Contextual Rogues: Movies Displaced in Time

Originally written 2021-10-15 but blogger was being an arse.

This isn’t a theory exactly, more a turn of phrase I created in an attempt to define an issue that arises when watching popular old movies. The issue of contextual rogues.

“Contextual spillover” is probably a better term but Contextual Rogue sounds cooler.

These are movies like The Godfather, Citizen Kane or Casablanca that are on every film student’s “100 MOVIES TO WATCH BEFORE YOU DIE” lists on IMDb. Movies you are encouraged the watch without being told why – “Just watch it, it’s fantastic, you’ll see what I mean.” While that might seem like a testament to a movie’s legacy, I feel like it encourages the viewer to ignore an integral part of many movies: the cultural context.

Right off the bat, this is not me complaining that everyone who doesn’t do hours of research before watching a movie is watching them “wrong”. I know that’s not a reasonable ask. But what I’d like to point out is that certain movies – the film buff favorites – have superseded their contexts.

Context is a cruel barrier in terms of how movies are perceived in later years, but I also understand that nothing exists in a vacuum and everything is a remix. Movies are informed by the eras and cultures they were made in, making them cultural time capsules of sorts. And if you need to do a deep dive on a movie for a research project, you quickly realize how much cultural influence informs movies. That all goes without saying, I guess. Of course movies are reflective of the cultures they’re made in. The “WHAT ARE THOOOSE??” joke in Black Panther was relevant at the time of its release but I won’t be surprised if in 50 years no one will remember the reference.

Back to Contextual Rogues: What do I mean that certain movies have superseded their contexts? What I mean is, how you discover a movie informs your first impression, and first impressions may be the only context you enter a movie with. If you are not forced to acknowledge some aspect of when, how, or by whom the movie was made, your interpretation could be wildly different than the filmmakers’ original intention.

I want to use some examples. Specifically, A Clockwork Orange and Boys in the Sand, both released in 1971.

When it first released, you could probably only see A Clockwork Orange at late night theatre viewings. Yes, it’s technically a dystopian future film, but in all other aspects it is a product of the time. If you bought a ticket to this film due to a scandalized review in your local paper, you knew what you were getting into. You are the intended viewer. I was not an intended viewer. Doesn’t mean I can’t watch it, but the filmmakers behind A Clockwork Orange did not make it with the intention of it being watched by 20 year olds in Toronto in the year 2020.

Back to the modern era. Let’s say your first exposure to A Clockwork Orange is when one of your buddies in high school lends you a flash drive containing all his favorite horror movies. You save those to your PC and watch them indiscriminately. Your only context in that situation is that A Clockwork Orange is a “horror” movie. You know nothing of Stanley Kubrick, of Anthony Burgess, or the cultural climate that movie was made in. You are not one of those kids watching the movie in a shady cinema in Liverpool at midnight in 1971. I’m not saying that’s a bad thing, but it’s a fact that I think is worth acknowledging, even just passively.

The means by which A Clockwork Orange was found and watched in this situation gives no indication of the cultural context. Its popularity and notoriety have reached a point where you do not need to have an interest in dystopian or experimental cinema in order to find it. Maybe Kubrick wanted to create a gripping and surrealist commentary on society and issues of humanism, but all you went into it hoping for was a good horror movie.

Personally, I found out about A Clockwork Orange through WatchMojo videos around 2013. I didn’t watch it in full until much later but I had no real context for it in the beginning either.

I’ll come back to this later, but what I’m saying is, most movies are obscure. Most movies are obscure. Most movies exist within their own pigeonholes, but a select few have gotten popular enough that they’ve flown the coop. Or flown the dovecote, rather.

The next example I had was Boys in the Sand. I admit this is a recent fascination… but whatever.

Boys in the Sand is a gay porn film. A culturally significant one, to be sure, but still, a porn film. It is not a movie your high school English teacher would recommend to you. It is not a movie anyone outside very specific online forums would recommend to you. Unless you were an 80’s kid home alone watching your dad’s secret tape collection I highly doubt you’d stumble across it by accident. Boys in the Sand (I’m shortening it to Boys) exists in a pigeonhole – the Gay Porn pigeonhole. I did not find it watching WatchMojo, I found it by scrolling through a twitter account that posts vintage gay porn. My expectations were immediately tempered by the environment I was in. To find A Clockwork Orange, all I had to do was watch some random youtube videos when I was 13. To find Boys in the Sand, I needed to be actively looking for gay porn.

Boys in the Sand is not a Contextual Rogue. It is not mainstream, which I think helps preserve its historical context. Because it isn’t mainstream, you do not have a whole swath of people instinctively filtering their perception of the movie through a 21st century lens and posting lengthy video essays about it on YouTube. Which I suppose is unfortunate in some ways, since pornography is its own fascinating reflection of culture and is worthy of study, but I know it has plenty of its own dedicated scholars.

Anyway, the concept I’m trying to define here is very vague, but it’s been on my mind for a while now, the idea that all these “classic” movies are now strangers in strange lands, original meanings lost to time.

Or maybe this whole thing was just an excuse for me to talk about Boys in the Sand cuz I’m currently enraptured by it. I’d never seen gay porn shot before the 2010s before that. I knew once I got into Soft Cell that I had an innate fascination with retro queer culture, so I feel like I’m on the precipice of a rabbit hole. lol. I love how part 2 starts out with a totally logical setup and then BAM, Bath Bomb Boyfriend. That Casey Donovan ain’t too shabby looking, either. I’m not huge into buff dudes but they look good on their knees. Him in part 3... holy shit. If that’s not an art, I don’t know what is.

Also the camera’s keen focus on the male member has inspired me to try and use a slinky to create a packer with more realistic physics. Wish me luck.

Rest in power, Casey.

Bolton Fall Fair, but more morbid than usual

I went to the Bolton Fall Fair last weekend, braving covid and pubescent boys in camo pants in an attempt to ride The Scrambler and get some artistic photos. The Scrambler has been there so long I know exactly how to hook myself in and hook myself out all by myself. My brother wasn’t in the mood this year so I went solo.                                                                                                                                                                   Anyway, shit has been happening, if you haven’t heard. Things rarely depress me – I tend to just go all Doctor My Eyes and become numb to prevent myself from feeling any negative emotions. I think it’s maybe the British heritage. Anyway, this whole fair felt like a Doctor My Eyes moment.                                                                                                                                                                   Canada is still in performative mourning after the “discovery” of countless child graves associated with Indian Residential Schools. (I’m posting this on the first annual Truth and Reconciliation Day. I remember I used to gawk at the fact that Australia has a National Sorry Day but at least they’re actually trying to say sorry. I can’t help but think “reconciliation” is code for “getting the natives to forgive us”. They don’t owe colonizers forgiveness. I digress.) The flags have all been half-mast for what feels like 6+ months now – you can’t really be sure what they’re half-mast for anymore.                                                                                                                                                                    Anyway, there was this flashy new ride there, the Freak Out, and upon approaching it from the library I caught both the ride and the lowered flag at the perfect angle.                                                                                                                                                                  

It’s poetry in motion.                                                                                                                                                                    Another clip I captured was the Ferris wheel. I’m actually really bummed about the Ferris wheel – the model the fair used to have was the exact same model Childish Gambino and the teddy bear were riding in the 3005 music video, but alas, I knew that rickety old thing would be replaced eventually.                                                                                                                                                                   The Ferris wheel had its own speakers that were blaring music, mostly hits from 2020. And to preface this, covid is far from over – we recently entered the fourth wave – so this fair happened amid covid. And in a poetic stroke or morbid happenstance that I could not have scripted better, the Ferris wheel played Level of Concern, the song Twenty One Pilots wrote specifically about covid-induced anxiety. I wish the video I got was longer, but the ride operators were giving me looks.                                                                                                                                                                  

                                                                                                                                                                   The last decent image I got was a carnie taking a rest in his teacup ride, which I personally feel has huge “how tf am i an essential worker” vibes. This was near the end of Friday. night when things were winding down. I think his last rider was one little kid wearing noise-cancelling earmuffs, having a blast by himself. Me and you both, lil dude.                                                                                                                                                                  

The symbolism writes itself in this case, I think.

The Strokes present Tesco

An off-the-cuff post, to elaborate on my recent hyperfixation. Also, elaboration on the intro of the last post: I think what I really wanted out of blogspot was an alternative to LiveJournal. LiveJournal was servicable and I did use it for a bit, but it did not have the option to customize the page to look like a really cheesy wesite from 1996, so blogspot is clearly the supirior platform.

Anyway: The Strokes. I am late to the goddamn party, huh? Well if anything I'm just in time, cuz it is very rare that I get into a band while they're still putting out new music or touring. 80% of the bands I listen to are either inactive, all dead, or in a foreign country. Possibly a combination of those elements. Frankly it feels somewhat odd to be into a band that's still relevant.

Being born in 2000, I did not know The Strokes were a big thing growing up. I was far more concerned with being a caterpillar vet in 2009 than I was about simping for Julian Casablancas, so I feel like I am absolved of any guilt there. Spotify recommended some stuff from their Room On Fire album to me around 2019, and Reptilia and Last Nite lived in my playlists for a while, but I did not give them a second thought beyond that. I think I assumed they and Jet were the same band for a while.

 

from the video for Instant Crush, 2013

It wasn't until I watched the video for Instant Crush by Daft Punk that I began to pay them any mind. I admit the initial draw was a shallow one, the song's title rather prophetic. I joked on twitter that Julian Casablancas is what Rodrick Heffley would look like if he actually succeeded at music - a joke I'll probably re-use if I ever get that movie review made, probably accompanied by Alex Turner's "I just wanted to be one of The Strokes" line from Star Treatment.

Frickin wannabe... (Rodrick Rules, 2011)

 

I suppose I could go into my theory about Rodrick Heffley being an aesthetic caricature of Julian Casablancas, and how that fits into my assertion that Diary of the Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules perfectly captured the bittersweet moment of my generation in liminality, but I won't bore you with that here. I'll probably bore you with it in its own blog post.

Anyway, I'm still discovering The Strokes, so there's not a lot to say on that front yet, but it wasn't Spotify where I first heard them. Arguably Last Nite was ruined for me before I ever got to enjoy it, by British advertising.

Growing up, me, my mum and my brother would always spend a month visiting family in Scotland, usually June. My dad would sometimes come along if he found something interesting to do while there. It doesn't sound like I spent a lot of time there but it was enough to pick up a pretty significant dose of the culture, or at least a semi-antiquated version considering I mostly spent the time with my grandparents and watching tv. I didn't know it at the time but I was in the midst of a full-blown American invasion - Strokesmania, the media tried calling it.

The Strokes were huge in Britain, or at least that's what I'm beginning to understand, which helps explain some things. I can see it in the genealogy of British music, now that I look closely - The Strokes were a freak transient species from a foreign land that managed to cross over a vast ocean and drastically changed the genetic makeup of their new home. After a while, speciation began to occur and new bands emerged, a hybrid of foreign and native genetics. Arctic Monkeys is a good example of this. Perhaps also The Kooks, Franz Ferdinand and The Fratellis. If I were older and discovered The Strokes sooner I imagine I might not have been so blasé upon discovering them. It's not novel now, because now EVERYONE sounds like The Strokes. I guess that's the curse of being the first of your kind, and being damningly successful at it.

 

But anyway, British commercialism. That's how I found The Strokes. I cannot recall the specific advertisement but it was something so incredibly mundane that it forever tainted by perception of Last Nite. I'm not sure if it was Tesco exactly, it may have been a tv channel bumper considering how simple it was, but it was incredibly forgettable. It was just some graphics that slid onto the screen while the song played in the background. No narration, just a caption that said "30% off Orange Squash at ASDA™" or "iTV+ now only £700 a month" or something like that. I guess I could pester Reddit to try and find it but I imagine there's about three dozen mid-2000s British ads that used Last Nite and I don't hold the memory particularly dear. The song portion the ad used was between 0:28 and 0:54. Listening to those lyrics again, I feel like a tv provider was probably the most likely source.

I was never huge into Last Nite (and apparently Julian is sick of it now) so I don't consider it a huge loss, but I hate that I have the exact same experience with Under Cover of Darkness, a song I actually would like to love but has been tainted in the exact same way. The first 15 seconds were used to advertise something similarly mundane, like a new sitcom about hot 20-somethings getting caught in scandalous love triangles and avoiding adult responsibilities.

The Strokes were not the only victims, by a long shot. Like I said, I only ever spent one month out of every year in Scotland, but that was more than enough time for my perceptions of Alright by Supergrass, Young Folks by Peter Bjorn and John, Home by Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros and Chelsea Dagger by The Fratellis to be tarnished forever as well. I feel sorry for all the full-time Brits out there. First impressions are everything - Strokes album reference partially intended.

(I'd never seen the music video for Alright before hunting down that link but my god that's the most British music video I've ever seen. Yes I unironically want that pearly outfit at the start.)

So, yeah, adverts were my real first exposure to The Strokes, sadly. I mean I guess it all ties into my morbid fascination with how the human condition is now intrinsically tied to the parasite of western commercialism. I've looked into a few of Julian's extracurricular efforts, and while I haven't done a deep dive yet I must commend his truth-seeking attitude. I imagine he leads a very comfortable life, and could very easily ignore most of America's political and economic problems if he wanted to, but stays resolutely engaged nonetheless. It's a very welcome reminder that I have no good excuse not to self-educate myself on current world issues.

That's been my short journey with The Strokes so far. I've been spewing a lot of Strokes stuff on twitter lately so hopefully this helps get a bit of it out of my system. I was going to close this off by discussing The Strokes' legacy as represented in real person fanfiction (RPF), but I think I'll save that can o' worms for another day. No truly succesful band can escape the curse of RPF, and after minimal investigation it appears The Strokes have been dragged into some particularly sordid waters.

There's a lot of content out there for me to catch up on, but as a former Beatles fan, I'm wary of idol worship. At the same time, though, I wonder if I'm not giving them the credit they deserve. It's really hard to say. 

I think I'll close off with this currently pop-culture relevant parody, which is modern art if I ever saw it. (If the video doesn't work for you, just search up " 'peaches' except it's the strokes " on YouTube.)

Ruffy Launch

 RUFFY HAS LAUNCHED: LINK

I want to start using this blog as the central hub where I share my thoughts. Yeah, it's like I'm stuck in 2009, but this was the appeal - It's not as restrictive as Twitter, more customizable than Facebook, not as hopelessly obscure as DeviantArt's journals, and also it isn't Facebook.

So yeah, launched a second channel! I've had the idea for Ruffy in the back of my mind for a while now.

This was my very first sketch of her - I was trying out different bird species, both Canadian and British, but I'm kinda partial towards Ruffed Grouse for multiple reasons. First off, they're chooks. They're lil chikkens. Who doesn't love a lil chikken.

The first place I heard of the Ruffed Grouse was probably The Dog Who Wouldn't Be by Farley Mowat, which my dad read to me when I was little. In the scene, a man expreses doubt at Mutt's skill as a hunter. Farley's father, insulted, takes out a rifle, mocks firing it, and Mutt takes off - never mind that this scene takes place in the middle of town, far from any wild game.

But Mutt is still victorius - he comes back with a Ruffed Grouse, "already stuffed and mounted".

I could only assume that the Ruffed Grouse was a particularly magnificent bird.

 

I've actually seen a Ruffed Grouse. Once. It was at our friends' cottage and I was able to get some very blurry photos of it. I think Ruffy was in the blueprint stages at this point so I was very excited to see one in real life.

 

Originally I was going to animate Ruffy in plasticine (which is the reason she's almost entirely orange), but that's like pulling teeth, yo. I have so much respect for Will Vinton, who worked almost exclusively in plasticine. I might pursue a stop-motion route if I can come up with a sturdier puppet, but I imagine lip syncing in plasticine is a nightmare.

So yeah, I want to try and use this blog more. Still to talk about my interests, but perhaps also to house my life updates as well.

OneRepublic: my first concert was the most forgettable

 

OneRepublic were a band. They still are a band, I suppose, but I think their peak of relevancy was around 2009-2014. Good Life was the first song I bought on iTunes. They were my first concert. Apparently they’re a lot of people’s first concerts. Interpret that how you may.  

The problem is, OneRepublic are cursed. They are too musically conservative to garner any praise yet too musically adept to receive any ire. And so, they are irrelevant. They are the eye of the pop music hurricane. They may have been my first concert but I could not begin to name a member of the band beyond Ryan Tedder, the front man.

I attended the concert (April 24, 2015) with what was essentially a chaperone, which is sad, but in all honesty, I did not begin to genuinely think for myself until 2018. To be fair, she wasn’t a chaperone, she was a part of this program that would assign autistic kids such as myself a “Big Sister” or “Big Brother”. I know the program had noble intentions but in hindsight it all seems slighlty orwellian.

Anyway, OneRepublic were good, I suppose. When they sang Good Life they changed the line “Colorado” to “Toronto”, which I appreciated.

(I want to try an make an effort to sound somewhat upbeat on this blog. I promise I’m generally a pretty optimistic person.)

I think that concert was a good exercise for me. I love concerts now. COVID kinda put the breaks on concerts – the 2020 OK Go concert I bought tickets for has been postponed indefinaly, with the singer Damian catching and subsequently recovering from COVID during the interim – but I saw Coldplay live last time they were in Toronto and it was killer. They’re at their strongest live.

Anyway, I do still have fond memories of OneRepublic, even if the tour shirt I bought there was a size too small. After that concert, I learned that, indeed, I can handle live events, and have been to some plays, a festival, and Dan and Phil’s first live show (that’s a story in itself). I’m stockpiling a list of bands I want to see in the After Times.

 Video: Ryan Tedder injecting the chorus of "Stay With Me" into the end of their song "Apologize". I took this with my iPod.

Testing

 Aaaaaaaaa this is a test I have no idea how this works