Warning: contains spoilers
Jun. 2nd, 2006 08:59 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shewhomustI love discussing books (and films and comics and even the occasional tv programme) with people who have also read (or seen) them; but I find it much more difficult to review them for the benefit of people who haven't. Oh, I can tell you whether I enjoyed it or not, but that's not a review; a review involves telling you what I liked or didn't like about it, and I have enormous difficulty in doing this without running up against the question of spoilers.
Part of the problem is that I don't really know what a spoiler is: oh, I know that it's bad manners to reveal the solution to a mystery novel ("the butler did it.") or to give away the twist ending of a movie. But there seems to be a convention that a review should begin by summarising a certain proportion of the story - and I have no sense of how much that proportion is. As I was saying, the publisher of The Rabbi's Cat refers to things that happen more than halfway through the story - as well as giving away one event which comes very early, but which is too good a joke to give away so lightly.
Way back last December![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
mabfan asked the question "Do spoilers expire?" - is there a time when you can assume that everyone who is going to see a movie, or watch a tv series, will have done so? rhiannonhero commented with the story of the fan who had complained of being spoiled by the showing of scenes from the upcoming season of her favoured show, which had been provided by the producers under the impression that this would be a treat for the audience. And of course for most of the audience it was, and of course anyone who goes to a forum where the programme's viewers meet the producers must surely be prepared for revelations.
Yet I do have some sympathy for that fan - occasionally there will be a book or a film that I am sufficiently keen to see that I don't need to know any more about it, and it's a rare treat to avoid reading advance publicity and approach it in total, or almost total, ignorance. I was lucky enough to see The Sixth Sense purely because the friend with whom I was spending the evening wanted to see it: I not only didn't know what the final twist was, I didn't know that it had a final twist: if I had known, I might have put together the clues, but as it was I noted them as bizarre choices by the film-maker, and then had the pleasure of realising "Oh, that's what that was about!". That's an extreme case - a twist ending might literally be spoiled by advance information. But mostly, knowing a little about what is going to happen may deprive us of the particular pleasure of freshness, but it doesn't actually spoil the story (I'm not the only person who re-reads detective novels, am I?).
Knowing the story can actually add to the experience: I had expected to illustrate this claim by some learned reference to Racinian tragedy, or the care of Shakespeare's mechanicals to ensure that their audience know beforehand what will become of Piramus and Thisbe. Then this morning's Guardian brought me a review of United 93 which makes the same point: every detail of the film gains poignancy from our knowing not exactly what will happen, but how it all turns out in the end. More frivolously, my difficulty in talking about X-Men 3: The Last Stand reflects my feeling that the film was in dialogue with all the different ways the same story has been told in the comics: far from being spoiled by prior knowledge, the film is enhanced by it.
Conclusions? The more I think about it, the more complex I think the question is. No rule is absolute, no course of action is proof against someone, somewhere being offended. Mileage varies. Or it could just be, as I said at the beginning, that I'm the one who has trouble grasping this, and it's really very simple...
Part of the problem is that I don't really know what a spoiler is: oh, I know that it's bad manners to reveal the solution to a mystery novel ("the butler did it.") or to give away the twist ending of a movie. But there seems to be a convention that a review should begin by summarising a certain proportion of the story - and I have no sense of how much that proportion is. As I was saying, the publisher of The Rabbi's Cat refers to things that happen more than halfway through the story - as well as giving away one event which comes very early, but which is too good a joke to give away so lightly.
Way back last December
mabfan asked the question "Do spoilers expire?" - is there a time when you can assume that everyone who is going to see a movie, or watch a tv series, will have done so? rhiannonhero commented with the story of the fan who had complained of being spoiled by the showing of scenes from the upcoming season of her favoured show, which had been provided by the producers under the impression that this would be a treat for the audience. And of course for most of the audience it was, and of course anyone who goes to a forum where the programme's viewers meet the producers must surely be prepared for revelations.Yet I do have some sympathy for that fan - occasionally there will be a book or a film that I am sufficiently keen to see that I don't need to know any more about it, and it's a rare treat to avoid reading advance publicity and approach it in total, or almost total, ignorance. I was lucky enough to see The Sixth Sense purely because the friend with whom I was spending the evening wanted to see it: I not only didn't know what the final twist was, I didn't know that it had a final twist: if I had known, I might have put together the clues, but as it was I noted them as bizarre choices by the film-maker, and then had the pleasure of realising "Oh, that's what that was about!". That's an extreme case - a twist ending might literally be spoiled by advance information. But mostly, knowing a little about what is going to happen may deprive us of the particular pleasure of freshness, but it doesn't actually spoil the story (I'm not the only person who re-reads detective novels, am I?).
Knowing the story can actually add to the experience: I had expected to illustrate this claim by some learned reference to Racinian tragedy, or the care of Shakespeare's mechanicals to ensure that their audience know beforehand what will become of Piramus and Thisbe. Then this morning's Guardian brought me a review of United 93 which makes the same point: every detail of the film gains poignancy from our knowing not exactly what will happen, but how it all turns out in the end. More frivolously, my difficulty in talking about X-Men 3: The Last Stand reflects my feeling that the film was in dialogue with all the different ways the same story has been told in the comics: far from being spoiled by prior knowledge, the film is enhanced by it.
Conclusions? The more I think about it, the more complex I think the question is. No rule is absolute, no course of action is proof against someone, somewhere being offended. Mileage varies. Or it could just be, as I said at the beginning, that I'm the one who has trouble grasping this, and it's really very simple...
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no subject
Date: 2006-06-03 02:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-06-03 07:43 pm (UTC)I don't recall if it was your brother, or a friend of your brother, who went to see The Sting. He was sitting near two girls who were obviously great Robert Redford fans. Right towards the end of the film, it appears he is shot. "Oh, he's dead", they said, and left the cinema. Those who have seen the film to its conclusion will know why it is called The Sting.
no subject
Date: 2006-06-03 07:53 pm (UTC)Yes, there's a final twist there that you wouldn't want to give away to someone who hadn't seen the movie: on the other hand, any experience of how commercial cinema works would tell you not to believe that Redford dies at the end of the movie - how naïve a viewer do you have to be to see a film completely unspoilered?
no subject
Date: 2006-06-06 01:59 am (UTC)On the other hand, I do not like horror movies, and I never would have seen The Sixth Sense had not a friend told me the spoiler. Once I knew that, I was motivated to see the movie and appreciate the artistry behind it.
no subject
Date: 2006-06-06 09:11 am (UTC)