AFI

A couple of things got me thinking about the AFI Top 100 Movies. A work colleague with a much more pretentious (i.e. impressive and learned) taste in movies was talking about it, and then there was a question about how many movies the hosts of Answer Me This had seen. So, I've seen seven of the top ten, and overall, a paltry 41. Boo. Still, I'm pleased with my top ten results. And, of course, Casablanca is second in the list, and as I have discussed at length elsewhere, I adore this film. So I'm watching this and I plan to make my way through at least some of the rest of this. Although given the results of my attempts to get through The Observer list, maybe I should avoid it and just watch some good films rather more informally.

Nadir

As Cerebus points out, I have my own unique brand of snobbery. For example, I get very uptight about the I'm-smarter-than-you-art-so-I-have-to-point-out-everything highbrow stuff, as I have discussed previously on this blog. I'd much rather watch/read something supposedly "low brow" but completely unaffected than ever, ever have to sit through American Beauty again. On the other hand, the "low brow" cannot be anything related to a shopaholic, anything with Kate Hudson or Matthew McConaughey, the "He's not that into you" film and its brethren and anything with the manic pixie dream girl as a main character. Or, indeed, anything trying to teach young girls that having sex is dangerous, you need to be protected from yourself by a man who may kill you with his passion if he does have sex with you, and if you have sex you'll end up with a weird mutant monster baby. And yes, the third installment of that movie series is out in cinemas now!

The problem is, I like low brow, but am picky about what constitutes good lowbrow as opposed to terrible lowbrow. Why, for example, do I find Jackass repeatedly compelling, whereas any reality show (more or less) is just too infra dig.? I haven't quite worked that out, but this weekend I've had a dear friend staying with me, and we've watched numerous incarnations of "The Real Idiots of Wherever" and their spin-off shows, and it really has just been too much for me. I don't know why, when I really can watch terrible things over and over and over, including horrible toilet humour, crass and revolting sexual jokes made by awful and grotesque human beings (hello It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia) and those are my favourite programmes, but when it comes to real people doing those things I am just horrified and find it all beneath me. I find their grotesqueness horrifying, not amusing; I need to turn away, hide under my cushion. But then, I do that with Peep Show and Extras but can watch those over and over and over again.

This is a remarkably useless post. I just wanted you to know that I really, really, really cannot bear reality tv and it's not because I think I should only watch Mad Men and things on HBO. I've tried, but unless it's neatly packaged and contained for me by Joel McHale, it's just not for me.