Modernism and Movies

Playtime (1967) – Jacques Tati

Jacques Tati’s Playtime is a commentary on modernism and the complications and confusions that come out of poor modern design.  Playtime follows Tati’s character Hulot an already goofy man who manages to get into numerous predicaments due to the confusion created by a monotone-bleak Paris, France.  As Hulot navigates through a city full of glass and drabbed in grey he and several other people are confused for being the same person.  It seems that in this modern world since everyone dresses the same there tends to be a lot of confusion, misdirection and an overall lack of communication.  This mainly comes from a poorly designed city with lots of frivolous material goods that have extra functions that are very redundant.  In the scene involving the restaurant the dining era begins to fall a part.  A woman walking by mentions, “this happens every night,” which implies that modern design or the modern world is constantly being rebuilt and tweaked.  Even though there are numerous amount of flaws and may fail at times, it can always be rebuilt to meet the demands of the consumer.  My only concern with the movie is that it seems slightly prejudice, which seems to be intended.  The first of this comes with the American tourists.  It seems that Europe or at least the French view Americans to be slightly dimwitted and somewhat destructive.  That Americans in the movie do not conform as easily as Europeans and have looser inhibitions?  The other prejudice takes place in restaurant lobby when a black man walks in and is immediately rejected.  The host pauses and then says, “you must be with the band,” the black gentleman then pauses and says a halfhearted yes and slowly walks into the restaurant.  This may be a social commentary of the state of civil rights in the 60s or is Tati saying modernism creates social classes and enforces class boundaries?

Monterey Pop: People In Motion - D.A. Pennebaker

Pennebaker’s Monterey Pop is a documentary of the Monterey Pop festival that influenced other historic music festivals such as Woodstock.  The documentary shows various young artists of the 60s and the diverse young crowd.  The festival attendees given it’s the 60s seem to be very free, most likely experimenting with sex and drugs, and most likely against corporate capitalism.  The idea of the Monterey festival and the era of 60s youth counter culture is the idea of being free and an individual.  A woman attending the festival states that “a new wave will come and a whole new set of rock and roll bands will follow, along with bullshit,” I believe what this woman is saying is that with the development of culture and societies there will always be new ideas.  The new ideas that are created will always spark the interest of others who will continue to be influenced to create new ideas, but eventually it will come to a point where these ideas will peak and fall.  This peak and decline will create only complications and limitations, until the next generation of new ideas.

When comparing Playtime to Monterey pop the differences are pretty noticeable.  Playtime modernism shows the fall of idea becoming a homogenized society, where people are confused for someone else, products have become full of frivolous functions, glass distorts perceptions, and everyone kind of conforms into this drab lifestyle.  Where as Monterey Pop features a counter culture youth against the rise of modernist conformity.  Monterey pop preaches individualism; the whole idea was to promote a new generation and a new form of music to transcend generations and cultures.  Tati’s Playtime was dubbed his masterpiece and was overall a financial blunder and not necessarily accepted by a wide audience.  It sort of failed like the modernist design and society he portrays.