I beg to differ about THE STING and being able to watch it a second time. Movies like that make me want to see them again if only to figure out where the twist began-like, as you mentioned, THE SIXTH SENSE, to catch any flaws but in a nice way. I watch again to see how the filmmakers “got” me, and with THE STING I figured it out on the third viewing. Without spoiling the end for those few who have not seen it, watch what Redford does the day of the big con as he dresses and checks himself in the mirror. He gets something out of a drawer and uses it in a way that looking back sure seems a bit out of the ordinary on repeated viewings, but you are so drawn into the film and its intricacies that it is a small enough detail to not even notice the first time around.

I also knew the “big twist” in THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK before the film came out-I was a graduate student in Popular Culture at the time and my department chair (who was also a close friend) got first crack at new books that publishers sent in. One of them was the novelization of EMPIRE, six weeks before the film came out! He tossed the book in my direction and said to keep it and enjoy. Needless to say I devoured that book in about an hour and when the twist came I could only think “Holy s***!” The day the film opened a convoy of us went to see it and my best friend was sitting next to me, and when the “holy s***” moment occurred, I was looking right at him and he turned to me with eyes almost bulging out and muttered “Holy s***!” To me, his reaction made that moment even more astounding. Needless to say, I now refer to those times as…well, you know. The cover art for BATTLE: LOS ANGELES is a perfect example of one, and any Michael Bay movie almost consists of just those.

Wow. This is the shortest write-up I think I’ve ever seen on this site. I agree with you mostly, but I have seen The Sixth Sense a few times. The second time was to go back and see if Shyamalan stayed true to his device throughout the movie. I watched it again years later out of nostalgia. I still like it, but all of his other movies fall into the “Once is Enough” category. I don’t think The Sting does.

I also think that The Silence of the Lambs, Cape Fear and Planet of the Apes are definitely rewatchable. Movies that I would put into the “Once is Enough” category are the vast majority of suspense thrillers with “twist” endings made since Hitchcock died. I would not include The Usual Suspects, Primal Fear or Seven in that category.

Fight Club is to some degree more interesting upon rewatch- the twist is something of a gimmick, and the movie has more than enough depth and ideas to work without it. I mean, Fincher’s best movie (I’d say) is Zodiac, and that’s one where virtually everyone knew the ending in advance- tricksy plots only get in the way of what Fincher’s really good at.

I have no idea of why the Silence of the Lambs wouldn’t be rewatchable, it’s not even twist based. It’s generally my argument that if a movie can’t survive without the twist as a hook, it probably isn’t actually very good- the two Shymalans are good examples (though I’m still convinced he could make a decent movie if someone else wrote it.)

I don’t know, Tom. I don’t think you give Shyamalan enough credit. I’m sure he’s perfectly capable of screwing up someone else’s screenplay.

Hmmm. Couldn’t disagree more with this post. I guess if you are watching a film only because of the plot then I can accept the premise, but as one of my film professors used to say, “Plot is only one element in a film and, most of the time, not a very important one.” And, I detect I bit of male bias here–I know that many men fawn over the Star Wars Trilogy like it was the second coming of cinema. But, really, the endings hold up and The Sixth Sense doesn’t? Really? I guess there must have been something special about those dancing Ewoks and the floating incarnations of Obe Wan and Darth Vadar at the end of the third one that I must have missed.

I like the Ewoks.

I would also have to beg to differ about the Sting. I have seen it several times and I enjoy the plot twists no matter how many times I see it. Actually, I feel that way about most movies I like. Knowing the ending in no way makes me want to see them less. Psycho, Sixth Sense and Wizard among them. Silence of the Lambs was hard for me to sit through the first time, so don’t force myself to do it again. Movies are like books to me, just in color. I reread my favorite books over and over because they are like old friends. I don’t read (or watch movies) again that I didn’t like the first time-with some exceptions if I was too quick to judge.

As to Star Wars, being a female, I have to say that I am slightly offended (*G*)at the “mail bias” because I happen to think the original trilogy Is the second coming, and the last three are a singluar testament to the levels of hell that exist. It has nothing to do with the dancing ewoks, though they were cute, and everything to do with the hope and promise of the future. At least for me, and it also was a good story, which is where the second set failed miserably. Apparently he sold his soul between the making of these two parts to the story, and it was obvious. I still watch them, and love every minute of them. Growing up in farm land south of Chicago, there wasn’t alot to hope for as far as your future went when they came out, and boy, did they cause a stir! People thinking about things besides farm subsidies or trains 0and working at McDonalds. A whole crop of college grads in something other than fertilizer and home ec graduated. Big things happened because of the effects of those movies!

Haha, I can’t say I see how preferring Star Wars to the Sixth Sense reveals a masculine bias, either- they’re certainly both boy’s clubs in the actual moviemaking. Gendering movie taste can be risky, since it tends to essentialize what men and women like.

Maybe we can all agree that Alien is a movie with a spoilable ending that’s endlessly rewatchable?

I must agree about Alien, Tom. However, genderizing is somewhat valid. Maybe not for Star Wars and The Sixth Sense as they have universal appeal, but how many men like The Notebook?

The Notebook has a 7.8 rating from male voters on IMDB, with 60,000+ men voting, so evidently: a bunch?

Heidi, your characterization of the two Star Wars trilogies is hilarious. And true! I believe that Lucas was spooked by the overwhelming success of the first three. No one could ever be prepared for that. When he finally felt able to get back to work on a movie, he became much more interested in special effects than in screenwriting. He should have turned the writing over to someone else.

THE WIZARD OF OZ is a special case because the whole “It was a dream, there’s no place like home” dreck is a Hollywood invention. In the book, well-known by then to four decades of children, Oz is real. I never watch the back in Kansas ending because it betrays the book.

Although I didn’t anticipate the twist in THE CRYING GAME, that film is still enjoyable. VERTIGO is an interesting case, letting the audience in on the twist before James Stewart knows, so that the tension becomes wodering how he will react once he finds out.

I am shocked at the rating by male viewers of The Notebook. I wonder if I will actually like it if I am ever forced to watch it.

And Kingrat- every Hitchcock movie is rewatchable.

I think that’s actually specifically the problem with gendering movie taste- a lot of people avoid movies without giving them a shot because they seem to be aimed at the other gender (or a different ethnic group, social class, whatever.) I’d blame that as much on the way movies are sold as anything, but think about how few straight guys are willing to give musicals a chance- Singing in the Rain is great no matter who you are, but somehow we as a culture have decided it’s for ladies and gay dudes.

I’ll agree with you about musicals, to a point. I love classic musicals, especially Rodgers and Hammerstein, The Wizard of Oz and Singin’ in the Rain, but today’s movie musicals do not appeal to me. They’re too Andrew Lloyd Weber and not enough Cole Porter, George Gershwin, Irving Berlin or Rodgers and Hammerstein. Moulin Rouge was interesting, but Chicago was dreadful. The Phantom of the Opera was boring and I didn’t bother seeing the new Hairspray or Mamma Mia.

Oh, Lord, the new Hairspray was painful- particularly because the original was excellent. It’s generally a good idea to avoid anything that goes the movie to Broadway adaptation back to movie route.

As far as recent musicals go, though, I thought Burton’s Sweeney Todd was the best thing he’s done in years.

Here are some points that I want to make:

1. I agree with Tom S. that is not appropriate to assign movies to a specific gender or sexual preference (or nationality, for that matter).
I have a big movie collection (VHSs and DVDs bought in stores or through catalogues). I told someone I met on a work assignment about it and was asked if I had musicals other than OKLAHOMA or any Montgomery Clift movies. It is not right to think that way.
(By the way, I am not gay.)

2. I am not fond of STAR WARS. I think the series and Lucas are overrated. I am encouraged by knowing that Alec Guinness didn’t think much of them either.

3. Everyone knows that rewatching movies depends on your personal taste. I can watch THE STING, THE SIXTH SENSE, SILENCE OF THE LAMBS, PSYCHO, PRIMAL FEAR, USUAL SUSPECTS, MY FAIR LADY, MAGNIFICENT SEVEN and WIZARD OF OZ plenty of times. Also CAPE FEAR, MAMA MIA and ALIEN.
I’ll pass on UNBREAKABLE, FIGHT CLUB and THE CRYING GAME.

4. During the heyday of classic cinema people went to the movies rather than watch TV (which had been invented but had not become popular yet). Men, women and families all went. Men watched Garbo and Bette Davis. Women didn’t mind seeing James Cagney, Spencer Tracy and Bob Hope.
The problem is that these days studios design the movies for women, with nothing to appeal to men. They proudly make “chick flicks.” And, of course, too, there are the movies just for the guys.

5. I watched the tape of the Clooney-Pitt OCEANS ELEVEN after seeing it in a theater and found it excruciating to sit through.

highhurdler–your dismissal of THE SIXTH SENSE is curious–”I get no pleasure out of seeing dead people.” The devices used to deceive us were so flawlessly executed, that you HAD to see it again to see how cunningly it was pulled off. The success of these deceptive tactics was almost unprecedented; they worked completely and virtually everyone was taken in. It’s a great film, but the reason it was #1 at the box office for 9 (!) weeks is because of the (almost required) compulsive re-viewings. Also, this second viewing prompted huge word-of-mouth attendance by first-timers and it snowballed from there. The other unique thing about these “ya gotta SEE this!” urgings is how “loyal” and careful the urgers were to adamantly resist “spoilers”. This was phenomenal. The BottomLine: It’s not the gimmicks that make this a Classic–the film stands on it’s own because it’s brilliant.

Honestly, I thought the movie was kind of hollow- the performances were solid, but Shymalan coasted (as he did for almost everything he’s done since) on whispery voices and spooooky atmosphere. Which is fine, since he does that well, but there’s really not much else going on.

I agree with Suzidoll. Plot is such a small part of film art, in some cases totally inconsequential. Film is a cultural document as much as anything else and I think anyone with an interest in history, humanity or art can find an awful lot to glean from watching some of these films many times, regardless of plot.

I’d agree that some gimmick films like Memento or the Sixth Sense lack a great deal of replay value, but that has more to do with their recent vintage than anything else, they simply aren’t old enough to hold a lot of historic/cultural interest quite yet. Aesthetics, characters, theme – these are elements totally removed from plot that carry a lot of weight. As an example, by your plot-biased definition of “rewatchability” the works of Cormac McCarthy might be deemed unworthy of rereads – being nearly devoid of traditional plot and totally meandering (aside from No Country for Old Men), but such a decision would deprive you of so much depth.

And, sorry, but not a lot of meat to this post. I always look forward to something I can chew on from the Morlocks blog, this seems a little superficial. If it was about an obscure DVD release or news item it’d be one thing, but an opinion piece oughta have more to munch on…But thanks nonetheless, at least ya got me griping, which is more than most blogs can say!

Tom–I totally disagree with you about this film while I also disagree about Shamalyan–your assessment isn’t strong enough. He got lucky with SIXTH SENSE. That’s all. Period. Megalomania set in and his fatuous attempts to duplicate this extraordinary “fluke” have been pathetic, predictable and boring. Look how long it took him (and those people who were financing all his Bombs while allowing him total 100% control) to finally admit that he’s an OK director, but that he needs a strong collaborator to write. He should stick to directing screenplays written by others…

@Matt

Reducing movies to cultural artifacts is incredibly reductive to them as art- there is infinitely more in movies to watch for than “what kind of clothes were people wearing in 1997″.

I think it’s also problematic that people dismiss plotting so lightly- yes, obviously you can have a movie entirely without it. You can also have a movie without sound or color, but that doesn’t mean that those things are not vital to the movies in which they are elements. A movie can be great in any number of ways, and storytelling is one of them- and in a well told story, you absolutely cannot divorce the plot, the events which actually occur, from the characters or the theme (or even the aesthetics, in a well-unified movie.)

That said, I do strongly agree that a plot that becomes worthless once you know where it is going is not much of a plot- Memento is very rewatchable, because the interest in it is not where it’s going but the way what is happening reflects on the characters and the ideas about how we blind ourselves etc. that Nolan is trying to get across with his gimmick.

Memento is infinitely rewatchable.

I feel very much the opposite. Spoiled movies make more interesting re-watches for me on the whole since the second watch puts you in a different frame of mind. The spoiler in FIGHT CLUB can almost be dismissed after enough viewings because that has little to do with what the movie is about.

UNBREAKABLE is even more interesting to watch again once you know the spoiler. That’s a great performance by Willis and a great unacknowledged comic book super hero origins story.

Not mention but I am sure you would find equally un-re-watchable is HAUTE TENSION, the French horror movie. The spoiler in it left a bad taste in some people’s mouths, but I have watched the movie a dozen times and it is genuinely gripping every time.

I choose the historical document angle as one way to illuminate my point, the nature of a limited online response is such that this becomes necessary. Notice I purposefully used the phrase “As much as anything else,” which was to say it is one of many faucets to be considered. By wording it so I was blatantly saying that there are infintely more ways to look at it than as a cultural document or a plot motivated entertainment. I also brought up “Aesthetics, characters, theme,” so I don’t understand why you so readily dismissed everything I wrote and got the message that I only valued film to look at hairdos and clothing.

Further, don’t get discouraged, because I can say that nearly 100% of film school is geared towards pounding the importance of plot into every student’s head. It’s definitely the dominant thrust. It’s probably the major factor in the average audience’s appreciation of film too. The posters on this board are in the minority, just a vocal one. Plot as king is the standard.

I feel the plot issue is driven into film enthusiasts brain in film school day one

I suppose I misunderstood your argument, then- I’m coming from a position of hearing the revisionist argument w/r/t plot so often that I forget that it is not the dominant one, and as I outlined, I think it’s more or less equally misleading to dismiss it or to embrace it as the vital element (and among the scholarly stuff I read, dismissing it seems much more common.)

As far as the historical context thing- it’s true that you hedged it, but you also made the claim that the interest of something like Memento is diminished because it’s not old enough to have historical interest yet, which I think is specifically dismissive of the movie as a work.

I am not the world’s biggest Nolan booster by any means, but he is a good example of a plot that can be a major part of the movie’s artistry, because the puzzlebox plot (when he doesn’t get distracted by it and pulled into dehumanizing his characters in service of it) can be a tool to illuminate his larger themes- beyond the bare facts of what happens, he calls attention to the structure of his plots, the jumbled nature of which (particularly in Memento) change the impact of what we are seeing enormously.

A movie I have no desire to watch a second time is Se7en. I suppose its a bit easier to rewatch a lighthearted movie again than one that is depressing.

Once is never enough for “The Sting”. Paul Newman and Robert Redford are great in this movie. “What Ever Happed to Baby Jane?” for that movie once was enogh! I made a promise to myself that I would never watch that movie again! It is too scary.