Crackbook & Marty

Zeitgeisters,

I‘ve admitted to a minor Facebook addiction in these pages. But if anything will cure that, it’s questionable applications like the “Which Hollywood Director Are You” quiz.

The quiz offers a series of not very challenging questions like “What’s Your Scene? – Bars, Sports, Clubs, Outdoors or Music”; after doing 10 vague multip;e choice questions like these, I hit the submit button, only to receive the news that I was 45% like Martin Scorsese. I was mercifully 0% like Steven Spielberg, but if you’d ever met me, you’d know I am actually NOTHING like the director of Taxi Driver, Goodfellas and The Aviator. Scorsese is the fast-talking, enthusiastic movie expert whose visceral, violent flicks have explored the American male psyche for a generation. Me? I enjoy watching the Gilmore Girls.

If I’m like any of the choices on offer in this quiz, then I bear some resemblance to the nerdly Steven Soderbergh. The slack questions lead to a 2% match with this director, so I could tell right there that the whole set-up was screwy. I'm sure Steve is an avid follower of the antics of Rory and Lorelei Gilmore in Stars Hollow.

I meet a number of filmmakers at Media Dell’Arte, where I work, and I think 99% of them would resemble Scorsese, if you asked them the same loosely-worded questions.

As much as I have enjoyed Scorsese’s work previously (Raging Bull would make my Top 10) I am a little disappointed with his latest outing. A short bit of blah called the Key to Reserva (check it out here or here). Basically it’s a commercial for wine done in the style of a Hitchcock film. It is presented as a real ‘behind the scenes’ film showing what Scorsese would do if he found some unfilmed Hitchcock script pages. Parts of it are very well done, but in the end I found it hard not to feel, meh – why’d you bother with this ad, Marty?

Pastiche and or homage always feels like a tremendous waste of energy and resources to me. The Key to Reserva is in a similar category to Baz Luhrmann’s ludicrous (and well-paying) Chanel No.5 commercial with Nicole Kidman. Luhrmann seemed to be pastiching himself in that one and it’s hard to say if that’s better or worse.

For some reason I am not judgemental about Scorsese’s very amusing American Express commercial.

So, providing that I’m entertained, that makes rampant commercialism and hocking one’s name for a product, acceptable, I guess.

Hmm.

Mr Trivia