14 Thoughts on “Overthinking it, indeed

  1. marc on July 28, 2011 at 6:37 am said:

    As to the article. Really? Really? This is what the academically precocious raised on theory are pondering these days? Really? And the presumption that what is being discussed is somehow new, nuanced and interesting.

    And not even a nod to the notion that the Collins track was chosen because the attempt might be to unify as much of the audience as possible through the most economical means, using a cultural artifact most of us have been forced to recognize and remember (except Dale, of course). Perhaps in order to produce something beyond what the lackluster filmic treatment of the sequence could accomplish.

    Familiarity breeds consent. What the hipsters seem to resent is how a cheesy artifact has been brilliantly constructed and rendered memorable. It’s Phil Collins! Dude, I can’t handle it. That is the trauma this “theorization” is really trying to countenance and render comprehensible.

  2. turff on July 28, 2011 at 7:16 am said:

    The article took me to a chapter in the recently-read Medici Effect (tons of good discussion fodder for our creatively-inclined selves in there, BTW) that talks about how creativity is enhanced by having low associative barriers, and how expertise in a given field tends to (by means of channeling thought along established paths) tends to create high associative barriers.

    I will confess that while I did not miss the drum fill, I did know exactly which scene would be in the video when I saw “In the Air Tonight” and “Risky Business”. Certain associations are more effectively imbedded than others.

    I also do not understand why anyone would chose to end that clip where the poster did.

  3. marc on July 28, 2011 at 9:13 am said:

    I second that question. Bizarre. Unless they were aspiring to a touch of arbitrariness in the delimiting of their fragment after the fashion of Roland Barthes in S/Z. Of course, of course. If Barthes wasn’t hopelessly outdated in theory circles I’d be certain that was it. Hmm.

  4. marc on July 28, 2011 at 9:20 am said:

    What do we call “associative” before it hits the snort and sniff of acute conscious awareness? I want a strategy that allows me to not really know what I’m doing. Maybe that contributes to the low barrier.

  5. turff on July 28, 2011 at 12:34 pm said:

    I don’t know Barthes. Does he traffic in the study of “How the pubescent brain retains forever anything related to sex especially if it includes Rebecca De Mornay”?

  6. Jeff on July 28, 2011 at 1:04 pm said:

    I’m all about low associative barriers. That’s why I’m going to Cowboys and Aliens this weekend, and I plan to damn well enjoy it. I’m also drawn to this concept of perverse readings. I’m surely guilty of that, even though I didn’t have a name for it. I have never found “author’s intent” as interesting as what a reader / viewer / consumer brings to a particular work.

    I’ve never seen Risky Business.

  7. marc on July 28, 2011 at 1:45 pm said:

    That’s quite a final confession from our Keeper of Popular Consciousness.

    Pubescent Brain dating using the figures of our first fixations. As effective as carbon dating. I’d trade my Charlie’s Angels for your Rebecca DeMornay anyday.

  8. marc on July 28, 2011 at 1:48 pm said:

    I’m especially jealous of those pimply tikes for whom the first fixation will be Olivia Wilde.

  9. First fixation … Jessica Lange tied to those posts as the natives chanted all around her. Something awakened in me in that dark movie theater in Griffin, Georgia.

  10. marc on July 29, 2011 at 6:27 am said:

    I remember seeing photos of outtakes in some magazine (like Time–weird) where Kong pulled down her top.

  11. turff on July 30, 2011 at 11:50 pm said:

    Jeff, I typed 3 different responses to that last post of yours. Was unwilling to take ownership of any of them, so I kept the fourth.

    marc, I consider you a friend, and would give you many things for the asking (typed “thinks” back there the first time), but I am unwilling to make the proffered trade.

  12. Understood, Turff. We are what we yearned for. No chance to change that. I’ve learned to make do.

    (Just had a redeeming memory of Jenny Agutter in Logan’s Run. Feeling less forlorn.)

  13. I’m enjoying the unintended excursions on this string. Who gives a shit about art and criticism when you can reminisce about early autoerotic companions. Really, Dale, it’s fun.

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