What makes a movie, show, or book "just work"?

It Follows has brought to mind, “what makes a movie work?” to me since I first watched it a few years ago. When some of my favorite horror films include Us and The Babadook, which get at themes of class, grief, and motherhood, I find myself really stopping to appreciate movies, books, and stories that feel “simple” yet really work. For me, It Follows satisfies what I want from a horror film: to be scared, to feel a sense of dread –  and originally I thought it does this by sticking to a simple premise and story and doing it well. I still believe this, but as I watched it again more recently, I found myself appreciating the elegance of what I originally perceived to be its “simpler” themes (a childish game, a sex demon), and I also noticed that when I was giving myself time to think a bit about the acting and what the characters were going through (Jay needing to have sex to try and buy herself more time, and essentially sacrificing the lives of others in order to protect herself), that there is more depth there if I give myself time to notice it.

What makes a “good” movie and what one might believe to be the “best” movie is pretty subjective.

I used to spend an entire class with students coming up with parameters and debating over “which movie is better” (Drive or Baby Driver? The Prestige or The Machinist? …any of the other films we’d watch as the year went on). My partner and I have some overlap in what we appreciate and enjoy watching, but when it comes down to it we often have completely different opinions of what we think “makes a movie good”. For him, he needs good, clean writing. The plotholes can’t be too big, the protagonist needs to be relatable and believable to him, the movie should be understandable and enjoyable upon first viewing. For me, I appreciate good writing, I adore when movies really do show and not tell, I like when there’s some level of depth (but that “depth” can kind of be in a variety of ways), and I get really excited when something is unconventional and mostly working even if it isn’t perfectly executed. I probably couldn’t answer for you what I think the “best” movie is of all time, and my favorites certainly shift depending on my mood, but I think my standards for what I’m looking for in a film have shifted the more that I’ve watched.

I guess it had to be five years ago, in anticipation of Avengers: Infinity War, one of my students was telling me that I needed to watch all of the Marvel films and then go see Inifinity War, too! At the time, I could only shake my head kindly at the number of hours it would take me to do that and admit that I didn’t have the time to do so. I didn’t think it would be a reality for quite some time, but lo and behold, halfway through the pandemic when I was desperate for a fun escapist journey, my partner and I decided we would watch the Marvel movies in chronological order. Now, our viewing experience meant we were watching a film over the course of 3 nights after our babies would go to bed, but we did it. And by watching all of them together like that, we actually found ourselves appreciating and enjoying the movies and the franchise in a way that we hadn’t before. We used to watch a Marvel movie and knit pick at certain things we didn’t like about characterization, or there would always be one moment that just didn’t make sense to us and we would want something different or more. But when we watched them altogether, a new understanding arose for us that “this is the type of movie you get” when you’re watching a Marvel movie, and it turned what we once used to think of as a lazy oversight, or something we believed could’ve been done better, into a charming tick that worked within the rules of the Marvel universe.

This realization unlocked a greater empathy (?) or understanding for us when it came to watching and discussing (ahem, critiquing) movies and shows.

I noticed that this had finally sunken in for us when we watched Tenet for the first time and had all kinds of complaints about it. Where we first couldn’t get over the protagonist and the distance we felt from his characterization, and then felt frustrated with the development of his relationship with the love interest, after sitting with our thoughts for some time, we developed a greater appreciation for the premise itself and the layers/puzzle it created. I think my brain still hurts trying to make sense of the timeline in that film though, and I probably let my thoughts rest there because trying to map my understanding of the timing to sync up with the relationships and character development just kind of makes my head hurt in a way where I’m not sure it’s worth it to push on. Some day, though!

Because, as I surprised myself earlier this week, I watched both Scream and Scream VI on my own - even finishing them in the evening in a relatively dark room by myself. I love watching horror films, but I typically have to wait for a certain point in my postpartum / breastfeeding journey for my hormones to re-regulate such that my fears don’t eat up my mind and keep coming back as invasive thoughts that make it so I can’t sleep when I’m already sleep deprived getting up multiple times at night to nurse a tiny human. But Scream was worth it to me to make progress with in the dark, and to finish with earbuds in on my phone while rocking the baby to sleep for an afternoon nap. If I felt motivated to watch anxiety inducing slashers, I’m guessing something like Tenet will be on deck in the near future for me.

I’m rambling around today, but what’s been on my mind this week has been what makes something “just work”. The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood has been nudging that thought along for me, too. Horror films by night, and listening to romance (rom-com?) novels by day has made for an interesting juxtaposition. I downloaded The Love Hypothesis to my audible library the same time I did Verity, just because I saw that it had been popular over the last year and figured I might enjoy it. Within the first few minutes of listening to The Love Hypothesis, I found myself giggling. Girl finds herself kissing a most detested yet surprisingly attractive for reasons she thinks she doesn’t understand guy? Pride and Prejudice. We can thank Jane Austen for a formula that has persisted over time. Yet, I think that formula takes quite a bit of care to execute and get right. It takes a slow burn and the long game. Tiny seeds of subtext planted over the course of a story unfolding. It’s been years since I’ve re-read Pride and Prejudice, but I’ve seen it come up time and again in You’ve Got Mail, Bridgerton, and The Perfect Date. Girl makes smart / overconfident assumptions about a tall dark and handsome guy based on rumors and gossip? Check. Two attractive people forced to be in a fake relationship? Oh, you know what’s coming. But where’s the line? If it’s predictable, how do you avoid being cheesy or cliché?

And that, my friends, is probably how I’ve wound up writing about a horror film and romcoms in the same post:

We can build suspense and anticipation in order to ready an audience for a jump scare or to make us sit with a sense of dread. We can also build suspense and anticipation in order to make an audience long for connection… both physical and emotional. When we know what’s coming, we wait in anticipation for it. I guess it’s what a storyteller does with the time in between the plant and the payoff that lets us determine whether something “works” or not. (OK, I guess this is a thread I’m going to have to pull on more another day).

Thanks for reading this far if you have!

❤️‍🔥 Cara