For me the first thing that comes to mind is Tales from Earthsea. I don’t think it’s excellent or anything and has plenty of problems but people act like it killed their dog. While it has its problems that have been covered extensively, I think it has a beautiful atmosphere and art.
IMO it would have been better received if it wasn’t advertised as an Earthsea adaptation and was just its own thing.
The number of times I’ve watched a highly rated movie only to find it’s not good. cough oppenheimer cough
watching oppenheimer felt like watching a 3 hour compilation of trailers for oppenheimer. everything was so dramatic, there was no downtime, and they always had some kind of music playing. it felt like every scene wasn’t allowed to last more than 5 minutes
Agree with you on that. Many of the “oscar bait” movies are not that great for just watching. For instance, “the Revenant” was not a great picture in my opinion.
What probably elevates them is watching for all the minutiae in the acting and really focussing on the actors instead of the greater picture. However, I think great moments have to be earned through screemwriting. A great example is “the Wire”. Lives caught short, loves truly lost, and a realisation you are just part of a greater machine. These are all earned moments of pure emotion that films often do not get because of their tight focus. I do not mean to encourage film makers to lengthen their movies, please for the love of god, your movies are lengthy enough.