problem is many times these names only serve as a producer or executive producer, but our bias takes over and we begin to get excited or write projects off just because of the name “associated” with the film. For example, I, like many of you, have heard the groans of the audience when M. Nights name pops up in the Devil trailer. The problem is we are letting our negative bias alter our perception of the film which is unfair to the Dowdle Brothers (The Directors) and Brian Nelson (who wrote the screenplay). Sure M. Night is one of many producers and he came up with the original story idea but this is the work of many other talented and undiscovered movie makers. But when Quentin Tarantinos name was on all the Hostel promo material, people couldn’t wait to get a look at a film by an unknown filmmaker.
One of these days I’d love to see an upper tier or lower tier Director use a pseudonym for a film. Stephen King did it in the late 70’s publishing stories as Richard Bachman to see if he would have the same success with a different name. These stories were largely unpopular until it was revealed they were done by King, at which point Rage, Thinner, The Running Man, and many other Richard Bachman stories were revealed to be Stephen King and became successful. How great would it be to see Uwe Boll or M. Night do this and have a film get nothing but high praise? If we loved it then we find later it was done by a “bad” director would our thoughts about the director change or just our thoughts about the movie? Or what is Sam Raimi or Wes Craven used a pseudonym and we panned the film? If we found out it was them all along would we think any less of them or would the film suddenly become a cult classic despite previous bad reviews? It’s really something I would love to see happen one day, but with this crazy thing called the internet there is no way anyone would be able to keep a secret like that anymore.
I have always found reactions to directors to be quite interesting. I love seeing who’s excited for a film because of a certain director and then their good or bad opinions once the film comes out. I just sometimes think we give too much credit to some directors for films they did a long time ago, while other directors get panned because their most recent movies were crap and it doesnt matter how many good films they did prior. Funny the way the minds of us genre fans work.
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