Much Ado About Oliver Stone
Recently, David Weinberger wrote an enjoyable polemic skewering Oliver Stone. This is a topic I can get behind, because I’ve never liked Stone’s work very much. David sums him up nicely:
A wildly incompetent director whose subject matter has led us to excuse his embarrassingly bad productions. Find a movie of his — I’ve seen most, but not all, of them — that doesn’t have a cliche-filled script, black-and-white characters, camera-work that needlessly calls attention to itself, actors pushed into career-damaging performances, and self-righteous, unsympathetic, simple-minded political stances.
Amen. I’ve found most of Stone’s work obvious, egotistical and incredibly showy. Alexander was profoundly awful.
James Wolcott disagrees, and offers a defence of Oliver. David has replied with an update to his original post.
-j.