Story or Glitz

MalcolmOng

MalcolmOng

Veteran
Alright guys, it seems this debate has come up alot - which film is better? a well executed film that looks great with a lousy story, or a story that's great but done with lousy execution and worst cinematography?

Now the thing about this is, the logical answer would be that story is king. However, firstly I feel that if anyone fel they had that great a story to tell, they owe it to themselves to make it look great as well. Also, the best stories could be ruined by trippy execution - ie the director accidentally reveals the ending 5 minutes into the show, etc etc. Lastly, having a great story shot with abysmal cinematography and standards, won't it detract from the overall mood of the story? Can anyone imagine, say, Star Wars for all its effects and blitz being shot on 'uncle joe's' brand new handycam, replete with shaky footage, constantly shifting cameramoves, etc. I say it's going to be torture to watch. I'd say with such production values, no matter how great the story is, its wasted.

On the flip side, having a really glitzy blitzy production with special effects extraordinaire might have a really really bad storyline....Imagine they create a multi million dollar action movie based on 'Mary had a little lamb', with no improvisation at all. Everything is entirely lifted from the original nursery rhyme. But they pump money into that thing like water, get star wars level special effects, cast Keira Knightly as mary, and johnny depp as one of the goats(i'm getting a bit influenced by POTC). Under these conditions, I'll bet even the staunchest believers would watch Mary Had A LIttle Lamb high budget, rather than Uncle Joe's great backyard production with great story.

So what are everyone's views on that?
 
BIAS: first let me clarify this by saying i'm what the popcorn-munching anti-art crowd calls a HUGE ****ing filmsnob... because I find value in cinema's potential to explore and reveal the spiritual, cultural, sexual, political, psychological, emotional, and undefinable aspects of human life. now this doesn't entirely relate to the topic, but i've always felt it would do well for everyone to list their personal bias when posting. :)

my view is that good filmmaking is a marriage of form and content. that being said, the characters and their story (content) must exist before the method of delivery (form) can be defined. so in a worst case scenerio, i choose content. but it's doubtful i'd have any real admiration for this hypothetical film.
 
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Well, truth be told my bias is all about the looks of the film. Its got to look professional, feel professional, be professional. Sure I like a good story, but I enjoyed Sin City more than I did El Mariachi, etc.
 
Story Story Story you can have the best looking biggest block buster film but if the story sucks the movie is going to suck. Look at all the big box office movies that fail. For example, New World. Beautiful movie and big name actors, but the story wasn't told that grate and the movie suffers from it and it bombs. But then you have a small no money indi film Like OLD BOY that dosen't look all that bad but not big budget hollywood. and that movie dose extremely well and it is hard to meet a person who has not at least herd about that movie. So story first, Actors second and then worry about what camera what lighting. I am not saying making it look professional is not important but if you are looking at what is more importent you have to look at the story IMHO
 
Granted. However I feel that for someone with a great story to tell, he owes it unto himself to find the means to execute it well. After all if the story is so great, he should have no problem finding investors....should he?
 
I do agree with that. But at the same time I don't think that should stop someone that has a good storie and just can't find the funds to make it the best way possible. Look at crash, it took them like 6 years to make that film, and then look at hustle and flow another movie that has a grate story and every studio turned them down until they made the movie with there own money. So just beacuse you might have a good story it may take more then just a script for people to see it. So sometimes you just have to make a movie and hope the story is good enough to make up for the lake of say production value
 
If the plot and characters are interesting to me, I don't really care if they shot it with a Hi8 camcorder. However, I will not sit through a good-looking, boring movie.
 
It's always about the story. As a screenwriter today there are many scripts which
I've read packed with action, packed with special effects, packed with a plethora
of characters, but without a good PLOT you have nothing.

An interesting story can be viewed on 8mm. People won't care if they're captivated.

Charli
 
Yeah i saw that one. Great short, I really liked the ingenuity...tho i wonder what editing was like..

Anyway, on the topic of short film plots, yeah i believe that real plots are really too much to fit in a short film. Not enough time to cover all the bases. I dislike short films that try to be more than they're supposed to be, except those that are doing so for commercial reasons - ie trying to generate funding interest for it to be made into a full length film, etc.

However, imo, the most important part of a film is not so much story, but rather execution. Lots of films out there, the core story can be broken down to a very simple one - say resevoir dogs. Buncha guys trying to rob a bank, one of them's a snitch, blah blah. What made it shine was the execution - how the story was presented. And of course the good acting and effects contributed to the captivating effect. I doubt resevoir dogs would have been the same with poor camerawork and bad acting...

I feel that most films considered to have a 'great' storyline come from how the storyline was presented, rather than the worth of the storyline itself...Thats my 2 cents
 
Story first. But I think the scenario where there is a good story with terrible execution would only be more interesting than the fluff with good production value. Both movies would most likely be bad. I prefer a better story, but that being said I have sometimes been wowed by amazing visuals in lesser (not terrible) stories and come away impressed.
 
I don't think the poles of either scenario are particularly good. Given the choice, the story has to be entertaining. I'll forgive some lack of aesthetics, but not completely. A bad looking film is still a bad looking film. A beautifully film movie with a boring story is still a boring film. Of course a movie without a story and poor picture just sucks.
 
I'm reaching the conclusion that most people appreciate glitz and style and visual wow over any kind of substance. Time after time, the short films that look great are the ones that seem to get the favorable response. And I think this is often because a well composed, beautiful, in focus image is much more immediately appreciable than a story. Story is much more subjective. Scripts require a lot of imagination of the reader, and they're very subjective. But a beautifully shot scene is much more widely appreciated as beautiful. Scripts are like trying to agree on poetry--everyone's bias and interpretation and ability influences their appreciation. A beautiful shot is much more immediate and we find so much more concensus on its quality than we can for a script. This is why so many films don't get sold by the script, and then, like Hustle and Flow, the script is filmed and everyone goes, "Oh, yeah, it IS good after all." But I'm coming to the sorta disappointing conclusion that people are wowed much more by a really sophisticated, visual, cinematic film than one that is really interesting story-wise. It's disappointing to me, cuz my living is made as a writer. I find much more enthusiastic responses to things I've shot with my DVX after only six months of practice, versus the best things I've written after six years of honing my craft. (I'm disregarding the possiblity that my writing just sucks cuz I've demonstrated a few times to myself and the industry that it's sometimes pretty good too.)

I posted a thread about a short film nominated for an Academy Award, which had no story but was shot with absolute perfect control and looked amazing. It was totally vacuous of story. And it was nominated for an Oscar.
 
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