Michael Bay Is An Asshat: The Nature of Art

So here I am, moseying about the interwebnets, gazing at pictures from my favorite movies, reading some amusing dialogue from Overheard in New York, and generally having no life outside of my computer, when I come across this charming little quote:

"It's easy to go shoot an art movie in a winery in the South of France. But people have no idea how hard it is to create something like Transformers." - Michael Bay

Now, I'm not a huge "art film" lover. One, because a lot of so-called "art films" do come off as fucking pretentious, and two, because I look at movies in general as an artistic medium. Calling something an "art film" implies that movies of other genres somehow aren't art just because they don't involve cleverly placed metaphors and a hand held camera set to black and white. A flick doesn't have to be some eloquently pieced together existentialist commentary on the futility and/or beauty of existence in order to be classified as "art".

But I digress.

Regardless of my general dislike for "art films", my first reaction to Michael Bay's statement was something along the lines of 'way to belittle an entire genre due to your own shortcomings, you unoriginal box office whore. Go masturbate to Armageddon and shut the fuck up'.

But then I thought about it. I thought about the words "it's easy to go shoot an art movie", and I came to the conclusion that he's right. Kind of. Maybe.

What Bay said - when looked at literally - is correct, along with being sickeningly arrogant. I dislike the man and I don't think he deserves to be regarded as a gifted or particularly important figure in movie history.

But the words "shooting an art movie is easy" are true. It is easy to make an art film. What isn't easy is making a good art film.

See, art is such a difficult thing to define that nearly anything can be considered art. Honestly, anyone can be an artist. That's easy. But it's not easy to create art that is skillful, meaningful, and ultimately worthwhile.

There will always be artists that are pretentious douchebags, and having to deal with them is an unfortunate aspect of being involved in any art community, no matter the medium (in this case, it just happens to be movies). But at the same time, there needs to be bad art. If there weren't, good art wouldn't really matter. People would say "oh, yeah, Billy painted a masterpiece today" the same way they "oh, yeah, Billy put on his pants without falling down". People would stop giving a shit quality.

Sorry for going off on a bit of a tangent regarding my views on art, but holy fuck, it's these shitty, misinformed statements that really get my brain cooking. It pissed me off when I first read it, but I wouldn't let myself comment on it until I'd thought about why exactly it irked me so much. I don't consider myself an authority on art, nor am I particularly educated in the way of "art films", but anyone who shit-talks an entire genre 'cause they're feeling "underappreciated" really needs to shove their foot down their throat and think a little before they start flapping their filthy rich lips.

Rich whiney cunt.