Whenever I hear a critic or someone criticizing a film using the word 'pretentious', lava starts bubbling my stomach and I become furious. Furious enough to make a blog post about it! It's not that it can't be used as constructive criticism, but I think people (and of course I'll be generalizing in this article, so I don't claim to speak for everybody) who have used the word are really trying to say something else and I'll explain why.
The definition of pretentious is to "attempt to impress by affecting greater importance, talent, culture, etc, than actually possessed." That could hypothetically apply to a movie, yes, but don't most filmmakers aspire their movie to be important? That it will stick with people, either by being incredibly entertaining or thought provoking? You're essentially saying that the movie failed to speak to you. Which happens. But you could hypothetically say that about any movie you didn't like. Batman & Robin just wanted to be entertaining to people, and it failed. Is Batman & Robin pretentious?
No, people use this word for a specific type of movie. These movies are slower paced, often long shots, less dialogue, less action, moments of surrealism, typically more focused on cinematography than story or characters. It's these movies that I always see people call pretentious. Why is that? I'll tell you why, and you're gonna hate me for saying such a cliche and annoying line; they just didn't understand it.
Make no mistake, I am not claiming to be super intelligent (or of average intelligence, for that matter) or suggest that those who thought these movies were pretentious are stupid, but they usually don't understand what the movie was trying to do. It's not that these movies are 'too smart' for them but that it's basically a whole type of 'genre', often arthouse, experimental, surreal, or any movie that is has a slow-burn pacing, that a lot of people just simply aren't into. They usually are under the assumption that the slow pace and the lack of dialogue and the surrealism and all that must be there because the underlying themes of the movie has to be important, super-clever, and worth the trouble. When they learn that sometimes the themes and messages that these movies just aren't that amazing, they feel they've wasted their time watching something they thought was boring. But you see, if you found it boring then you found it boring, not pretentious.
Some people just don't find these types of movies entertaining and that's perfectly fine. I, however, enjoy movies that a bit more slower paced and has surrealism. Movies that get weird and hypnotic are just what I'm into. I like movies that focus on cinematography and trying to give off certain emotions through visuals rather than a standard narrative and I'd recommend people open their eyes to what's entertaining. That especially goes for people who believe 'movies don't have to be entertaining!', because I believe they do. It's just how broad is your palette of entertainment is. Art, no matter how depressing, disgusting, or puzzling it is, should give you enjoyment, enjoyment that a film was good enough to make you feel the way the movie intended you to feel.
Could you trust those beady, evil eyes?
But, hey, maybe these movies just aren't your cup of tea, you're fine and there isn't anything wrong with that. Maybe you see movie fans who claim to have superior knowledge because they watched The Master and all of Christopher Nolan's filmography. Those people are pretentious. A director asserting that his movies are the best movies in the world, that's a person who's pretentious. But you see a film that you thought you understood and didn't like because the underlying themes weren't worth the bore? You were just bored, so why not say it as it is?
And of course I'm not speaking to everyone who uses the word, some undoubtedly use it correctly. But this is what I've seen over and over by people. Feel free to agree or disagree, but I hope you'll have an open mind about it because, in truth, it often comes across to me as an insult to a filmmaker, essentially calling that person a show-off idiot, than anything else.
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