Attack of the Killer Allusions!

About a week ago Laura and I saw Monsters versus Aliens.  As fans of vintage sci-fi, the experience was a rewarding one; nearly every scene included some allusion (sometimes subtle, sometimes not) to an old 50s or 60s B movie.  

 

After the movie ended, however, I had to wonder: are allusions, by themselves, entertaining?  The producers of Monsters versus Aliens are betting so, and to some extent I have to agree with them.  The movie opened at number one and has since made well over $300,000,000.  More importantly, like being a part of an inside joke, I enjoyed recognizing the visual references to The Blob and The Thing From Another World, among others.

 

Still, I can’t imagine that re-watching the film would be very rewarding.  Yes I’ve seen Dr. Strangelove.  Yes, I’ve seen Close Encounters of the Third Kind.  And, yes I like those movies.  But why refer back to them?  Are the filmmakers trying to raise any thematic questions by alluding?  What would happen to the story if the reference were cut?  (In the case of Close Encounters, the movie would only lose a strange scene that highlights Stephen Colbert.)  In the end it actually seems like the plethora of references and allusions were included merely for their own sake, as if the filmmakers wanted to show off their vast knowledge of film history.  Of course it’s great that they have that knowledge, but ultimately who cares?   

 

To be fair, Monsters versus Aliens had a likable, if uneven and somewhat choppy, story.  In this sense it was at least as entertaining as other recent entries into the genre of allusion-laden CG films.  Others, like the Shrek franchise, seem to have devolved into banal pop culture pastiches based on the (mistaken) idea that allusions are the only thing a movie needs to be engaging.

 

In the end then, what’s the point of constantly alluding to older, more venerated movies?  Whereas a film like Enchanted seems to be both an homage and a deconstruction of its genre, Monsters versus Aliens and other recent animated movies simply flaunt their cinematic lineage.  In turn, these movies come off as fairly shallow, especially when compared to just about everything made by Pixar.  Finally, then, if CG filmmakers started worrying less about being cheeky and more about conveying a story, they might produce more films that are memorable and genuinely profound.