>This sounds super uber-precious, but I think it's hard to do this kind of creative work in a modern secular society because it becomes all about your ego and yourself. And I am envious — this is the horrible part — I'm envious of medieval craftsmen who are doing the work for God. And that becomes a way to ... you get to be creative to celebrate something else. And also, you're censoring yourself because it's not about like me, me, me, me, me, me. So you say, "Oh, I got to rein that back because that's not what this altar piece needs to be." Any worldview where everything around them is full of meaning is exciting to me, because we live in such a tiresome, lame, commercial culture now.
Eggers is saying what David Lynch has mentioned as well from a different angle: focusing on the IDEAS, letting them flow and express one's creativity without taking into account either the market or, even worse, the lowest common denominator ideological superstitions.
Is he a hardcore White nationalist? Or just a soft White conservative made to look like a "Nazi" by the current woketariat? Or even merely centrist who is not ashamed to apareciate European aesthetics and history?
He's a white nat like us
Third option obviously. What he said above is sheer common sense among the cesspool of nonsense spouted by some meretricious Hollywood types.
Probably the last one. No idea when this weird shift happened where everybody wants him to be a white supremacist. It wasn't even that long ago everybody was trashing the guy's films and calling him peak reddit. Fickle fricks, the lot of you. Just appreciate good movies and quit the identity politics.
Obviously the last one, how tf do any of his comments make him a wignat or some kind of extremist lol
All of the above to the "people" that are part of the twitter mob
I am not biggest fan of his movies, but god damn he is great, just doing his thing, how was he able to break into industry without pandering? It's such a delicate balance only few can posses.
i like Eggers but this is a reactionary cope
Not at all: being true to yourself as a creator is the purest way to honor the craft. Everything else is self-destructive mediocrity, either commercial or ideological.
But he's saying the opposite. He fights being true to himself in the name of creating an "alter piece" to some higher plane. He's upset that his movie bombed because he thinks nobody can appreciate the spirituality of his mediocre Viking movie that blew 90 million dollars on a shitty farm set. Everything about his films is dishonest, everything he says is a cope. But because he accurately laments consooooomerism people think he's heckin based and redpilled
>He fights being true to himself in the name of creating an "alter piece" to some higher plane.
That is the definition of art. It looks upward.
Art made to assuage or to indoctrinate is 2nd rate at best because it is constrained by limits and ultimately commodified.
The fact that you try to bring financial aspects into it shows how little you know.
Art looks inward. It's like that James Joyce quote about starting with a name, moving outward to country, to the world, then the universe, means nothing. But starting with the universe and ending with a name, that is poetry.
Eggers wants to act like he's better than his ego, that he's resisting his ego to make something more than himself. It's a lie. He's still acting on his ego, just veiling it. I true dishonest artist of the highest order.
Inward for inspiration, not necessarily for a story. Joyce is a bad example since his genius was very specifically biographical, he shines in Portrait of a Young Man/The Dead?Ulysses because both his experiences and some facts of his life and his surroundings led him to create beautiful works.
Putting what you call "ego"-- which these days is simply a narcissistic, manicured obsession with one's identitary/economic facade-- in perspective is what Eggers is hinting at, and it's exactly what Kubrick, Lynch etc did-- telling inspired stories, not using them as crutches for "self-expression", "representation" and assorted bullshit.
>Own vision =/= worshipping yourself.
That's precisely what he says: true creators detach themselves from ideas such as public persona, movie industry politics etc and focus on the work itself.
>being true to yourself
aka being a narcissistic homosexual who creates this as a little monument to himself. everyone’s tired of that shit and it hasn’t produced anything worthwhile
That's following the example of great artists from Kubrick to Michelangelo: ultimately, they were beholden to their own vision. Their patrons and the audience were along for the ride, not in the driver's seat.
Own vision =/= worshipping yourself. Obviously every artist has a vision, that doesn’t mean the vision is to communicate something about themselves or that they can’t say something which transcends them as people
Name a single great artist that didn't do this. Literally the greatest poetry ever written is called "song of myself"
>walt whitman
>greatest ever
holy cringe
Yup. He was the American spirit. Something a shitskin euro will never understand.
He was a gay
What. If art is true to yourself then it's "about me me me me" which is something Eggers doesn't like
You're mistaking art with autobiography- which all too often descends into navelgazing a la Lena Dunham or cloying, idealized reminiscence of one's social milieu that hacks such as Spike Lee often churn out.
The artist is the conduit, the subject matter can be him or his experiences but not necessarily.
I am ambivalent on his films but this is a based and correct quote. There's a common understanding today that art is superior when it's more personal and individualistic but that's not true at all. Most artists today do not aspire towards higher values. They make works that are didactic, narrow and enjoyed mostly by themselves.
>They make works that are didactic, narrow and enjoyed mostly by themselves.
or they get extremely high on their own farts and make themselves the """"art""""
You're right about that, and Eggers isn't making anything really great. Northman is so dull and generic compared even to his inspirations like Conan.
Hey Eggers if you’re here buddy will you make an adaptation of Thus Spake Zarathustra
I think he's making 18th century kino next
That sounds great too, but please at least read the book and consider it for a future project. I would just do it myself but I’m not a filmmaker
I am actually adapting Bronze Age Mindset next. Who's this Nietzche guy?
another artsy fartsy director bites the dust to the might of Capeshit
well, he should tell god to start existing.
>God is dead
And we’re all struggling, rob, not just you
Maybe he should stop making these pagan, satanic shits and do a true christian kino
Based. Atheshits finna seethe. I have enjoyed all of his films.
“The downfall of classical ideals made all men potential artists, and therefore bad artists. When art depended on solid construction and the careful observance of rules, few could attempt to be artists, and a fair number of these were quite good. But when art, instead of being understood as creation, became merely an expression of feelings, then anyone could be an artist, because everyone has feelings.”
- Pessoa
It's funny, because when viewing The Northman as an actual piece of craft rather than a feelings mood piece, it completely collapses. Everything about its style and construction is aesthetically motivated, especially look at the terrible action sequences filmed in arbitrary one-shots that only serve to make everything look fake, slow, and cheap in the name of his artificial moody long shot stylings. If what Eggers is saying is accurate, he thinks way too highly of himself to think he's actually applying it to his work. He's a hack that's salty his "art" bombed, until he makes an actually good movie he will continue to be a hack.