It's Only a Movie!: Films and Critics in American Culture

Abstract

Film critics emerged around 1900, discussing the form's merit and its influence on the public. A smaller group debated whether motion pictures constituted a viable art form. The critic's role in the success or failure of films is the subject of Raymond J. Haberski Jr.'s survey of American film criticism. Sparked by lamentations of recent film critics concerning the dearth of “good films” in theaters, Haber-ski argues that what rankles them is the decline of their “cultural authority.” Because contemporary critics sit appalled by the general public's lurid tastes, Haberski examined the film critic's role over time. Through a series of case studies he discovered that current critics often echo the protests and praise of earlier cultural critics. (One of the most interesting concerns Theodore Dreiser's antipathy for movies and the film industry. Dreiser, who considered himself a good socialist, hated a medium that appealed to the masses.) Literary and art critics, who used different language and criteria for assessing their subjects, were the first to examine film seriously. They posed a recurring question for critics: do “movies force a reconsideration of the form and function of art?” Class distinctions often clouded the first generation's appraisal, because serious critics (for example, Van Wyck Brooks, Waldo Frank, and Randolph Bourne) found it difficult to reconcile popular tastes with the expectations of high art. These men regarded movies as a guilty pleasure, fearing they would lure barbarians against the bastions of good taste. The prevailing critical attitude of early-twentieth-century guardians of culture was that middling- and lower-class people lacked the ability to appreciate art. Dwight Macdonald feared a growing “Mass Cult,” which involved the blending of high and low culture into a bastardized Frankenstein monster, spoiling both. Even critically acclaimed movies could lead to the diminution of what critics considered good taste. Taken to an extreme, these attitudes led to censorship. The public had to be protected from the dreck churned out by Hollywood that appealed to prurient interests.