"MTV Aesthetics" at the Movies: Interrogating a Film Criticism Fallacy
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“MTV Aesthetics” at the Movies: Interrogating a
Film Criticism Fallacy
marco calavita
mt v debuted on cable television in au- form continue unabated not only among main-
gust of 1981 in only a few US markets, airing stream journalistic critics, but also, in an indi-
music videos introduced by awkward video cation of its cultural ubiquity, among academic
jockeys. In fact, according to historians of MTV, writers, alternative media critics, amateur
it was not until January of 1983 that the channel critics, and fans posting reviews online. Refer-
really took off, when it expanded more fully into ences in contemporary film criticism to “MTV
most markets around the country—including, visuals,” “MTV-style editing,” “the MTV gen-
for the first time, New York and Los Angeles eration,” “post-MTV filmmaking,” and the like
(Denisoff; McGrath). And yet that same year, constitute what I will call the “MTV aesthetics
upon the release of Adrian Lyne’s Flashdance trope.” It is significant that this trope actually
(1983), American film critics already had begun cites “MTV” specifically as part of its discourse;
to observe that Hollywood films were unduly as I discuss below, there is a world of discur-
influenced by the music video form and by MTV sive difference between a critical trope that
in particular. In its review, Variety described references MTV’s influence and one that simply
Flashdance as “pretty much like looking at MTV references the influence of music videos. The
for 96 minutes. Virtually plotless, exceedingly fact that the MTV aesthetics trope persists even
thin on characterization and sociologically today, when the vast majority of videos are
laughable, pic at least lives up to its title by screened and seen via television channels and
offering an anthology of extraordinarily flashy media other than MTV—which has long since
dance numbers” (12). A few months later, cut back on its airing of videos—is a further tes-
Roger Ebert opined that Staying Alive (1983), tament both to the staying power of this critical
a “sequel to the gutsy, electric Saturday Night reflex and to the fact that the “MTV” in the MTV
Fever, is a slick, commercial cinematic jukebox, aesthetics trope serves a predominantly sym-
a series of self-contained song-and-dance bolic function (Caramanica sec. 2:1).
sequences that could be cut apart and played The foundation of the MTV aesthetics trope
forever on MTV” (Staying). is a fairly straightforward and concrete critique
More than two decades later, MTV is still a associating contemporary Hollywood filmmak-
common critical shorthand and reference point, ing with the music video form, although it also
as similar critiques of Hollywood films and their typically coexists with much more symbolic and
connotative importations about what MTV and
its audience represent (see below). The foun-
Marco Calavita is an associate professor of com- dational critique is concerned with three inter-
munication studies at Sonoma State University.
related characteristics of recent Hollywood film.
He is the author of Apprehending Politics: News
Media and Individual Political Development (SUNY The first is the frequent use of (mainly nondi-
Press, 2005) and a frequent contributor to Cineas- egetic) popular songs for a film’s soundtrack,
te magazine. especially for montage sequences of characters
journal of film and video 59.3 / fall 2007 15
©2007 by the board of trustee s of the universit y of illinoisdancing, fighting, falling in love, trying on rassingly misguided direction is artificial and
clothes, and so on. Although still noted by crit- airless. (“Gen-MTV”). And in a 2001 anthology
ics discussing current films, this continues to of academic criticism, Wheeler Winston Dixon
be a particularly common point to make about laments how “MTV hyperedited ‘shot fragment’
films of the early-to-mid-1980s, such as the editing has become the rule for dramas and ac-
aforementioned Flashdance and Staying Alive, tion films. An entire new generation of viewers
as well as Footloose (1984), Top Gun (1986), became visually hooked on the assaultive grab-
Dirty Dancing (1987), and Rocky IV (1985), of 360).1
bing power of MTV’s rapid cutting . . .” (360).
which Ebert wrote: “[there are] endless, unnec- Even when offering some praise for “MTV
essary songs on the soundtrack; half the time, aesthetics” and for filmmakers who employ
we seem to be watching MTV . . .” (Rocky). them, as critics do on occasion, a swipe is
The second and third cinematic charac- often just around the corner. Thus Janet Maslin
teristics that form the foundation of the MTV of the New York Times, in a review of Enemy
aesthetics trope relate to the perception that of the State (1998), pays director Tony Scott a
many Hollywood films since the origins of MTV lukewarm compliment—“[Scott] keep[s] the
have become showy exercises in technique and story moving faster than the speed of scrutiny.
style. The second characteristic is the tendency And he does use sharp, video-influenced edit-
of films since the early 1980s to privilege gloss, ing more effectively than most”—only to follow
atmospherics, and camerawork. According to it with a parenthetical putdown: “(though John
this critique, films too often serve up produc- Frankenheimer’s Ronin achieved the same high
tion design and especially cinematography velocity without benefit of MTV tricks)” (E1).
and direction clearly meant to be noticed and Sean Burns of the Philadelphia Weekly does
appreciated on their own burnished terms. The something similar in his review of Scott’s Spy
third characteristic is the one referred to most Game (2001), but this time Scott passes muster
often by critics, especially since the 1990s. and everyone else must wear a scarlet “MTV”
Recent Hollywood films, it is said, fly by their affixed to their chests. “There’s nothing Scott
audiences at a breakneck pace and with jittery loves more than slick, gimmicky shots of attrac-
rhythms, apparently trying to mimic MTV vid- tive movie stars . . . ” Burns writes, “but he’s
eos, which do the same thing three or four min- . . . the only director out there using the rapid-
utes at a time. Part of that pace and rhythm is fire MTV aesthetic as a narrative technique
achieved in a particularly conspicuous way—via instead of a distraction” (“Big Budget Brains”).
manic editing that often features flash-cuts, There is, to be sure, some truth to these
jump-cuts, and the stirring together of varied claims and to the MTV aesthetics trope in
film stocks, colors, and speeds. general. These critics are to some extent cor-
Examples of these last two elements of rect when they call attention to certain Hol-
the MTV aesthetics trope, often loaded with lywood trends and trace some similarities to
value judgments about MTV and its audience, music videos; for example, in the simplest
abound. While mocking the “pretentious connect-the-dots approach, it is of course true
touches” of Oliver Stone’s Natural Born Kill- that several high-profile directors working in
ers (1994), Jeff Millar of the Houston Chronicle Hollywood today got their start, or close to it,
called it “Stone’s attempt to reinvent himself making music videos, including Michael Bay,
as the world’s oldest rookie MTV video direc- David Fincher, Michel Gondry, Spike Jonze,
tor” (“U-Turn”). Writing in the Seattle Post- and Dominic Sena. (That said, the aesthetics
Intelligencer, Sean Axmaker observed that of these videos have always been far from
Crime + Punishment in Suburbia (2000) “looks monolithic, and the actual airing of music
every inch the MTV video, shot through a lens videos on MTV is increasingly rare [Reiss and
so smeared in petroleum jelly it made me want Feineman; Vernallis].) Some of the critics who
to scream ‘Focus!’ throughout. . . . [The] embar- cite MTV’s influence are no doubt aware that
16 journal of film and video 59.3 / fall 2007
©2007 by the board of trustee s of the universit y of illinoissuch references are simplistic and somewhat Media historian Steven Stark offers the com-
wrongheaded, useful mainly as throwaway mon view that “By 1983, MTV was already in-
lines or as critical shorthand in reviews that do fluencing movie-making: Much of the popular
not allow for much nuance or elaboration. In Flashdance was little more than a dance video
addition, I have no great interest in defending at greater length” (327).
( 327). In this sort of histori-
films like those mentioned above—although, cal accounting, as epitomized by Thomas De-
as I argue below, the critical dismissal of them lapa in the Boulder Weekly, “American feature
is too often self-satisfied and facile.2 filmmaking” has been “comatose” “ever since
My purpose instead will be to explore what the early 1980s,” when movies got “caught
I see as the significant flaws in this trope as it up in a witches brew” of, among other things,
has come to be used in American film criticism. “MTV cutting” (“Screen”). David Ehrenstein of
There are three interrelated problems with it, Slate.com also traces the recent “downward
the first being that it is ahistorical—it ignores spiral” of serious filmmaking back to the
the abundant evidence that doesn’t fit into its 1980s, when “we were suddenly drowning in
media-history timeline. The other two prob- teenpix, Simpson-Bruckheimer-style Go For It
lems with the MTV aesthetics trope are that it movies, and mismatched-buddy cop flicks. The
typically works with problematic assumptions MTV aesthetic hadn’t enlarged the vocabulary
derived from “medium specificity” theory and of storytelling—it had dumbed it down” (“Very
is weighted down with hysterical judgments of Un-Sucky ”). Similarly, Jon Niccum’s Lawrence
what MTV and its audience represent. These Journal-World dismissal of The Matrix: Revolu-
judgments are manifest in the timeworn, unten- tions (2003) as “a boring, joyless exercise in
able binary oppositions that critics tend to set post-MTV filmmaking” is one of many refer-
up between, on the one hand, who they are ences to a “post-MTV era” and to “post-MTV
and what real and good film culture is, and, filmmaking,” all of which rest on the same re-
on the other, what MTV and its attendant bad- ductive tale (Matrix). The nostalgia for an imag-
ness is, the most significant being art versus ined, Edenic past—before MTV—is particularly
commerce, adult culture versus youth culture, strong and misguided in an efilmcritic.com
and ideas, humanity, narrative, and coherence review of What Lies Beneath (2000) posted
versus distraction, chaos, superficiality, and by Erik Childress: “Living in the post-MTV era
meaninglessness. All of these problems obfus- where a large number of the populace has the
cate and elide important truths about filmmak- patience and span of a schizophrenic with at-
ing and its evolution, about audiences, and tention-deficit disorder, What Lies Beneath is a
about the contemporary mass media landscape hark back to the old days of filmmaking” (What
in general—truths that recede further into the Lies).
background each time this seemingly obvious Again, this history is not entirely inaccu-
and innocuous trope is employed. I conclude rate; it would be wrong to argue that music
by speculating about the possible reasons for videos—along with comics, video games, and
the staying power of this film criticism fallacy. other media forms—have had no influence
on filmmaking since the 1980s.3 But there
“MTV Aesthetics”: A Revised History are significant problems with this history, the
obvious and overriding one being that the
As outlined above, the MTV aesthetics trope characteristics most often identified as “MTV
usually implies (or states outright) the follow- aesthetics”—the pop songs strung together
ing history of contemporary Hollywood film- on the soundtrack, the flashy cinematic style,
making and the influence of an upstart cable and the fast-paced, conspicuous editing—have
channel: beginning in 1983, and accelerating demonstrable origins in five developments in
in the 1990s, film form began mimicking MTV, the two decades (and more) before MTV began.
with results almost entirely for the worse. These developments and their effects are
journal of film and video 59.3 / fall 2007 17
©2007 by the board of trustee s of the universit y of illinoisparticularly apparent in American films made torial style, and editing.6 These qualities are
between 1967 and 1982.4 most notable in such films as Bonnie and Clyde
First, there is the influence of international (1967), The Graduate (1967), Head (1968), Easy
and avant-garde filmmaking, in particular the Rider (1969), The Wild Bunch (1969), The French
French New Wave and related movements Connection (1971), Mean Streets (1973), Nash-
throughout Europe in the 1950s and 1960s; ville (1975), Taxi Driver (1976), Star Wars (1977),
American experimental and avant-garde film- The Driver (1978), Apocalypse Now (1979),
making of the postwar era; and the 1980s Dressed to Kill (1980), Raging Bull (1980), Raid-
boom of Hong Kong action filmmaking. It is a ers of the Lost Ark (1981), and One From the
story often told that the European cinema of Heart (1982).7
the 1950s and 1960s had a profound effect on Although in a necessarily indirect and diluted
the so-called New Generation of filmmakers way, postwar American experimental and avant-
that emerged in the 1960s and 1970s, which garde filmmaking has also had an undeniable
included older filmmakers such as Arthur Penn, influence on Hollywood filmmaking as it has
Stanley Kubrick, John Cassavetes, Robert Alt- evolved since the 1960s (and as it is manifested
man, Mike Nichols, Bob Rafaelson, and Sam in the last two-plus decades). In fact, some
Peckinpah in addition to such usual suspects of the characteristics that have come to make
as Francis Ford Coppola, Dennis Hopper, Wil- up the ostensible MTV aesthetic in the Ameri-
liam Friedkin, Brian DePalma, Martin Scorsese, can cinema could be found decades earlier
George Lucas, and Steven Spielberg (Biskind, in the work of Stan Brakhage, Bruce Conner,
Easy; Cowie).5 Several prominent films made by and Kenneth Anger, and in even earlier work
these directors and their contemporaries show like Luis Bunuel and Salvador Dali’s Un Chien
the influence of what might be generically de- Andalou (1928) and Jean Cocteau’s Blood of a
scribed as the European New Wave, and their Poet (1930). Anger’s Scorpio Rising (1963) and
work through the early 1980s exhibits some of Conner’s Breakaway (1967), to take just two
the same qualities that critics have identified examples, are stylistic precursors of several
as MTV aesthetics, especially the conspicuous more famous films. For instance, Dennis Hop-
and self-consciously provocative design, direc- per was friends with and found inspiration from
Photo 1: (Left to right) Billy
(Dennis Hopper), Wyatt
(Peter Fonda), and George
( Jack Nicholson) hit the
open road to a pounding
rock soundtrack in the ex-
perimental counterculture
classic Easy Rider (1969).
18 journal of film and video 59.3 / fall 2007
©2007 by the board of trustee s of the universit y of illinoisConner—and the French New Wave—while edit- nomics, aesthetics, and demographics. But it ing Easy Rider (Biskind, Easy 65–66, 70; Sitney). is nevertheless important to consider how the Hollywood filmmaking has continued to technological innovations of the period not show the influence of international cinema in only responded to and developed alongside recent years, especially Hong Kong action films. the supposed “MTV aesthetics,” but also facili- The action sequences that critics so often link tated them. to MTV aesthetics, especially since the 1990s, The most significant of these changes have often reflect the popularity of the John Woo-Tsui affected sound recording, theatrical sound Hark-Ringo Lam wave of Hong Kong films and systems, and electronic and nonlinear editing. the eventual migration of those filmmakers Advances in sound technology were taking and some of their associates—such as fight place throughout the 1970s, but the release choreographer Yuen Woo-Ping—to the US.8 True of Star Wars (1977) marked a turning point in Romance (1993), Face/Off (1997), The Matrix the quality of cinematic sound. Dolby noise (1999), and Charlie’s Angels (2000) are just reduction had been used as early as Kubrick’s a few of the films that, according to the con- A Clockwork Orange (1971), and Ken Russell’s ventions of this trope, could be seen as MTV Tommy (1975) had been the first true Dolby ste- offspring. In reality, however, as MTV was mak- reo release, but the huge success of Star Wars ing its debut in the early 1980s, an important and the apparent role that sound played in that movement of Hong Kong action filmmaking was success, especially in compatible theaters, beginning on the other side of the globe, build- spurred the transition from monaural sound ing upon the previous international success of tracks to stereo optical sound, and to more the Shaw Brothers and Bruce Lee (Stokes and advanced theatrical sound systems. By 1979, Hoover 17–37). And that filmmaking style has there were twelve hundred Dolby-equipped the- taken hold, for better or worse, in Hollywood aters in the US, a sharp increase over just a few action films made since the 1990s—to a greater years earlier, and by 1984 more than six thou- extent than “MTV aesthetics” has. Stephen sand theaters in forty-five countries, the bulk Holden’s New York Times review of Cradle 2 the of them in prime, first-run locations around the Grave (2003) is a telling example of reflex-like US, were equipped with the new system. On references to MTV that neglect the recent influ- top of these changes, George Lucas began work ence of the Hong Kong tradition; despite the in 1980 on the development of what would fact that the film stars Jet Li and features fight in 1982 become the THX system of “optimal” sequences that fans of his earlier films have theatrical sound. That year also saw the in- come to expect, Holden’s only reference to style troduction of digital audio CDs, which further and technique is the fact that the film would stimulated conversions to more refined digital have been improved had the director “relaxed audio in production and exhibition. By the his camera and reprogrammed his editorial mid-1980s nearly 90 percent of all Hollywood shredding machine. . . . [Bartkowiak, the direc- films were being released with Dolby stereo tor] likes his MTV-style editing so much that in sound (Cook 54, 217, 408; Prince, Pot 292–93). his drive for hyperkinetic overkill he sacrifices The potential of this improved sound technol- coherence to wallow in barely contained chaos” ogy— more popular music on the soundtrack, (E17). Overkill indeed. for instance—was obvious, and for the most Another important factor elided by the MTV part it was being exploited before MTV and its aesthetics trope is the technological changes supposed effects appeared. that have taken place in the industry since Similarly consequential was the transition the 1970s. To be sure, like all of the other de- from linear editing via physically handling, cut- velopments discussed here, these changes ting, and splicing film, to nonlinear electronic are inextricably linked with other factors and and digital editing systems. Experiments in cannot be understood in isolation from eco- electronic and video editing were taking place journal of film and video 59.3 / fall 2007 19 ©2007 by the board of trustee s of the universit y of illinois
Photo 2: Murderous mar-
rieds Mickey and Mallory
Knox (Woody Harrelson
and Juliette Lewis) take a
break between jump-cuts
in Oliver Stone’s Natural
Born Killers (1994).
throughout the 1970s, and in Apocalypse Now tronic editing has affected the style of Stone’s
and One from the Heart (1982) Coppola took films more than an attempt to ape MTV has.9
important steps in the development of such The third of the five interrelated develop-
methods. The year 1982 also saw the introduc- ments that began before MTV is the ideological
tion of two elements that would pave the way and economic changes that have taken place
for random-access digital-electronic editing since the 1970s. As the US moved to the right
when Kodak introduced a way to record time after the 1960s, films like Star Wars and Raid-
code in transparent magnetic coding on each ers of the Lost Ark not only (partly) reflected
frame of film, and CMX introduced a semicom- that shift but also pointed toward the huge
puterized version of a flatbed editing system profits and synergistic ancillary revenues avail-
(Cook 393–94; Prince, Pot 111–15; Fairservice able from widely released, big-budget, special-
330–37). Oliver Stone was one of the early effects “blockbusters” and “high concept”
adopters of these new methods as they were films. Such industry trends were facilitated by
refined in the 1980s and 1990s, and not coin- political economic changes in the 1970s and
cidentally it is in JFK (1991) and Natural Born later, the most crucial of which were corporate
Killers (1994) that a shift in Hollywood editing deregulation and the easing of antitrust restric-
style (and cinematography) can be discerned— tions (Ryan and Kellner; Wyatt; Prince, Pot).10
toward an often faster and more expressionistic The marketing and cross-promotional strategies
mix of imagery, including varied film stocks, that both stimulated and were afforded by that
colors, and speeds. One could of course argue environment were underway before MTV (al-
that it was Stone’s desire to adopt such a style though MTV no doubt added to the resources
which led him to these technologies and meth- available), and those strategies further stimu-
ods, and not vice-versa. Regardless, an under- lated the use of popular songs on soundtracks,
standing of why many current Hollywood films building on a trend that had begun in the 1960s
are cut and move in the way that they do must (see below). One could argue with the notion
acknowledge that technological changes made that the conservative ideology of this period
it substantially easier to edit with experimental was specifically conducive to high-concept
whimsy and abandon. It certainly makes more films featuring blaring soundtracks, like those
sense to say, for instance, that along with the that took off in the 1980s. But it is clear that the
French New Wave, avant-garde filmmaking, and changing political economy and media industry
perhaps psychotropic drugs, nonlinear elec- trends in marketing and synergy epitomized
20 journal of film and video 59.3 / fall 2007
©2007 by the board of trustee s of the universit y of illinoisby films like Saturday Night Fever (1977), with Horror Picture Show (1975), The Song Remains
its box office and soundtrack success, fueled the Same (1976), Grease (1978), The Kids Are
the look, sound, and promotional strategy of a Alright (1979), The Blues Brothers (1980), and
film like Flashdance as much as MTV did (Wyatt Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982).
139–44; Smith 186–229). This unprecedented wedding of rock music
Saturday Night Fever was one of count- with Hollywood film is another pre-MTV de-
less films from the 1967–82 period that were velopment that fed these supposed MTV aes-
pop/rock/soul musical experiences—at least thetics, and it is very much rooted in time and
at moments—as much as they were visual place—the postwar baby boom and the rise
ones. There were certainly precedents for this of rock ’n’ roll. For many boomers and those
from the 1950s and the early 1960s both in slightly older, including much of Hollywood’s
the US and in Europe, including Jailhouse Rock New Generation, new music was essential to
(1957), It’s Trad, Dad! (1962), Band of Outsiders their cultural landscape, which meant that both
(1964), and, most significantly, Richard Lester’s filmmakers and audiences were primed for
Beatles films, A Hard Day’s Night (1964) and more of this music on film (Smith 165; Biskind,
Help! (1965). It has become a commonplace Easy). For example, 1973 alone saw the release
that these two films established some of the of Lucas’s American Graffiti, Scorsese’s Mean
“vocabulary” of MTV, and indeed that is so Streets, Peckinpah’s Pat Garrett & Billy the
(Ehrenstein and Reed 13–63; Mundy 97–126; Kid, The Mack, and Jesus Christ Superstar—ten
Neaverson). But it was in the late 1960s that years before MTV arrived on the national scene.
the use of popular music in film increased and The first four of these films relied heavily on
widened in scope, something reflected in the music for their appeal (Smith 169–85; J. Miller
period’s rock musicals, music documentaries, 304–17), and the last was significant not only
concert films, and films with (frequently) nondi- for being one of the first “rock opera” musicals,
egetic pop music soundtracks (Smith 154–85). but also for its groundbreaking efforts to sell
A list of those films would include, among oth- its soundtrack, theatrical musical, and film,
ers like The Graduate and Easy Rider mentioned aspects of which producer Robert Stigwood
above, Don’t Look Back (1967), Monterey Pop repeated to even greater success with Saturday
(1969), Woodstock (1970), Superfly (1972), Night Fever and Grease (Wyatt 139–45).
Phantom of the Paradise (1974), The Rocky The fifth and last of the interrelated devel-
Photo 3: Tony Manero
( John Travolta) sets the
dance floor on fire in Sat-
urday Night Fever (1977),
a landmark in the syner-
gistic marketing of movies
and music.
journal of film and video 59.3 / fall 2007 21
©2007 by the board of trustee s of the universit y of illinoisopments that, to a great extent before MTV, saw significant growth in the late 1970s and
have fueled the so-called MTV aesthetics early 1980s, and all have likely played substan-
of Hollywood film, is television (other than tial roles in the trends toward attention-grab-
MTV )—specifically commercials, cable televi- bing filmmaking, faster action in particular. The
sion, video cassette recorders, and the remote years 1975–81 in particular were crucial, as all
control. Television commercials’ glossiness and of the studios started home-video divisions,
fast rhythms have often been cited as perni- video stores appeared for the first time, satel-
cious influences on Hollywood film aesthetics, lite delivery of programming began, a court
and much of that story predates MTV, includ- ruling eased FCC restrictions on cable-casting
ing the transition, during the 1970s, to thirty- current movies, and virtually all of today’s most
second spots and shorter and shorter shot popular cable channels were introduced, in-
durations. Another influence was the influx cluding HBO, ESPN, CNN, USA, TBS, BET, Bravo,
of TV-commercial directors working in Europe Nickelodeon, Showtime, and, finally, MTV. The
who went on to direct such “MTV-era” films as rapid penetration of both cable and VCRs into
Flashdance (Adrian Lyne), Manhunter (1986; US households was well underway during this
Michael Mann), and Top Gun (Tony Scott) period, and would soon reach 50 percent by the
(Wyatt 26; J. Miller 186–246; Gleick 187–88).11 mid-1980s (Walker and Stumo; Wasser).
Along with Stallone, Stone, Baz Luhrmann, Meanwhile, alongside this growth in cable
and producers Don Simpson and Jerry Bruck- and video, the increased use of remote control
heimer, these TV-commercial veterans are the devices allowed viewers to control what they
filmmakers most often identified with the MTV were watching to an unprecedented extent—to
aesthetic, and in each case their styles and “graze” rapidly across more and more channels
common flourishes were already on display by and form their own programming collage, or to
1982. The often glossy, stylized, arguably indul- stop or speed up a videotape when it failed to
gent filmmaking, including the frequent use of sufficiently arrest them (Bellamy and Walker;
rock music, can be found in abundance in Alan Gleick 181–86). And yet, in a simplistic attribu-
Parker’s Bugsy Malone (1976), Fame (1980), tion of responsibility, critics tend to blame the
and Pink Floyd—The Wall (1982); Ridley Scott’s supposedly shortened attention spans of the
Alien (1979) and Blade Runner (1982); Lyne’s “MTV generation” for changes in Hollywood
Foxes (1980); and Mann’s Thief (1981). What film aesthetics without first locating this un-
might be called an advertising aesthetic even wieldy group—as well as those much older—in
found its way into films of this period by non- its historical-technological context. As I argue
TV-commercial veterans, like Paul Schrader’s throughout this article, these changes were on
American Gigolo (1980). Gigolo features an display in many pre-MTV films, and so were
opening-credits montage set to Blondie’s “Call probably nurturing and cultivating audience
Me,” during which the title character drives expectations for action that was even faster
a fancy car, buys designer clothes, and does and louder.
business with wealthy clients. In addition to These interrelated historical developments
looking like sequences in later films so often played crucial parts in the evolution of MTV
compared to MTV, this montage also looks very aesthetics in Hollywood, and it is noteworthy
much like a commercial for luxury goods and an that most of them began and even flourished
idealized lifestyle ( J. Miller 186–246; Jackson before MTV. For the sake of clarity, this argu-
158–60, 164).12 ment has so far been simplistic itself. In par-
The rise of cable and the VCR, along with ticular, there has been too little said about the
the proliferation of remote-control devices, are inevitable cross-pollination and multivariant
other key, intertwined factors in the evolution influences shared across media and art forms
of Hollywood aesthetics in recent decades. All in the contemporary period—most importantly,
three of these television-related technologies the ways in which all of the developments dis-
22 journal of film and video 59.3 / fall 2007
©2007 by the board of trustee s of the universit y of illinoiscussed above, most of them related to film, not (xi). It is now clear that another pursuit in which
only shaped Hollywood film but also MTV and these theorists were engaged was the very le-
its videos.13 Often built into the MTV aesthetics gitimization of this specific medium as art—in
trope is the implication that, perhaps A Hard contrast to other technologies of the time, and
Day’s Night aside, MTV has always been funda- later.
mentally and intrinsically of and about televi- Other film theorists have rejected medium
sion, and so does not have basic roots in or specificity theory, especially Noel Carroll, for
similarities to the cinema—just as the cinema whom “the task of the theorist of an art is not
should have no roots in or connection to MTV to determine the unique features of the me-
(or TV in general). This implication flows from dium but to explain how and why the medium
highly suspect, value-laden assumptions about has been adapted to prevailing and emerging
media and their essential nature, assumptions styles . . .” (35).
35). While not challenging cinema’s
embedded in “medium specificity” theory. potential as art, such an argument tends to
suggest that film does not necessarily have
Problematic Faith in Medium Specificity peculiar essences, is not so distinct from other
media forms, including video, and further that
Medium specificity theory is rooted in the study those media too may yield art. Similar chal-
of art, most notably in G. E. Lessing’s Laocoon, lenges have also been made to the medium
an eighteenth-century philosophical treatise. specificity argument by media theorists and
Following a line from essentialism, Lessing critics. Marshall McLuhan famously suggested
argued that because of the physical properties that the content of every medium is another,
of each artistic medium, each art form must previous medium—that “the ‘content’ of TV,”
necessarily have specific properties, capacities, for instance, “is the movie” (ix). And Jay David
and effects that are appropriate only to itself. Bolter and Richard Grusin have described the
Clement Greenberg brought the medium way new media evolve as “remediation”—the
specificity argument into the twentieth century, honoring, rivaling, and refashioning of older
most famously in his 1940 essay on abstract media. Writing of digital visual media in par-
art, “Towards a Newer Laocoon.” Greenberg ticular, they argue that “No medium today . . .
proposed that “purity in art consists in the ac- [does] its cultural work in isolation from other
ceptance, willing acceptance, of the limitations media, any more than it works in isolation from
of the medium of the specific art. . . . It is by other social and economic forces. What is new
virtue of its medium that each art is unique and about new media comes from the particular
strictly itself” (32).
32). ways in which they refashion older media and
Film theorists also weighed in on the subject the ways in which older media refashion them-
of (cinematic) medium specificity throughout selves to answer the challenges of new media”
the early and mid-twentieth century, sometimes (15). They add that as “arguably the most
by simply asking questions like the one André important popular art form of the twentieth
Bazin famously posed: “What is Cinema?” century, film is especially challenged by new
There was a certain essentialism inherent in media” (147).
such a question, which earlier theorists such Even if one assumes that film was medium
as Rudolph Arnheim and Siegfried Kracauer specific when first invented, its history since
had made explicit—particularly Arnheim in his has been of the constant erosion of that speci-
essay “New Laocoon.” As video historian James ficity. For some, the arrival of “talkies” ruined
Moran puts it: “[D]espite variations of agenda what had been a pure, silent art by turning it
. . . film theorists from the turn of the century into variations on the theater and the phono-
into the 1970s shared an elemental pursuit: to graph record (Clair 137), and by “smash[ing]
identify and define the essence of cinema as many of the forms that the film artists were
an autonomous medium of artistic production” using in favor of the inartistic demand for the
journal of film and video 59.3 / fall 2007 23
©2007 by the board of trustee s of the universit y of illinoisgreatest possible ‘naturalness’” (Arnheim 154). mess—one that ultimately has no humanity, no
The essentialism of medium specificity theory significance. Wheeler Winston Dixon contends,
is apparent here, as is the fear of new media’s for instance, that the “MTV hyperedited ‘shot
clouding and damaging film’s ostensible sta- fragment’ editing” in films today manifests
tus as a pristine art. Television’s arrival, and itself in a “hysterical blenderization of visu-
especially its ability to show movies on its own als. . . . excess is the dominant characteristic”
or connected to a video player, challenged (360).
360). Along the same lines, the Washington
film’s medium specificity even more, as has Post ’s Desson Howe is unimpressed with Days
digitized film sharing, copying, and exhibition of Thunder’s (1990) “barrage of macho-MTV im-
(Balio; Wasser; Zacharek). These technological ages and blaring, youth-adulatory music. This
developments and their aesthetic implications, movie, if nothing else, is loud: Whizzz! Vroom!
along with contemporaneous trends toward Nyeoooow! as those high-performance cars fly
media conglomeration, have spelled the virtual past the camera” (53).
end of essentialist notions of cinematic me- In the same newspaper, in an example of
dium specificity—to the extent it ever existed. critics lamenting MTV aesthetics because they
And yet when employing the MTV aesthetics overwhelm anything worthwhile, Jane Horwitz
trope, critics usually imply that MTV is what writes that Luhrmann’s Moulin Rouge (2001)
it is, film is something else, and the shotgun features a “dizzying MTV aesthetic. . . . It’s daz-
commingling of their styles, conventions, zling, but the gimmickry undercuts the movie’s
and filmmakers is therefore fundamentally emotional impact” (49). Similarly, Reel.com’s
wrong. This clinging to medium specificity is Pam Grady writes that Sofia Coppola’s Marie
especially wrongheaded in the (post)modern Antoinette (2006) “at times plays like an elabo-
age of mass- and multimedia, for some of the rate music video, and with about as much
reasons outlined above. More interesting and substance.” Going further, Jonathan Foreman
revealing, however, are the critical schema and of the New York Post chastises Michael Mann
implied value judgments—all of them basically for being influenced by MTV in the making of
hollow—that are embedded in this adherence Ali (2001), not just because it resulted in a
to, and apparent longing for, cinematic medium bad film but because it disrespects its sub-
specificity in the so-called MTV era. ject: “[This] sketchy biopic . . . in which style
repeatedly tramples substance, actually does
Untenable Oppositions and the the great man a disservice. . . . [Mann] uses
Symbolism of “MTV” Ali essentially as a linking device for a potted
MTV-style history of the ’60s and early ’70s. . .”
When lamenting the influence of MTV aesthet- (48). These filmmakers should have heeded
ics, and at least by implication yearning for critic Jeff Millar, who notes that Stone’s Natural
cinematic medium specificity, critics set up Born Killers had a fundamental flaw and was
several binary oppositions that, upon examina- doomed to fail: “an MTV directing style can’t
tion, bring into sharp relief the fallaciousness be used for didactic purposes because MTV
of the MTV aesthetics trope. The most common isn’t intended to add up to anything.”
of these interlinked, untenable oppositions The opposition of art and high culture versus
is ideas, humanity, narrative, and coherence commerce and mass culture is also embedded
versus distraction, chaos, superficiality, and in the MTV aesthetics trope, and the valuations
meaninglessness (a.k.a. the postmodern) (Big- are no less facile. MTV aesthetics films appar-
nell; Goodwin). The overriding suggestion here ently can never be art, can never challenge us,
is that in contrast to real films, complete with touch us, or better us, but rather will always be
stories, recognizably human characters, and a crass, commercial product cranked out for the
coherent expressions of meaning, MTV aes- masses. Ebert’s reference, quoted earlier, to
thetics make for a loud, over-the-top, too-fast Staying Alive as a “slick, commercial cinematic
24 journal of film and video 59.3 / fall 2007
©2007 by the board of trustee s of the universit y of illinoisPhoto 4: Diamond-en-
crusted “Material Girl”
Satine (Nicole Kidman)
channels Marilyn and Ma-
donna in Baz Luhrmann’s
Moulin Rouge (2001).
jukebox, a series of self-contained song-and- God—and Godard” (“Very Un-sucky”). Although
dance sequences that could be cut apart and this is one of the few instances of a critic see-
played forever on MTV,” is a good example ing cinematic benefits to such aesthetics,
of this—as is his contrast of this film with its Ehrenstein nevertheless sets up another facile
“gutsy ” predecessor, Saturday Night Fever opposition, this time within the larger one: bad
(despite the fact that Fever broke new ground in MTV aesthetics (lowbrow junk rooted in the
its preplanned marketing) (1983). Robert Elder wretched 1980s) versus good MTV aesthetics
of the Chicago Tribune takes a different route (cool and challenging art rooted in the free-
toward emphasizing the base commercial- wheeling 1960s).
ism of MTV in his review of XXX (2002), which MTV aesthetics films apparently transgress
consists of an imagined discussion among even more terribly when their source material
industry “Suits” brainstorming about what the is itself high culture. It is on these occasions
film would be. Their cynical powwow includes when echoes of Dwight MacDonald come
references to MTV aesthetics and to MTV’s sell- through most clearly, as critics lament the
ing power while citing a need for films that are ways mass culture (read MTV ) has mined and
“pre-sold and critic proof” (C1). debased the classics. For example, in his re-
These critics would no doubt admit that the view of Crime + Punishment in Suburbia, Sean
vast majority of Hollywood films do not qualify Axmaker writes that “the guilt” of Dostoevsky’s
as art (however defined), but blaming this on novel “meets the adolescent angst-chic of the
the lowbrow commercialism of MTV aesthetics MTV generation in the latest installation of liter-
implies that they are holding out for its op- ary classics for teens. . . . [T]he biggest crime
posite—something more pure, less machine- is turning the story into an overheated, sen-
made. Ehrenstein suggests exactly that in his sationalistic movie-of-the-week. . . . [T]his film
1999 Slate.com piece when, after looking back would do well not to advertise its inspiration. It
to the 1980s and declaring that “the MTV aes- only makes it look sillier” (“Gen-TV”). Several
thetic hadn’t enlarged the vocabulary of story- reviews of Luhrmann’s Romeo & Juliet (1996)
telling—it had dumbed it down,” he deemed also expressed these sentiments. Ebert, for
“this past year—the last year of cinema’s first instance, takes pains to make it clear that he is
whole century—as the most hopeful since not averse to updated versions of classics, then
the 1970s. . . . [T]he aforementioned ‘MTV declares of the film that “The desperation with
aesthetic’ is beginning to come of age. Thank which it tries to ‘update’ the play and make
journal of film and video 59.3 / fall 2007 25
©2007 by the board of trustee s of the universit y of illinoisit ‘relevant’ is greatly depressing. . . [A] film Lies Beneath, or of opining, as Eric Robinette
that (a) will dismay any lover of Shakespeare, does, that “the influence of MTV and short
and (b) bore anyone lured into the theater by attention spans gets to be a real curse” when
promise of gang wars, MTV-style. This produc- manifested in films like Underworld (2003).
tion was a very bad idea” (William). Posting at Even when critics do not dismiss such films
Amazon.com, meanwhile, “Stewart” vents that or their audiences out of hand, the references
“This modern MTV version of Romeo & Juliet to attention deficits remain. That is the case
is another piece of trash taken from classic with Manohla Dargis’s New York Times review
literature. . . . [M]ostly for the MTV teen crowd, of Doug Liman’s Mr. and Mrs. Smith (2005),
with fast cuts and constantly moving cameras” in which Dargis writes that his previous films
(“Mostly MTV”). “move to the quicksilver rhythms of Gen A.D.D.
These reviews are also examples of the last With their flicker editing, narrative drive and
of the untenable oppositions embedded in the revved-up soundtracks, these are movies made
MTV aesthetics trope, namely the one between for plugged-in, hard-wired audiences for whom
adult culture, which the critic inevitably associ- multitasking isn’t a modern complaint but an
ates with him- or herself, and youth culture, objective fact. In other words, anyone weaned
which fares quite poorly in comparison. As part on MTV, Michael Bay, the Internet, PlayStation
of this trope, the symbolism of the “MTV” itself and commercial music. . . ” (B1). To her credit,
is enough to trivialize the films in question— Dargis here situates MTV and related films in
simply by associating them with contemporary some context, and she does not demonize
youth and their values, interests, and concerns, contemporary youth culture. But the reader is
all of which are insignificant, unhealthy, or still left thinking that this is an alien cohort with
both. The academic film historian Ronald Davis, problematic tendencies, and the film culture
for example, offers this perspective on youth of which they are a part is not what a serious,
and MTV aesthetics: “Flashdance mirrored artistic, adult cinema should be.
frivolous attitudes of teenagers interested in The problems with these oppositions, and
dancing, fashion, and enjoying a good time. with the notion of cinematic medium specific-
. . . [It] has the look of an MTV production. . . . ity, are legion; just as it makes less sense in
Footloose, similar lightweight entertainment, the contemporary, postmodern, mass- and
followed in 1984 . . .” (156). Often the connec- multimedia environment to claim the cinema as
tion is made between a film’s aesthetics and its own pristine, artistic medium, it is increas-
a whole hopeless generation, as in other Ama- ingly wrongheaded to set up oppositions of art
zon.com reviews of Luhrmann’s Romeo & Juliet. and adult culture versus crass youth culture
“Andre S. Grindle,” for instance, posts that the product. Most significantly, even if one sets
film is “obviously designed to pander to the aside the inapt valuations that make up these
cultureless, cynical, MTV-generation, pseudo- oppositions, the realities both of contempo-
grunge teens” (“So Very”), while “Larry” rary film and media business practices and of
asserts that the film was “built to satisfy the contemporary audience behavior bear little
needs of the miserable MTV-microwave-dinner resemblance to this schema. In the decades,
generation” (“Shame”). even centuries, since cultural critics and gate-
The most common disorder attributed to this keepers first began to draw the lines between
generation is an abnormally short attention high culture, mass culture, and folk culture;
span, a problem that is apparently the cause between highbrow and lowbrow; between art
and effect of both MTV and MTV-influenced and commerce; between adult culture and
films. Critics never tire of citing the contempo- youth culture—while inevitably privileging one
rary audience’s “patience and span of a schizo- over the other—these divisions have blurred
phrenic with attention-deficit disorder,” as Chil- substantially. Markers along this postmodern
dress does in his efilmcritic.com review of What cultural path include Pop Art, animated TV se-
26 journal of film and video 59.3 / fall 2007
©2007 by the board of trustee s of the universit y of illinoisries like The Simpsons, rap music, “alternative” other, more interesting functions that the MTV
rock music, graphic novels, and big-budget aesthetics trope may serve for critics, most of
“independent” literary film adaptations like the which connect back to the erosion of medium
Miramax-Disney coproduction Cold Mountain specificity in the contemporary media environ-
(2003) (Bagdikian; Bennett; Wright; Biskind, ment and the blurred boundaries and hierar-
Down; Stabile and Harrison). chies that go with such erosion.
Relatedly, there is an obvious bias toward Just as the accelerated erosion of cinematic
mainstream, cinematic convention at work in medium specificity may have spurred a recent
the opposition critics set up between ideas, wave of Hollywood films attacking television
humanity, narrative, and coherence (good and video, as filmmakers attempt to draw dis-
films) and distraction, chaos, superficiality, tinctions between themselves and their art on
and meaninglessness (MTV aesthetics films). the one hand and these lowly transgressors
In other words, even if it were true that recent on the other, professional film critics may be
Hollywood films are very different from previ- anxious about their status and relevance as
ous work (a highly questionable assertion), authorities in an age of do-it-yourself Internet
there is still no reason why coherence, narra- critics, media conglomeration, and “pre-sold
tive, and character development should be and critic-proof ” films (Calavita 135–49). Using
privileged over style, spectacle, and “super- the MTV aesthetics trope can help critics assert
ficial” cinematic “chaos”—unless, as I have what one does and does not stand for, and in
argued is the case, critics are working with the process define and protect their identity
rigid assumptions about what Hollywood films and professional turf. This is by no means a
can and should be.14 The fact that so many new phenomenon, as journalistic and aca-
critics reject MTV aesthetics films for being demic critics dating back to the silent era have
dumb, formulaic, and commercial and at the had to defend the artistic worthiness of film
same time reject them for straying from norms and the value of film criticism. But the conflu-
of coherence, story, and clear, discernible ence of recent developments on several fronts
meaning—which could describe countless discussed in this article—economic, techno-
works of art, cinematic and otherwise—only logical, demographic, and aesthetic—have
points to further contradictions in the MTV turned on their heads the rigid distinctions
aesthetics trope.15 between art and commerce and high and low
that once put film critics and aficionados on the
Conclusion defensive about the lack of respect given to the
objects of their affection; now the ostensible
Given the substantial flaws that this interroga- problem is a creeping relativism engendered by
tion of the MTV aesthetics trope has revealed, a bottom-line ethos, MTV, and a wired, short-at-
including its historical inaccuracy, its mis- tention-span-suffering generation of moviego-
guided adherence to medium specificity theory, ers (Haberski).16
and the timeworn and untenable oppositions Again, this is not to say that MTV-era films
embedded in it, what accounts for its staying like Staying Alive, Days of Thunder, and Cradle
power in American film criticism? As previously 2 the Grave are being shortchanged by review-
noted, there are some simple and straight- ers blind to their artistry. But one nevertheless
forward explanations for this, such as the gets the feeling that some contemporary critics
temptation to use shorthand when one does have put themselves in an uncomprehending
not necessarily have time or space for nuance and defensive posture not completely different
and elaboration, or when one is perhaps even from the one adopted by the old guard of the
encouraged to shy away from complexity by 1960s when confronted by a changing land-
editors and other gatekeepers concerned about scape (Bosley Crowther’s disgust with Bonnie
alienating readers or audiences. But there are and Clyde being the most famous example)
journal of film and video 59.3 / fall 2007 27
©2007 by the board of trustee s of the universit y of illinois(Haberski 175–78).17 And one is left with the editors Joe Hutshing and Pietro Scalia, perhaps sig-
naling that such aggressively stylized work—and the
paradox of critics who want to set themselves
technologies that facilitate it—should be embraced.
and their preferred films apart from the juve- 10. Raiders, which hit theaters a few months before
nile, taste-challenged masses, but who often MTV began, was criticized in certain circles for some
try to do so within a mainstream, corporate sys- of the same faults later attributed to MTV aesthet-
tem, and according to the rules of good cinema ics films. Pauline Kael, for instance, begins her New
Yorker review by observing that “The marketing execu-
from an imagined, Edenic past—before things
tives are the new high priests of the movie business,”
got so fast and loud. and goes on to write that Raiders is representative of
“the whole collapsing industry.” As part of its frenzy
notes to engage the audience it features a “pounding score”
1. To his credit, Dixon does cite some cinematic and it “gets your heart pumping. But there’s no ex-
harbingers of MTV aesthetics. hilaration in this dumb, motor excitement. . . . You can
2. Nor am I interested in defending MTV itself, almost feel Lucas and Spielberg whipping the editor
which can and should be taken to task for a variety of to clip things sharper—to move ahead. . . . Seeing [it]
faults. See Jhally; Banks. is like being put through a Cuisinart.” (207–12).
3. See Wright; King and Krzywinska. 11. Of course, if one were to look at music videos
4. There is a history of music videos that predates themselves as TV commercials there would be much
MTV, on The Monkees, Don Kirshner’s Rock Concert, less separation between these two phenomena.
and elsewhere, but these early videos tended to be 12. Schrader cites the additional influence of
“performance clips” rather than the concept and Bertolucci’s The Conformist (1970) and its production
narrative videos that came later and are said to have designer, Fernando Scarfiotti, whom Schrader hired to
affected filmmaking practices most. Early videos also work on American Gigolo. Schrader also claims that
tended to be rather cheap and simply made. See The Conformist influenced his friends and contempo-
Reiss and Feineman 13–9; Goodwin 29–38; Mundy raries, like Michael Mann, whom Schrader says based
179–220. the look of Miami Vice on Scarfiotti’s work on several
5. Akira Kurosawa is also cited frequently as an films. Despite this, and despite the fact that Mann’s
influence, on Lucas and Peckinpah in particular. See show had much in common with Thief (1981), Miami
Prince, Savage 51–62; Pollock 46. Vice is often described, reductively, as an MTV-type
6. Many directors working outside the US during show (in part because an NBC executive supposedly
this time also betrayed these qualities and influences conceived it as “MTV Cops”).
(and others), including Seijun Suzuki (Branded to Kill 13. For an eclectic accounting of influences dating
[1967]), Nicolas Roeg and Donald Cammell (Perfor- back to the 1930s, see Ehrenstein “Pre-MTV.”
mance [1970]), Dario Argento (Suspiria [1977]), and 14. One could argue that coherence, narrative,
Jean-Jacques Beineix (Diva [1981]). and character development continue to be privileged
7. As part of their conspicuous exercises in style over other characteristics because Aristotle’s Poetics
and technique, these films also exhibited some of the established them as the norms of drama thousands
other postmodern tendencies associated with both of years ago. While true, this does not fully explain the
the European New Wave and MTV, including intertex- dogged resistance to change among a range of con-
tuality and homage. On the postmodernism of these temporary film critics.
films, see Ray 247–95; Kolker. On postmodernism 15. And yet, to be sure, this does not mean that
and MTV, see Goodwin. these supposed MTV aesthetics films are somehow
8. Some of the international filmmakers whose more likely to be artistically worthwhile.
stylized and “showy ” work since the early 1980s has 16. On contemporary film critics, see “Film Criti-
influenced American filmmakers—and who have of cism” 27–45.
course been influenced by American filmmakers (and 17. The critic who best fits this description now is
others) themselves—include Luc Besson (La Femme the New Yorker’s David Denby, whose paeans to Ste-
Nikita [1990]), Danny Boyle (Trainspotting [1996]), ven Spielberg’s Saving Private Ryan (1998) and Clint
Tom Tykwer (Run Lola Run [1998]), Guy Ritchie (Lock, Eastwood’s Mystic River (2003) and Million Dollar Baby
Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, [1998]), and a host (2004) can be contrasted with his dismissive reviews
of Japanese directors, including Hideo Nakata (Ringu of Fight Club (1999), Kill Bill (2003), and David O. Rus-
[1998]) and Takashi Miike (Ichi the Killer [2001]). sell’s Three Kings (1999) and I Heart Huckabees (2004).
9. See Kagan. Robert Richardson, the cinematogra-
pher on JFK, Natural Born Killers, and Nixon (1995) has references
clearly been an important force in shaping Stone’s Allan, Blaine. “Musical Cinema, Music Video, Music
films as well. Richardson won an Oscar for JFK, as did Television.” Film Quarterly 43.3 (1990): 2–14.
28 journal of film and video 59.3 / fall 2007
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