do you ever stop loving a film you loved?

[BJBMK2]

I can't share the Dogma love sadly. I rewatched it recently, and it's SO self indulgent, so impenetrable in terms of it's in jokes and clever-clever religious allusions, it gets suffocating. I barely made it past the shit, unfunny disclaimer, for a start. Honestly took a few goes.

Someone clearly gave Kev far too much praise for the Chasing Amy monologues, cos every line of every character goes on for about two mins, it's the worst excesses of the 90s, post Tarantino trend of wordy, pop philosophic dialogue. It makes scenes that should zip by with energy and action, feel lumpen and glacial.

It's why I actually prefer Jay And Silent Bob Strike Back. Cos in that one, he knows that he's making a fanservice-filled, dick and fart film, and it delivers on that, despite anything else you could say about it. Dogma wants to be more then that, it wants to be a FILM. But it can't escape the trap of being a Kevin Smith Film.

(Having said that, I actually think he did manage to make a properly good film with Red State, and he managed to do that without relying on his usual tropes and fallbacks. Once.)

[Waking Life]

My favourite film growing up was Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey. I can see why too, as it had all the fantastical elements I still enjoy to this day. I only saw Excellent Adventure a few years later; while good (and I know it's generally considered better), it felt like more of a dress rehearsal. But that's obviously due to the subjectivity from how I watched them.

I went back to it probably close to a decade ago, although seems a lot more recent. I did still enjoy it but more because of the familiarity in terms of how I'd hardwired it in my head. I'm sure it's still an enjoyable film on its own terms, but I can't actually remove myself from my youthful eyes, no matter how critical I try to be. Home Alone 1, 2, and the Muppet's CC are similar in this regard and get stress tested every year. Think it's also a lot easier to return to comedy though.

There are definitely other films I thought I loved that I wouldn't get as much out of now, particularly from the late 90s. But I was a very different person then, so it stands to reason my tastes - particularly with drama - will be quite different. Before Sunrise is a perhaps one-and-done anyway but I struggled on a rewatch to get enthused. American Beauty is both cringe and horrifying, although my sister rightly pointed out that the dynamics were still appalling back in 1999. But to go back to the title, did I 'love' these films anyway? Or did they just change my perspective a bit at the time? Obviosuly in 2024, my film watching has gotten a lot wider and more diverse, so things won't hit the same. The other big difference between my teenage self and my middle aged self is that I could effortlessly watch films over and over back then, partly due to a very different perspective on time and a more focused attention span. This again impacts objectivity.

I think with a lot of these discussions, you inevitably start straying from subjective appreciation into how a particular film you grew up with holds up from a 2024 lens. And we're probably more critical in this regard than we'd be about films from the 50s and 60s, which you'd typically view on their own terms.

One of the best ways to stress test it (again) is to watch a particular film with someone who has never seen it before (especially if you've hyped it at any point). I end up watching the film through their eyes and can be a lot more objective about it; I can usually tell by the end if they've liked it or not.

[paddy72]

I watched Mike Leigh's Naked a couple of years ago. Not sure if it's me, the film, or a hit of both, but I found it far less exhilarating than my memory of it in the cinema on release.

The things I disliked became impossible to ignore, and all the things I liked fell flat.

I had this exact same experience very recently. Thewlis's performance is still great of course, but my main obstacle on revisiting it was that Johnny is just an annoying twat.

You'd just tell him to fuck off, which admittedly would make for quite a short film.

[Minami Minegishi]

I had this exact same experience very recently. Thewlis's performance is still great of course, but my main obstacle on revisiting it was that Johnny is just an annoying twat.

You'd just tell him to fuck off, which admittedly would make for quite a short film.

I've always hated Cartlidge's performance, and the Landlord. Thewlis comes across as an annoying twat and his eulogies are rubbish. I didn't find the third act revelation about his childhood abuse very moving, and it did little to dent my frustration with his misogyny and sexual violence. Leigh's use of Bremner is only slightly more sophisticated than Linehan's tired use of Limmy. 

The film is saved by Lesley Sharp, who is the only believable human being. Also, the music is good, and some of the shots are really great - a step up from Leigh's previous films.