FILM OF THE NINETIES
The nostalgic Mode of the Postmodern and Nostalgia as a Theme and Symbol of the End of the Century
The artistic merit of a postmodern work
is often found in the unexpected joining of elements in
the various chapters of cultural history, and in the mixing
of genres, styles, conventions and cliches. This presumption
that the paradigm is exhausted, and that innovation is
trickery can be interpreted as nostalgia for a time when
there was still faith in the power of creation and poetry.
Accordingly, this type of nostalgic sentimentality is sometimes
invalidated, while, at other times, it is enriched through
an ironic viewpoint.
A paradigmatic example of this type of film nostalgia
during the eighties and nineties is Tim Burton, whose films
exude nostalgia at various representative levels — from
the overall structure to the mood of his characters and
various motifs. Exceptional expamples of this are the films Batman (1989), Batman
Returns (1992), Ed Wood (1994), Tim Burton’s Nightmare Before Christmas (Henry
Selick, 1993), Mars Attacks!, 1996), as well as Midnight in the Garden
of Good and Evil (Clint Eastwood 1997), in which
a pathological obsession with a traumatic childhood and
a nostalgia for a nonexistent ideal society are at the
forefront.
Unlike the eighties, the end of the nineties produced
a number of very good films that, on the surface, resemble
the manifestations of this postmodern sensibility, but
that could not be pared down to the same stylistic paradigm
(Pleasantville,
Gary Ross, 1998, The Wedding Singer, Frank Coraci,
1998, Blast from
the Past Hugh Wilson, 1998). Not even the manaristic
broadness of Blast
from the Past and The Wedding Singer can
be compared to the richness of Batman’s para-narative
structure.
On a note not related to a concrete decade, it is worth
mentioning how the above mentioned films by Tim Burton
are exceptionally postmodernistic, just like Midnight
in the Garden of Good and Evil, while in the case
of Pleasantville, The
Wedding Singer and Blast from the Past,
the execution (which is in great part typical of postmodernistic
art) is a secondary property of the structure. Even
if it would be excessive to assert that these three
films represent a return to realism/mimetism (in the
sense of the classic Hollywood style), we would not
be mistaken in saying that they do signify a return to
some genres — the romanitc comedy, and even to some
extent, the screwball. However, this time around, they
are devoid of the irony that marked the return of the melodrama/horror
in films such as Edward Scissorhands, Tim Burton,
1990.
Nikica Gilić |
