American Movie Habits
Joe Queenan in the 'Confessions of a Cineplex Heckler';
The results are not pretty. Of the nine conventional American made films that I investigated, only 6.75 out of the 90 people knew the name of the director. That's 7.5 percent. Throw out the universally famous Steven Spielberg and the percentage drops to 1.75 out of 80, or 2.2 percent.
Pathetic.
And even in Spielberg's case (50 percent), the rate of recognition numbers were much smaller than for James Ivory (100 percent). Worse still, Spielberg's 50 percent rating put him in exactly the same class as an obscure, English female director of a drama about cross-dressing that is playing at only about six movie theatres on the entire planet.
The inescapable conclusion that must be drawn from the data is clear: Americans could give one (1) *#@! who directed Posse, and couldn't give even that many *#@!^ who directed Indecent Proposal, Dave, Sleepless in Seattle, Last Action Hero, Cliffhanger, Menace II Society, or Guilty as Sin. Proving, once and for all, without the slightest shadow of doubt, that this is not France.
The results are not pretty. Of the nine conventional American made films that I investigated, only 6.75 out of the 90 people knew the name of the director. That's 7.5 percent. Throw out the universally famous Steven Spielberg and the percentage drops to 1.75 out of 80, or 2.2 percent.
Pathetic.
And even in Spielberg's case (50 percent), the rate of recognition numbers were much smaller than for James Ivory (100 percent). Worse still, Spielberg's 50 percent rating put him in exactly the same class as an obscure, English female director of a drama about cross-dressing that is playing at only about six movie theatres on the entire planet.
The inescapable conclusion that must be drawn from the data is clear: Americans could give one (1) *#@! who directed Posse, and couldn't give even that many *#@!^ who directed Indecent Proposal, Dave, Sleepless in Seattle, Last Action Hero, Cliffhanger, Menace II Society, or Guilty as Sin. Proving, once and for all, without the slightest shadow of doubt, that this is not France.
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