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Why are Black Comedies box office poison?

Started by Sin Agog, December 07, 2018, 04:19:03 AM

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Sin Agog

Had a double-bill of Hitch's The Trouble With Harry and Polanski's The Tenant earlier, and they're both close to my favourite movies by their directors, and they both got completely filleted by critics and audiences at the time.  Then I gots to thinking so's I did, consistently entertaining a genre though it may be, it rarely does well beyond a niche audience.  Monsieur Verdoux was loathed and misunderstood (the poster and the movie).  The King of Comedy was king of nothing when it came out.  Don't think people liked John Huston's Wise Blood too much.  Harold & Maude was not appreciated at all when it came out.  Fear & Loathing and Fight Club only found their feet on video. I'm pretty sure Kind Hearts & Coronets did pretty badly for Ealing. What About Bob? almost fucked up Bill Murray's career for awhile there. Same with The Cable Guy for Jim Carrey. Then there are legions of little gems like The Opposite of Sex, Welcome to the Dollhouse, Zero Effect, Coldblooded and whatnot that did diddly-squat at the box office.

My theory is there's a percentage of the population who are just completely literal-minded. Tell them to feel multiple sensations at once and their circuits will fry.  Or it could be marketing.  I'm not sure, really.  It's the perennial outsider genre.

And before someone else goes there:
QuoteBecause of racism

McChesney Duntz

Dr. Strangelove is about the blackest a comedy can get (since, presumably, everybody on the fucking planet dies in the end), and that was pretty much hailed as a classic from the day it was released. But that's probably the major exception that proves the rule.

And I'd argue that What About Bob? didn't harm Bill Murray's career in the least - in fact, it was a pretty solid critical/commercial success. And Kind Hearts is one of the movies one immediately thinks of when they think of Ealing (another of which, The Ladykillers, qualifies as well).

Would Fargo be considered a black comedy? I'd think so. That did well, youbetcha, yah. (Sorry.)

But your overall point stands - many of those you mention are among my favorite movies ever, so it's a subgenre I definitely applaud.

It may be as simple as most people not liking feeling uncomfortable - it's less the content than the tone. All the films I mentioned above deal in dark subject matter, but they're all raucously, even joyously, entertaining. The trouble tends to be when the pictures push their audiences into places they're not prepared to go (which, I realize, doesn't really rebut your theory at all, does it, just combines the "feel multiple sensations at once" and "marketing" parts of it into a single statement).

But, whatever - let's talk about black comedies, by god. Good black comedies are beloved by me for the simple reason that it's such a hard style to pull off - the bad far outnumber the good, and the bad ones tend to get it so wrong that they make me physically angry, more so than any other failed genre picture. My gorge rises just thinking of the likes of Very Bad Things and War, Inc. and dozens of others whose memories I've suppressed for the sake of my blood pressure - just shrill, smug exercises in unpleasantness for unpleasantness' sake. Or take something like Natural Born Killers, which is an impressive (though tiring after about twenty minutes) technical feat marred by the fact that the director has no demonstrable sense of humor or subtlety or restraint (and I like a number of his movies - the latter two traits can be virtues when used correctly; the first is never a virtue). The Cable Guy, much as I admire the intent behind it, has never worked for me for what I've decided is the opposite reason - it's not dark enough. Some directors hit the balance, then wobble and fall - Welcome to the Dollhouse hits the spot, probably because its protagonist is recognizably human and sympathetic while simultaneously grating and pitiful, and then Happiness ratchets it up several notches and pushes things as far as possible without (to my mind, anyway) falling apart, but everything I've seen of Solondz' since then has played as too gimmicky, too obviously button-pushing and less (perversely) humane to work. (Haven't seen Weiner-Dog yet; one of these days I'll give it a go.)

So, what are good black comedies to you and why? More to the point, what constitutes a black comedy by your definition? Let's dig in. Lots to be said here.

Favorite b.c.s not yet mentioned: To Die For (my favorite Gus Van Sant movie, alongside Drugstore Cowboy, which, come to think of it, is something of a b.c. itself), After Hours (Scorsese's next film after King of Comedy; perfectly cast from top to bottom and a laugh-out-loud nightmare from start to finish), Cheap Thrills (fairly recent, low-budget piece of work, and, like After Hours, one of those films that gets funnier the worse things get - and they get pretty fucking bad)...

There's more, and I've got a crackpot theory or two I'll want to share before too long, but I'll take a breath and leave the above contentions laying there, waiting for someone to tear the fuck out of them. Happy to participate.

greenman

#2
The key to success does really seem to be to build an audience, Kubrick, the Coens or recently Lanthimos and the Mcdonagh's. Look at say War on Everyone, more aimed at trying to break the US being sold as more a "bro" style buddy cop film than his previous audience and pretty much sank without trace.

I'd agree Duntz that the failing of a lot of black comedies isn't just a lack of humour but a lack of humanisation and empathy for anyone within the film just making it a parade of awefulness. Something like Killed of a Sacred Deer I'd say plays off of both, allowing it to make jokes such as Farrell asking the teacher which of his children is "better" that would just seem nasty without the human drama and the humour itself allowing the drama to be pushed to such an extreme degree.

Lisa Jesusandmarychain

How's about " Very Bad Things " ? Misleading poster campaign,  has one of the bleakest endings I ever did saw, and got banned in France, innit ?

( Ah, just read what yer man Cunts has to say about this particular film )

( maintaining my tablets rendition of " Duntz  " )

mothman

Thing is, yer definition of a BC is as vague as calling something a cult film. By the criteria gleaned from this page alone, you could call Avengers: Infinity War a black comedy. To be honest I'm struggling to think of any films I really, really like that you'd call a BC. I quite liked The Last Supper..?

Lisa Jesusandmarychain

" Man Bites Dog " is a top black comedy. It helps that the bloke who's playing the top heartless geriatric- snuffing , randomly murdering, wilfully raping assassin looks like Ryan Stiles. Keeps you in the laughter zone.

Sin Agog

Quote from: mothman on December 07, 2018, 08:39:45 PM
Thing is, yer definition of a BC is as vague as calling something a cult film. By the criteria gleaned from this page alone, you could call Avengers: Infinity War a black comedy. To be honest I'm struggling to think of any films I really, really like that you'd call a BC. I quite liked The Last Supper..?

I haven't actually tried to define it yet, have I?

If you've watched enough of them, you'll find they're as tangible as rom-coms and heist movies.  It's basically gallow's humour.  You can go as far back as Arsenic & Old Lace, or even Thomas de Quincey's On Murder, and see clear parallels with something like In Bruges.  Generally speaking, it involves either the characters, or the filmmakers, treating death (or serious transgression) with levity.  There's a certain tone present in all of them, and you can tell when someone who doesn't quite hear the tone is trying to muscle in on the act, because it usually results in laboured product like the Sweeney Todd movie.

Brundle-Fly

But on U.S. TV, black comedy is king. ie- Breaking Bad, Dexter, Desperate Housewives, The Santa Clara Diet, AHS, Black Mirror...etc