Traverse City Record-Eagle

2010 Traverse City Film Festival

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  • U of M screen arts and cultures professor Hugh Cohen talks about trouble he faced in the late 1960s for showing a controversial film that's considered tame by today's standards during Wednesday's "How to Be Smart by Going to the Movies in a Dumbed-Down Society," panel at the City Opera House. From top are filmmaker Ben Hickernell, Cohen, U of M professor Marcus Nornes and filmmaker Michael Moore. Record-Eagle/Jan-Michael Stump

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July 29, 2010

Panelists call movie lovers to big screen

BY SHERI McWHIRTER smcwhirter@record-eagle.com

TRAVERSE CITY — High-quality films continue to be made across the United States and around the world, it's just a matter of whether today's audiences see them.

A Traverse City Film Festival panel Wednesday bemoaned the lack of audiences willing to immerse themselves in a movie at a theater. More and more people watch on small-screened computers and handheld devices, members said during a discussion about film literacy.

"We as filmmakers put so much into the art and it's meant to be seen in a theater," said Academy Award-winning director and festival founder Michael Moore.

Movie watching should not be a solitary experience, but a collective journey as part of an audience, he said.

Director Julia Bacha, whose film "Budrus" is featured at the festival, said online social networking is a tool that can be harnessed to build anticipation about a film and then spread the word through the digital world.

Director Ben Hickernell agreed and reinforced how online tools should attempt to draw viewers into theaters for that collective movie-watching experience. His film "Lebanon, PA," screens for a second time Sunday.

Hickernell said film-watchers often miss key elements when viewing a movie on a computer, pausing to answer the telephone and other tasks. They may finish the film, but don't take away as much, he said.

"They are more concerned about getting there than watching the movie," Hickernell said.

Part of the struggle surrounds film distribution, the panel agreed.

It's become difficult for documentary and independent filmmakers to land distribution deals, particularly in a down economy when movie studios look for guaranteed profits from their investments, Moore said.

Hickernell said what used to help such filmmakers is regional movie critics at newspapers across the United States who helped draw in movie-goers. Declines in the newspaper industry led to the demise of widespread regional movie critics and that presents new challenges, Moore said.

Moore suggested part of the problem also is generational, noting how much of downtown Traverse City's State Theatre audience is composed of older people. Younger people tend not to seek the communal movie-house experience as often as their elders, he said.

"I'm concerned that we haven't done a very good job of instilling that desire ... to the next generation. I think we've created a couple generations of film illiterates," Moore said.

Benjamin Busch, of Reed City, attended the panel discussion and asked the panelists how independent filmmakers like himself can engage the current "fast-moving culture" to take time to consider characters and themes.

"I worry. It's a generation of incredible distraction," he said. "The subtle is often overrun."

Other panelists included professors Hugh Cohen and Markus Nornes, from the University of Michigan's Department of Screen Arts and Culture. Cohen teaches film criticism and Nornes specializes in Japanese cinema.

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