How do you define 'high brow' (movies)?

[Uhura]

I was reading the Oscar thread and something caught my eye. There seemed to be several users who referred to Oscar movies as pretentious or something people say they watch in order to appear smart and sophisticated. I personally disagreed and it made me wonder, how people actually define what is high brow art?

I don't personally perceive most Oscar movies (Best Picture winners/nominees) as high brow. When I think of movies that might be called high brow, I usually think of experimental films or movies that have otherwise challenging or unusual storytelling. These films don't usually make a splash at the Oscars. Movies that succeed at the Oscars often appeal to emotions and they don't have particularly complex narrative structures. To me, movies that try to primarily hit you in the feels don't evoke an image of stuffy art house fare aimed only for sophisticated and smart people. But people seem to disagree.

So how do you define high brow movies? Why do you think Oscar movies/historical dramas are often labeled as high brow or sophisticated?

 

[tippy2k2]

"High Brow" movies to me are usually the Oscar Bait kind of movies (though not necessarily). Many of them are made with the intention of getting recognized as artistic and deep. A good version of this is a movie that will challenge what you believe and perceive while remaining entertaining (see "Wolf of Wallstreet") while a bad version of this will challenge what you believe and perceive but that's all it's got in it's favor for it's boring (see "Crash").

The "art-house" films that you refer to I see as "art-house"; they have their own category to me.

The problem with defining it is it really can't be defined. It's kind of the art versus porn argument; I know it when I see it but I can't tell you why they're different. Same with what makes a movie High Brow.

 

[dyre]

Yeah, I agree. Movies that explore more complex narratives, attempt to challenge the constraints of the medium, or spend their efforts on developing themes or sending a message instead of just entertaining, tend to not be Oscar favorites. Oscars are usually middle-brow (not that it's a bad thing).

I imagine the users you mentioned might be talking about "Oscar-bait" films, which I guess could be mistaken for "high brow" but really seem to be more "tug at the right strings of the Academy." Or maybe those users are just such "low brow" people that anything above mediocrity is considered high-brow

In terms of this year's big winner, Gravity struck me as an exercise of technical excellence, which might mean that viewers who pay attention to the filmmaking might appreciate it more than viewers who simply watch the action on screen (people who say things like "wow, that was some great cinematography" rather than just "wow, look at that explosion"). But I also think it was easily accessible to regular audiences, so I'm not really sure where these naysayers are coming from.

 

[ClockworkPenguin]

Yeah, I agree. Movies that explore more complex narratives, attempt to challenge the constraints of the medium, or spend their efforts on developing themes or sending a message instead of just entertaining, tend to not be Oscar favorites. Oscars are usually middle-brow (not that it's a bad thing).

I imagine the users you mentioned might be talking about "Oscar-bait" films, which I guess could be mistaken for "high brow" but really seem to be more "tug at the right strings of the Academy." Or maybe those users are just such "low brow" people that anything above mediocrity is considered high-brow

In terms of this year's big winner, Gravity struck me as an exercise of technical excellence, which might mean that viewers who pay attention to the filmmaking might appreciate it more than viewers who simply watch the action on screen (people who say things like "wow, that was some great cinematography" rather than just "wow, look at that explosion"). But I also think it was easily accessible to regular audiences, so I'm not really sure where these naysayers are coming from.

Well, there was that bit where they where trying to grab onto the spacecraft and even though they came to a complete stop and thus had no more momentum to pull them away, Clooney's character still made a noble sacrifice so his (0 in that frame of reference) weight wouldn't pull them both away. But that's actually a nitpick which only turns up in fridge logic unless you're a science nerd like me.

OT; not really sure.

Although really, I think it just means 'stuff posh people like or try to like because other posh people like them'

A list of things that come to mind when i think 'highbrow' in general;
theatre
classical music
Documentaries
'classic' literature

The trappings of the upper middle class intelligentsia basically, and highbrow is whatever they say it is.

(I'm not in any sense saying that these things are only or can only be appreciated by the upper middle class. I like a bunch of that stuff, and I'm not nearly that posh. I'm just saying it's associated with them.)

 

[Uhura]

snip

Yeah, we have very different definitions of 'high brow'. I definitely agree that it's one of those 'you can't really define it' things but it's still really interesting to hear how other people perceive the term. For example, I have heard people (usually Americans) argue that watching foreign movies is some kind of 'high brow activity'. I'm not American nor is my native language English, so obviously that definition was very dissatisfying from my pov (for me, watching Pacific Rim would be high brow activity by that definition).
(And yeah, I use 'art house' and 'high brow' pretty much synonymously. Oh you, language.)

Oscars are usually middle-brow (not that it's a bad thing).

This is the way I see it too.

You might be right about the whole 'Oscar-bait' thing actually, since that's something that comes up often when people talk about 'high-brow' movies (and I think at least one of the people in that thread specifically mentioned Oscar-bait in their post). I guess I can kinda see how they might see it that way, especially in cases where we are talking about very ponderous Oscar-bait movies that handle some kind of heavy subject matter. Those movies make people wax poetic about all kinds of philosophical topics and anything philosophical -> high brow.

 

[dyre]

Well, there was that bit where they where trying to grab onto the spacecraft and even though they came to a complete stop and thus had no more momentum to pull them away, Clooney's character still made a noble sacrifice so his (0 in that frame of reference) weight wouldn't pull them both away. But that's actually a nitpick which only turns up in fridge logic unless you're a science nerd like me.

Yeah, I remember that and it actually bothered me for a few minutes while I was watching the film (I'm not a science nerd, but I was thinking "without gravity, what's pulling Clooney now that he's come to a stop?"). But that's not what I meant by technical excellence; by that I mean the quality of the filmmaking itself. I'm an ignorant amateur in this regard, but even I can sometimes see that a scene was shot in an exceptionally impressive way, whether it be from the creativity/cleverness or difficulty involved. It's kind of like watching a great violinist perform a piece; sure, the music is important, but a knowledgeable audience might also appreciate the technique of the violinist himself.

edit: lol, documentaries are considered "high brow" too? Those ignorant plebs really can't handle anything beyond the circuses, eh?

 

[MeChaNiZ3D]

Naturally it's going to vary for different people because what is high-brow to some may not be so to others. Personally I define 'high-brow' as not entertaining on the more basic levels - special effects, story, action, humour, music, etc. - and requiring a higher idea in order to appreciate. Pretentious also extends to movies with a very basic underlying ideology that hit you over the head with it and think they're being subtle and nuanced, and movies that attempt to justify an idea that the director believes in (often religion) by having the movie's events support that conclusion (despite the fact that it's a movie and thus has no weight in that area).

 

[legend of duty]

There should be another award for "Public Favorite"; I mean who really saw "12 Years a slave" or "The Artist"? Apparently some oscar voters didn't even bother.

 

[Plasticaprinae]

High Brow movies are something that take many outside sources and understanding of the movie to get the most entertainment out of it. Its art that refers back to previous artworks and historical moments. This doesn't necessarily mean they don't appeal to emotion since art is all about that. Most High Brow films are obviously trying to get a complicated message across.
Popular movies or Oscar movies sometime have outside sources that make it more fun, but they are also something that most people don't have to think too hard. I think it has to do with the idea of education and that having it makes people better than others. I think people associate High Brow with pretension, and the oscars can come off like that. But then there's Trash Humpers.

 

[FPLOON]

"High Brow" movies are those kinds of movies that only become "high brow" years after they have been released to the public... They first come off as a movie that would either be forgotten almost a year after it has come out or, in a rare instances, gets recognized by the Academy and the like...

This is where things get complicated even more... You see, no one can fully pin point a "High Brow" movie the same year it comes out because it would come off as being "pretentious" or something like that... At the same time, the people claiming that they're making a so-called "High Brow" movie probably do not realized that, for the most part, no one would ever call said movie "High Brow" like they would and/or, at best, would only label it as "Middle Brow"or something along those lines...

Now, this is all coming form someone who, frankly, doesn't go out of his way to seek out these "High Brow" movies in the first place... However, even if I was, I doubt that a "High Brow" movie would be recognized so soon after it has been released publicly... The amount of years it would take before a movie can be seen as "High Brow" is both subjective and questionable...

 

[newfoundsky]

To me a high brow movie is one that is

a) deliberately Oscarbait. I really dislike these kinds of movies, because of the "Oscar formula". Limited releases with a mostly unknown supporting cast, but a big ticket star so people talk about it, usually involves the problems of the very rich or the very poor (Twelve Years a Slave, and the King's Speech respectively), and there is always a character that supports the lead that is from the opposite circumstance as the character that drives the plot (Epps, the only Black person in that movie who was not a slave, and the Kings Butler, the only white person in that movie who was important), and the main character always has to overcome something in order to do the Really Important Thing, and that is usually a personal flaw if the lead is white, or a societal flaw if the lead is black.

b) Movies deliberately trying to be artsy. I can enjoy these more than Oscarbait movies, but really only if it is VISUALLY artsy. An example of visual artsy would be the most recent Tron, which was absolutely beautiful to behold, but everything else about it sucked. The problem is they try to hard on one aspect, and the others suffer as a result, and the defenders champion them as great movies because of the one thing they did well.