Movie Review: Super 8

           So, maybe it’s just me and maybe it’s just because I’ve been reading a little too much of good-old, sexy Jacki Derrida--



--and so am just super attuned to all things “Metaphysics Of Presence”, but I think that a great many reviewers of JJ Abrams’ recent Super 8 are knee-deep in the M.O.P. sh*t, so to speak, and being knee-deep in the M.O.P. sh*t is no good for reviewers and no good for those of us that read their reviews. Why? Because if/when a reviewer is knee deep in the M.O.P. sh*t, the tools they use for critical assessment are warped and the products of said warping get passed on to others in/through their reviews, just like a nasty case of... ORAL HERPES!



Egads!

So, you’re probably wondering “What, the eff, does M.O.P. (‘Metaphysics Of Presence’) mean? And, uh, can it really give me oral-herpes?” The answer to the second question is, unfortunately, yes. The answer to the first is contained in the following and also contains the cure.

In his Of Grammatology, Derrida explores the common-understanding of the relationship between writing, speech and, to a lesser degree, thought, in which speech is understood to be more “present” than writing, and thought more “present” than speech. Which definition of “present” is Derrida being critical of? One in which present is defined as complete, full, trustworthy (i.e., non-differantial... I'll explain this in a moment, to the best of my abilities). In response to this common understanding of the relationship between writing, speech, and thought, Derrida says “Je ne se No!” (i.e., speech is not more present than writing, thought is not more present than speech), and charges said common-understanding with being complicit in the history of what he calls the metaphysics of presence. To be complicit in the history of the M.O.P. means to posit/think/believe that something--like speech or thought--is fully present and/or trustworthy, without any gaps in it, all there, etc., but, more than this, it is also to posit/think/believe that something like speech (or thought) is more-present than things that are supposedly parasitic on and/or derivative of it, like writing, e.g., “Speech is more trustworthy than writing. Speech, that’s real, that’s where it’s at! If only we could get writing to be more like speech!!! Or, gosh-golly, so-and-so’s writing is a lot like speech, ergo, better, more accurate, more true." Over and against being complicit in the history of the M.O.P., Derrida wants us accept what that he calls differance--which means both to defer, in time, and to differ, in space--which Derrida wants us to accept as true of everything (thought, speech, writing, you, me, movies, what-ever), i.e., all things differ and defer and aren’t fully-present to themselves or others. So, rather than say things like, "Speech, that's real!" We should say things like, "Speech isn't more real than writing, but rather, writing is different than speech, and vice versa." Thoroughly confused? Well, I felt like I at least had to try to explain/define M.O.P. if I was going to fault people for falling into it’s traps.

So... In the case of Abrams Super 8, I noticed that a number of reviewers were knee-deep in the M.O.P.-sh*t. Here’s a quote from somebody that liked Abrams’ movie (thanks Rotten Tomatoes), “Remember the good old days? This is the movie you went to see on a Saturday afternoon in the good old days” (Tom Long of the Detroit News, italics me). Here we have a clear case of the critical-analytical herp caused by M.O.P., which is here indicated by the phrase “the good old days,” which, I’m sorry Tom Long, NEVER ACTUALLY TOOK PLACE!!! Or, at least, didn’t quite take place like you remember them, sorry (again). Why do I say this? Because I guarantee that Abrams Super 8 is better in almost every conceivable way than most of the creature films from the “good old days.” Don’t believe me? I double-dog dare you to go and watch a bunch of old creature films, hell, go and watch E.T. and tell me: Is the story better? Are the characters more engaging? Is the production value as mint? Go and watch E.T. and watch it from the perspective of your expectations and tastes and sensibilities today and don't compare Abrams' movie to your memory of E.T. and honestly tell me that Abrams’ movie doesn’t compare favorably. Long is complicit in the history of the M.O.P. in that he grants full-presence to his memories of the good-old days, which are never quite as good as we remember them being because of the nature/character of memory, which fills-in certain gaps and glazes-over cracks and... You get the idea.

On the flip side of the same coin, here’s a quote from somebody that didn’t like Abrams’ movie (thanks again, R.T.), “In a manner similar to Gus Van Sant's Psycho, it's merely a high-resolution photocopy devoid of its revered predecessors' soul” (Nich Schager of Slant, italics me). Here we have another clear case of herp, M.O.P.-style, which in this case is indicated by the words “photocopy” and “soul,” which are set in an antonymic relationship in order to justify why Schager didn’t like Abram’s movie (or Van Sant’s), suggesting that Abrams’ movie has no “soul,” whereas other movies, movies like Psycho--and movies like E.T., for that matter--do. Schager is complicit in the M.O.P. in that he posits that certain movies have souls--ergo, are fully present and trustworthy and Good--and certain movies are photocopies devoid of souls. You know what, Van Sant’s Psycho sucks in comparison to Hitchcock’s, but that doesn’t mean that Hitchcock’s has a soul whereas Van Sant’s does not.

Both Schrager and Long are guilty of basically the same thing, which is to view and review Abrams’ Super 8 from a fully-present perspective, Long from the perspective of the Good-Old Days, Schrager from the perspective of There-are-Movies-with-Souls-and-Movies-Without-Souls. This should be unacceptable behavior for movie critics the world over, which doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t occasionally indulge in nostalgia or engage in metaphysics, merely that we shouldn’t let our nostalgia or our metaphysics color our reviews of films, which other people are going to read and then take with them into the theater and into their conversations with others (herpes). It would be like, if I started watching every single movie from the perspective generated by my childhood memory of the quality of the original, animated, Transformers: The Movie, which had Leonard Nimoy and Orson Welles and Eric Idle and Judd Nelson--

(that’s right, Judd F’ing Nelson!!!)--as voice actors. If I approached movies from this perspective, then every single movie I didn’t like would be soulless, and every single movie I did like would take me back to the really, really good-old days in which Autobots battled Decepticons, protected the entire universe from Orson, er, UNICRON, and awesome 80s hair-metal and Weird Al tunes were the only tunes on the proverbial juke-box. Wait, maybe that’s not such a bad place from which to approach my movie reviews...
   

So, what’s my review of Super 8? Well, I probably wouldn’t pay to watch it again, but I have no problem imagining myself between the ages of 7-11, going to the movie and absolutely loving it and having a huge crush on the girl and starting to make monster movies with my friends as a result of how much I loved it, which I think is actually pretty high-marks for a movie, but then, I'm not between the ages of 7-11.