10 Best Movies About Making Movies

10 Best Movies About Making Movies

The best of these films allow artists to directly explore themselves and the power of film.

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There’s the old adage “write what you know.” When filmmakers take this advice, what audiences get are movies that are either textually or metaphorically about movies and how they’re made. Such a set-up is a prime opportunity for self-referential (or self-deprecating humor) and meta themes. Actors can get in on the fun too and parody either their general profession or specific things about their persona.

The best of these films allow artists to directly explore themselves and the power of film, including why it’s the medium they’ve dedicated their lives to. After all, there’s little more revealing than the process of creating something.

10 Inception Is A Metaphor For Filmmaking

Christopher Nolan previously explored meta text and the relationship between the artist and their audience in “The Prestige,” but he took the metaphor a step further with Inception. The process of a team implanting a memory in Robert Fischer’s brain is akin to a movie crew trying to make a blockbuster that’ll wow viewers. Protagonist/group leader Cobb is the director (it’s no coincidence that he bears a resemblance to Nolan himself), while his partner Arthur is the producer. As the designer of the dream world, architect Ariadne is the production designer, while the face-swapping Eames is an actor. Finally, the operation’s benefactor, billionaire Saito, is a studio bigwig.

9 Wes Craven’s New Nightmare Is Meta-Horror

The strangest Nightmare On Elm Street was Chapter #7, New Nightmare. It was the first since the original to be directed by Wes Craven. Heather Langenkamp also returned for the first time since Chapter #3, Dream Warriors. The twist? Langenkamp wasn’t playing Nancy Thompson.

She played a fictionalized version of herself alongside Craven and Freddy Krueger actor Robert Englund. In the film, the cast and crew soon find themselves being picked off because Freddy Krueger has entered the real world. Set in the world of Hollywood, this very meta-film is a precursor to Wes Craven’s similarly referential but less supernatural Scream.

8 Tropic Thunder Is Hollywood Ribbing Itself

The best comedians are those who can laugh at themselves. Tropic Thunder is Hollywood itself doing so. Starring and directed by Ben Stiller, the film is a collection of some of the biggest names in Hollywood lampooning the industry where they’ve made their names. The film opens with fake trailers depicting films not too far off from some real productions. The characters explicitly discuss what kind of performance it takes to be an Oscar winner, and Les Grossman (Tom Cruise) is a hilarious spin on the ruthless moneymen who make Tinseltown go round.

7 Sullivan’s Travels Follows A Director In Search Of Truth

Hollywood director John L. Sullivan wants to break away from the lighthearted comedies where he’s made his name. Now he wants to make a picture with meaning; one that speaks to the plight of the common man. Realizing a rich white man knows as little about the common man as possible, he decides to travel across the country in the guise of a bum. His odyssey eventually leaves him imprisoned in a southern prison camp. There, he learns that what the common man really needs isn’t to see their struggles reflected back, but the lighthearted escapism his films offer.

6 Ed Wood Is A Biopic About History’s Worst Director

How ironic; one of Tim Burton’s best films is about one of the worst directors in Hollywood history. Ed Wood’s monster movies, from Bride of the Monster to Plan 9 From Outer Space could barely even be considered B-Movies, while his attempt at speaking from the heart in Glen or Glenda was just as inept. Despite this, Burton doesn’t disrespect the man. Even when he pokes fun, it’s in good jest. The star of the movie, as with many of Wood’s, is the erstwhile Dracula Bela Lugosi, played in an Oscar-winning turn by Martin Landau. Burton’s film gives Wood and Lugosi kinder memorials than they get in life.

5 Adaptation Is About Writer’s Block

How did Charlie Kaufman break his writer’s block when trying to craft a script adapting The Orchid Thief? He wrote a script about his writer’s block while trying to adapt The Orchid Thief. Starring Nicolas Cage as Kaufman, Adaptation is specifically about writing and Kaufman’s struggles with it, from how his self-loathing filters his work from his fictional brother Donald (also played by Cage) representing the voice in his head telling him to sell out.

The film also features a brief but memorable appearance by Brian Cox as Robert McKee, screenwriting guru and author of Story. In a very meta turn, Adaptation becomes more conventional once Charlie starts taking Donald’s-by-way-of-McKee’s advice about the story.

4 Millennium Actress Is A Celebration Of Cinema’s Possibilities

Satoshi Kon’s first two films are both about the entertainment industry. However, while Perfect Blue is a nightmare about how fame warps one’s identity, Millennium Actress showcases how one can find purpose in life by pretending to be someone else. A pair of documentary filmmakers interview Chiyoko Fujiwara, a retired Japanese actress. She takes them through her life story, but she lived many lives. When she was a teenager, she met a young soldier and became an actress in the hope she’d meet him again. From there, the story bounces between reality and cinema, surreal yet seamless.

3 Boogie Nights Is Set In The 1970s Adult Film Business

One might be hesitant to label pornography as cinema, but it takes filmmaking to produce. Paul Thomas Anderson’s Boogie Nights is a love letter to the black sheep of movies. With only his second movie, PTA mixes the energy of a talented novice with the precise craftsmanship of an expert; a rare but fantastic combination. Anderson is a director who can do both character studies which focus on one or two people or ensembles equally well. Boogie Nights is definitely the latter. The film’s influence lives on this year’s X, best described as Boogie Nights plus The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

2 Singin’ In The Rain Is Set in 1920s Hollywood

Singin’ In The Rain is set in the late 1920s, just as sound is beginning to take over movies. It showcases how silent film stars are struggling to adapt to the new process granted by technological innovation. Fittingly, the film is a genre that only became possible due to sound: a musical. The film is a love letter to Hollywood, showing it as glamorous and basically good despite the shallow stars and gossip rags. Even better, the movie incorporates filmmaking into its own humor; the funniest scene is when the crew of The Dueling Cavalier struggles to align Lina Lamont’s microphone properly, resulting in many mishaps and multiple takes.

1 Sunset Boulevard Shows Hollywood’s Dark Side

Billy Wilder’s Sunset Boulevard is a black mirror to Singin’ In The Rain. Released in 1950, the film was set in contemporary times, but the shadow of the silent era casts a shadow over it. Gloria Swanson plays Norma Desmond as an insane version of herself; a former silent film star who couldn’t adapt to the sound era and was left out to dry by Hollywood. Protagonist (but not star) Joe Gillis (William Holden) is a screenwriter whose struggles to get work, hack-level talent, and mercenary behavior seem like Wilder is laughing at the worst stereotypes of his profession.

Link Source : https://www.cbr.com/best-movies-about-making-movies/

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