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James L Brooks - Why The Love?

post #1 of 22
10/31/10 at 2:34pm
Thread Starter 
Watching the trailer for the abysmally titled How Do You Know, I was struck by two things: Firstly, how gently amusing it looked, and secondly, how gently amusing I find James L Brooks' entire big screen canon. Nothing wrong with 'gently amusing', of course, or, for that matter, 'poignant', 'witty' or 'wry', all words that could be used, in my opinion, to describe Brooks' flicks. It's just that so many people seem to insist that he's a comedy god - Even Broadcast News and As Good As It Gets -which are zingier than, say, Spanglish, don't strike me as being half as hilarious as they think they are (they also strke me as more than a little smug). His Gracie Films output, as well as his writing credits for shows like Taxi, proves that he knows comedy, but I just don't get why the latest movie from the director of Terms of Endearment is marketed as an 'event'. Even looking at his movies as comedy-dramas rather than LOL-fests, I still don't get the hype. Am I completely and utterly wrong? How do folks feel about one of America's (supposedly) best-loved writer-directors?
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post #2 of 22
10/31/10 at 2:42pm
Brooks means more to baby boomers than he does to the younger audience or Gen X-ers, and much of that is goodwill for creating Mary Tyler Moore and Taxi. I think his work is incredibly influential, though; it's not hard to look at something like MORNING GLORY or even DEVIL WEARS PRADA and see his fingerprints.

Obligatory mention of how much I hate the ending of BROADCAST NEWS.
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post #3 of 22
10/31/10 at 3:08pm
If you were a sweater wearing 40-something in the 80s, the WASP-y output of James L. Brooks was particularly poignant. Same goes for ORDINARY PEOPLE or THE ACCIDENTAL TOURIST.
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post #4 of 22
10/31/10 at 3:44pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by RathBandu View Post
Brooks means more to baby boomers than he does to the younger audience or Gen X-ers, and much of that is goodwill for creating Mary Tyler Moore and Taxi. I think his work is incredibly influential, though; it's not hard to look at something like MORNING GLORY or even DEVIL WEARS PRADA and see his fingerprints.
Yeah, he's certainly influential - you've also got official Brooks protege Cameron Crowe, and Judd Apatow, who has described Funny People as his James L Brooks movie. And which I'll take any day over anything in the Brooks canon.
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post #5 of 22
10/31/10 at 4:35pm
I haven't seen all of his films but Broadcast News is a wonderful movie. I'm surprised at the negativity that film gets.
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post #6 of 22
10/31/10 at 4:43pm
Rath, please take this opportunity to explain exactly why you hate the BROADCAST NEWS ending so much. Are you talking about the whole '10 years later' coda? I actually don't mind that, but I just woke up and I'm still too fuzzy to go into exactly why I like it.

That said, the comments that Brooks set a tone for the upmarket comedy-drama for mature audiences with the likes of TERMS OF ENDEARMENT and BROADCAST NEWS pretty much answer the question posed in this thread's title.
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post #7 of 22
10/31/10 at 4:47pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ricardo Brady View Post
Yeah, he's certainly influential - you've also got official Brooks protege Cameron Crowe, and Judd Apatow, who has described Funny People as his James L Brooks movie. And which I'll take any day over anything in the Brooks canon.
Disagree completely. Broadcast News actually has focus, pacing, and some amount of subtletly. Funny People is a slog by any standard.
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post #8 of 22
10/31/10 at 4:53pm
His stuff tends to get a bit treacly but Brooks writes the type of dialogue that almost NOBODY in Hollywood writes anymore. I have no idea how anyone could read one of his screenplays (particularly earlier ones) and not recognize what a good writer he is - even if it doesn't cater to your particular tastes.

EDIT: And yes, Jesus, Funny People over Broadcast News?!
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post #9 of 22
10/31/10 at 4:57pm
In short: The ten years later epilogue of BROADCAST NEWS is a complete betrayal of everything we've come to love and know about Holly Hunter's character. I do not believe for a second, for a second, that the character of the first 110 minutes wouldn't turn in William Hurt's character for being a lying manipulative scumbag who probably has a really nice career working for FOX today.
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post #10 of 22
10/31/10 at 5:01pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Evi View Post

EDIT: And yes, Jesus, Funny People over Broadcast News?!
Maybe he has a soft spot for Apatow's home movies. Of his own kid. Singing. For ten minutes.
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post #11 of 22
10/31/10 at 5:22pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by bendrix View Post
Maybe he has a soft spot for Apatow's home movies. Of his own kid. Singing. For ten minutes.
Yeah, that lasts a couple of minutes and actually plays a pretty central role in a character moment. But that's all for here:-

http://www.chud.com/forum/showthread.php?t=117599
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post #12 of 22
10/31/10 at 5:38pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by AdrianDyka View Post
Yeah, that lasts a couple of minutes and actually plays a pretty central role in a character moment. But that's all for here:-

http://www.chud.com/forum/showthread.php?t=117599
Doesn't matter how long it actually lasts; it feels like ten minutes. And the actual character moment could have been accomplished in half the time. Which can be said about the entire movie.

Which makes it far inferior to Broadcast News.[/ontopic]
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post #13 of 22
10/31/10 at 6:03pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Evi View Post
His stuff tends to get a bit treacly but Brooks writes the type of dialogue that almost NOBODY in Hollywood writes anymore. I have no idea how anyone could read one of his screenplays (particularly earlier ones) and not recognize what a good writer he is - even if it doesn't cater to your particular tastes.

EDIT: And yes, Jesus, Funny People over Broadcast News?!
Broadcast News doesn't have Jonah Hill at his most obnoxious and hateful. Broadcast News wins.

Like Rath, I don't much like the coda at the end of Broadcast News, but I really hate the ending of Funny People and what a pussy Ira is. I really like Adam Sandler in it, but I hate the rest of the movie.
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post #14 of 22
10/31/10 at 6:06pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by RathBandu View Post
In short: The ten years later epilogue of BROADCAST NEWS is a complete betrayal of everything we've come to love and know about Holly Hunter's character. I do not believe for a second, for a second, that the character of the first 110 minutes wouldn't turn in William Hurt's character for being a lying manipulative scumbag who probably has a really nice career working for FOX today.
Not to mention that it dilutes what would have been the perfect ending with Holly Hunter in the cab, driving away from the airport. HATE that epilogue.
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post #15 of 22
10/31/10 at 6:53pm
I will say this about BROADCAST NEWS, which is pretty close to a masterpiece right up until that ending. This monologue is one of the best things Brooks ever wrote, and one of the most prescient pieces of film dialogue:

Quote:
What do you think the Devil is going to look like if he's around? Nobody is going to be taken in if he has a long, red, pointy tail. No. I'm semi-serious here. He will look attractive and he will be nice and helpful and he will get a job where he influences a great God-fearing nation and he will never do an evil thing... he will just bit by little bit lower standards where they are important. Just coax along flash over substance... Just a tiny bit. And he will talk about all of us really being salesmen. And he'll get all the great women.
And I look at how much of the news today is reflected in William Hurt's character, and how well that description applies to so many people, and it only makes me more frustrated, because I get what Brooks was trying to do, I get it...but god, that ending. You didn't need it.

That being said, I haven't seen FUNNY PEOPLE yet, despite owning it.

Observation: workplace dramedy Brooks (MTM, Broadcast, Taxi) > quirky stories about odd people finding love and shit (As Good As It Gets, Terms*, his output of the last few years)?


*Which I also haven't seen, but it's got American Icon Larry McMurtry writing it, so it can't be that bad.
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post #16 of 22
10/31/10 at 8:39pm
I think James L. Brooks grew up in television, and if I have a problem with his work, it's that he loves buttons quips. So, every once in a while stuff breathes, but then it snaps back into TV mode. That's partly because Brooks's style was adapted writ large over television because of his successes. It's also why I have yet to sit through TERMS OF ENDEARMENT. But I really liked SPANGLISH, and BROADCAST NEWS is mostly awesome. Ultimately his television legacy is more important than his filmography. I mean, the dude's also behind The Simpsons. I need to see I'LL DO ANYTHING, but I'm waiting to see the musical cut.

He's also brilliant in MODERN ROMANCE as a performer.
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post #17 of 22
10/31/10 at 8:46pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Andre Dellamorte View Post
I think James L. Brooks grew up in television, and if I have a problem with his work, it's that he loves buttons quips. So, every once in a while stuff breathes, but then it snaps back into TV mode. That's partly because Brooks's style was adapted writ large over television because of his successes. It's also why I have yet to sit through TERMS OF ENDEARMENT. But I really liked SPANGLISH, and BROADCAST NEWS is mostly awesome. Ultimately his television legacy is more important than his filmography. I mean, the dude's also behind The Simpsons. I need to see I'LL DO ANYTHING, but I'm waiting to see the musical cut.

He's also brilliant in MODERN ROMANCE as a performer.
Spanglish, really? Didn't expect that.
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post #18 of 22
10/31/10 at 9:12pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Andre Dellamorte View Post
I need to see I'LL DO ANYTHING, but I'm waiting to see the musical cut.
I'm on pins and needles waiting for that to see the light of day. I've seen the film as it is. Arguably his worst film. And probably because it was tampered with. I have no doubt that the musical cut was a mess too... But at least it would have been more interesting.

It's ironic that a movie about the perils of the studio system fell victim to that studio system.

There is this great bit, though, where this douche at the studio starts picking apart a list of possible candidates for an action lead - which features terrific character actors like John Malkovich and F. Murray Abraham - and his descriptions of why they're not suitable are funny and pointed. If that was originally a musical number it makes me even more upset that it was changed.
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post #19 of 22
10/31/10 at 9:50pm
Although I'm not a huge fan of the mans work, he gets a lifetime pass for me thanks to Broadcast News and The Simpsons

That speech Albert Brooks gives that Rath quoted is one of my favourites in all of cinema because it's spot-fucking-on and only getting more and more relevant with each passing year.
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post #20 of 22
11/1/10 at 1:26am
Am I alone in loving every inch of AS GOOD AS IT GETS? Of the L. Brooks category, that one's easily my favorite. Before I saw L.A. CONFIDENTIAL, it was actually my go-to "what should've won instead of Titanic" pick, and to be honest, depending on my mood, still makes an appearance as such. Not a moment misses a beat for me, and I do miss Helen Hunt in stuff.
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post #21 of 22
11/1/10 at 1:40am
I agree with you Greg. As Good As It Gets doesn't have a tacked-on happy ending.
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post #22 of 22
11/1/10 at 1:44am
I think that might be a contributing factor. Yeah, Melvin's got the girl, but he's not cured, he's still a pain in the ass, but he wants to get better. Will he? We don't know, but the movie's about him summoning up the courage to make an effort, and leaves it there.
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