Are Happy Endings the New Sad Endings?

By Spence Blazak

Tragedy has been the trend of late in movies, television, and storytelling in general. In 2012, patrons of the arts found themselves mourning over everything they loved dying on “Game of Thrones”, they all but lost hope in humanity with Season 5 of “Breaking Bad,” and they saw a seventh consecutive year of romantic misery for Ted Moseby on “How I Met Your Mother.” Sadness and heartbreak (with a pinch of hopelessness) were the hip and current fad until HBO’s masterful mini-series “Parade’s End” premiered last month. “Parade’s End” just might have been the catalyst into a wild new movement: dramas that end….with the characters being happy.

“Parade’s End” consists of 5 episodes, and follows Christopher Tietjens (Benedict Cumberbatch, “Sherlock”) as a heroic British statistician (I say this unironically) during the 1910’s. Tricked into marrying the contemptuous Sylvia (Rebecca Hall, “Vicky Cristina Barcelona”), Tietjens suffers through years of marital horrors rather than divorcing her and taking the demerit to his social pride. Marriage, AM I RIGHT? He finds himself falling in love with a young suffragette, but never consummates the affair, because he is just that good of a guy. He winds up in World War I and is shrouded in misery throughout the series. Just from the words “World War I, British, and love triangle,” it seemed like a tragic outcome for poor old Tietjens was soon to be at hand.

When “Parade’s End” had concluded, and all poetic justice had been served in the way of a happy ending, it was absolutely shocking. Seriously. It had “this dude is going to off himself” written all over it. After 3 seasons of tragedy befalling “Downton Abbey,” no happily ever afters on “Boardwalk Empire,” and an adaptation of “Les Miserables” that made….my friend….cry, it seemed like Tietjens had no hope. The catch is that rather than feeling like a cop out (as many happy endings tend to do), “Parade’s End” feels like a breath of fresh air, a well deserved gift to drama watchers. It is the tragedy that doesn’t end in tragedy.

Throughout the history of the fictional story, it seems as though happy endings could never be synonymous with good endings. It also seems that whenever an audience genuinely wanted the two main characters to wind up together, any hope for their happiness became immediately doomed. Rick and Ilsa in “Casablanca” are the Barack and Michele of classic cinema: their chemistry is loved across the board. Sadly, Rick and Ilsa have the misfortune of being adored by an audience, so they, per the rules of drama, don’t wind up together.

This entire case can be juxtaposed to that of “Twilight.” At its pinnacle, it was about as popular as popular could be, for some reason or another (probably the surgeon-like handling of Jasper’s origin story. Ha!) Yet anyone outside of the “fanboy” culture of the films merely saw the campiness of the story and its relationships, specifically that of Edward and Bella. Due to the fact that the relationship was just regular for the average reader or filmgoer, Bella and her vampire boy toy get a dull and predictable happily ever after.

“Parade’s End” might be the new beginning in endings for dramas, where the characters get a shot at happiness, while still having it make sense to the course that the plot took.  While in the past, a character being likable and having a goal which would make them happy if achieved was the proverbial “black spot” on them, nowadays, it might mean that maybe they’ll be, gasp, okay.

The Dark Side of Ang Lee

By Spence Blazak

At this year’s Oscars ceremony, Ang Lee nabbed his second Best Director statue for his work on “Life of Pi.” Unlike many great directors, Lee is viewed by the media as a man who can seemingly do no wrong. No matter how many great films Spielberg has made, “Jurassic Park 2” and “Indiana Jones 4” will always be blips on his permanent record, so how has Lee achieved the feat of a pristine career? The answer is a simple one: all that glitters is not gold. The real question here is just exactly how bad is the seemingly infallible Ang Lee at his worst?

Lee is in an odd place among lauded directors. Since he started out making films in his native Taiwan, the average filmgoer never heard of his work before the martial arts epic “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.” Also, when his films come out, they are only heavily discussed when they are masterpieces. In the case of his flop “Taking Woodstock,” it was released during the summer, and no one seemed to notice it slink in and out of the theater at all. So this means that the first half of Ang Lee’s career is virtually unknown to the general public, and critics tend to leave up their blinders when he releases a dud. Then again, another possibility is that maybe his bad movies aren’t really even that bad at all.

Since he emerged onto the international stage with “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon,” he has released the critically acclaimed hits “Brokeback Mountain,” “Lust, Caution,” and “Life of Pi.” That is a run of four excellent films in a period of twelve years. Peppered in between these hits are the goofs “The Hulk,” his foray into the Hollywood blockbuster, and “Taking Woodstock.” That is a batting average of 4/6, putting him at .666 while he has been in the American spotlight.

“The Hulk” is a very curious case in film lore. Created after the box office success of “X-Men” and “Spiderman,” Ang Lee got the job based on his action direction of “Crouching Tiger,” where he juggles action and still keeps the relationships at the center accessible and honest. The road to hell is paved with good intentions, and so was “The Hulk.” Lee didn’t want to waste the character on a silly action flick, so he used a very dark and serious script that focused on the Jekyll-Hyde-esque battle of main character Bruce Banner. While the “darkly-toned superhero movie” formula was later perfected in Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy, Lee’s movie failed in almost every storytelling aspect. The script is just so ridiculously serious that by the time the big green monster comes out; it feels like he came into the wrong movie. Once the action starts, the film fails there too. Watching the Hulk fight mutated dogs at night in the woods can be a cure for insomnia, quickly sending viewers to sleep.

Lee himself admitted to the horrors of “The Hulk,” and almost retired from filmmaking because he was so upset about it. As for “Taking Woodstock,” Lee once again tried something new by crafting a comedy set around the inception of the famous three days of peace, love, and music. The film doesn’t work as a whole, completely ignoring the whole musical aspect of the festival, as well as using characters for cheap laughs rather than actually developing them. Despite that, “Taking Woodstock” is a film that is hard to hate, with brief personal moments throughout that save it from being dubbed a “bad” movie. In the end, its greatest shortcoming might be that it just wasn’t as good as a Lee hit like “Brokeback Mountain.”

A director who focuses on minute moments in stories and details in character progression, Ang Lee is put on a pedestal because even his bad movies might not even be all that horrific. As for his great movies, they are so good that they make people forget about his “Hulk” and focus on his successes instead. The bar is set high for him, and the stats show that he meets it .666 of the time. As far as people forgetting his flops, it looks like Ang Lee deserves it.