75 replies to this topic

[Persona]

Peter.

Your response was about as predictable as I thought. Talk about past problems, post many words to justify your opinions and beliefs, and finally, post a link to where Doug has supposedly previously offended you.

I think you have a lot to offer, Peter, and I want you around. This is just something that I wish would depart from these boards forever. I am sick of it.

For the record, Ebert was right. How you say something is as important as whatever you are saying.

-s.

[Persona]

Thank you Alan for moderating this thread so well. I will not post regarding this again. I appreciate your work, and hope to see you moderate even more in the future.

-s.

[Peter T Chattaway]

stef wrote:
: Your response was about as predictable as I thought. Talk about past problems . . .

Sorry, stef, but someone asked how this board came to be, and like it or not, those disagreements and evolutions in our personal thought are a part of our story. I actually wrote out the details about Entertainment Weekly etc. in my initial post, and then deleted them, because I didn't want to bog us down in all that stuff. But apparently my reliance on mere adjectives (e.g. "lowbrow") didn't help either. So, whatever.

: . . . and finally, post a link to where Doug has supposedly previously offended you.

FWIW, I made a point of linking to something Doug had posted "lately", to use your earlier term. As in, I linked to something he had posted just last week. Whether or not I am offended is a subjective matter, and possibly irrelevant. The objective question is whether what he posted there fits the definition of the term you used ("personal attack").

Still love ya, though. I still think back fondly to that moment, three message boards ago, when we discovered that you were the guy who had written a letter to the editor in response to my friend Byrun's blistering review of that band you'd been in ten years ago. That was one of the great "it's a small world" moments.

[Russ]

Well, Peter, if the whole Christian media thing doesn't work out, you should have a fruitful career ahead of you writing selective history textbooks for totalitarian regimes.

[Overstreet]

Sara... why TELL you the history when we can DEMONSTRATE it so succinctly?

One person presumes to speak for another, and, upset that this has occurred, others decide to throw fuel on the fire by responding with their own volatile terms rather than trying to cool things down or understand each other better.

And even saying that, I realize I'm probably throwing fuel on the fire myself. Crap.

And (probably for the best) Doug is showing remarkable restraint here, not taking any bait (intentional or otherwise).

Since Peter has used the terms he has, I'll just say that I totally understand Doug's choice to focus his efforts on other circles of dialogue. Arts and Faith encompasses the most wide-ranging dialogue on the Web I've ever seen, and I love the fact that we can talk about Entertainment Weekly AND Film Comment here. But there is a lot to be said for specializing, and what Doug has cultivated at FilmJourney is an admirable, focussed effort on raising awareness for international cinema and film that doesn't get widely distributed. His choices have paid off.

I can't blame Doug for having an aversion to "Entertainment Weekly"-style reviews (if, indeed, that is how he would still characterize his view), as such reviews are often tainted with commercial interference and trivialities (although I do still think EW does a better job than MOST mainstream publications). And I think that his aversion to such stuff is a necessary aspect of his hunger for more academic and intellectual dialogue about film... something that we should encourage.

Sometimes, I envy Doug his opportunities, but I feel that I personally am better suited to working more in the "bridge" area, trying to help "specialized" cinephiles enjoy the finer points of mainstream cinema, and trying to help the larger mainstream audience discover that they are missing out on some of the world's best filmmaking... not to mention helping them discover that there is a lot more to film in general than meets the eye at the multiplex. I know many of us here have benefitted greatly from knowing Doug, Darren, and others here who spend most of their time in material that the mainstream public will never know about or appreciate. I would never have seen Werckmeister Harmonies or even Ordet, probably, without those relationships. Similarly, I would have missed out on a great deal of my education about bringing deeper, more productive dialogue to the arena of mainstream filmmaking if I had missed out on cultivating a close friendship with Peter.

Like the church, I see A&F as one large body performing a variety of functions, and when we clash, it's often because we don't understand or fully appreciate the vasty different functions, capabilities, perspectives, and specializations we provide.

Edited by Jeffrey Overstreet, 23 November 2005 - 02:58 PM.

[Sara]

Sara... why TELL you the history when we can DEMONSTRATE it so succinctly?

And (probably for the best) Doug is showing remarkable restraint here, not taking any bait (intentional or otherwise).

I really did want to know about the history of A&F. And I did not know it had such a long history. Many of you have been a part of this for a long time.

I would not have expected this long and strong a forum to have emerged "pain free."

But we are still together!

Thanks for telling me about how it began and grew - and is still going on.

I am glad to be here.

Sara

[Overstreet]

P.S. I've just revised my previous post considerably.

[M. Leary]

Things have improved a lot, and I think we've all learned lessons and grown.

I for one am very glad that the Chiaroscuro messages are no longer in the public domain. I seem to recall saying things like: "I just saw Magnolia last night and adored how cool it was. Were those frogs or something? I just rented a movie called Wild Strawberries. Is that any good?"

Let's list the "oldies."  Those here at least since the novogate days.

JO
PTC
Alan
Russ
Darrel
Stef
DanBuck
Kennedy
Doug
MLeary
MattPage?
Others?

Asher has also always been around, at least since the Novogate days. At one point Aquarello and a few others were posting there, but I can't squeeze any of their names out of my memory. Steve Lansingh and his wife used to post a lot at the pre-Novogate and Novogate boards.

Edited by MLeary, 23 November 2005 - 03:03 PM.

[M. Dale Prins]

I was part of onFilm and Novogate. But no one remembers poor Dale.

poor Dale

[M. Leary]

Outline of our History:

rec.music.christian/Movies and Ministry/Film Forum -> OnFilm Yahoo D-list by PT

OnFilm Yahoo D-list hive off/Decent Films/Promontory/Flickerings -> Chiaroscuro/Film Forum Discussion (affectionately referred to as the "reverse implosion" list by Stef)

Chiaroscuro/Film Forum -> Novogate "Film and Spirituality Discussion Board" (out of which came the infamous Chicago Novogate Film and Spirituality Discussion Board Group, still rumored to be in existence, and of which Dan Buck at one time was an honorary member for saying something funny).

Novogate F and S -> Promontory Film and Spirituality Discussion Board

Promontory F and S -> Promontory Arts and Spirituality Discussion Board

Promontory A and S -> Arts and Faith

[M. Leary]

I was part of onFilm and Novogate.  But no one remembers poor Dale.

poor Dale

I was seriously just about to edit my post and remember poor Dale. Man, sorry. We also need to include Mike H. and J. Robert. The latter helped me into my first pre-screenings long ago.

Edited by MLeary, 23 November 2005 - 03:18 PM.

[M. Leary]

I would not have expected this long and strong a forum to have emerged "pain free."

But we are still together!

We have even been around long enough to develop a canon (the A&F top 100) that even all of the longstanding members have participated in.

[Overstreet]

I remember poor Dale as one of the pillars of our earlier manifestations. I grieve how rarely we engage with him now. He remains, for me, the Michel Gondry of discussion-board posters.

Edited by Jeffrey Overstreet, 23 November 2005 - 03:29 PM.

[Darren H]

If Peter were standing here beside me, I'd ask this question while smiling good-naturedly and tussling his hair. I promise I mean no offense. But can any of you remember a single argument (excluding the "politics" area) in which Peter was not involved?

[Overstreet]

Actually, I remember having a rather long, elaborate tangle with Doug that, at the time, I was grateful that Peter let Doug and I work through it on our own.

Let's try to steer things back to the History of the Board and away from the History of Debates on the Board.

Edited by Jeffrey Overstreet, 23 November 2005 - 03:46 PM.

[Peter T Chattaway]

Oh, Dale, I remember you very fondly. I smile at the memory of how you revised the title of my second-favorite movie of all time to "periwinkle" something or other. But you were never an administrator. I confess, my account focused on the elites.

BTW, if I didn't go into as much detail on the progression from Novogate to PF to PA to A&F, it's partly because I'm not really sure why the changes happened, there. The previous changes were all precipitated by obvious glitches in the board, but I think the reasons for the later changes were more subtle, or hidden to all but the administrator(s). Plus, from PF on, all the threads have stayed "active", so the line dividing the various boards isn't as sharply drawn, there.

Russ, there's a difference between a thumbnail and a textbook. But if it's footnotes you want, trust me, I've got the material!

Re: arguments, I seem to recall narrowly missing out on a huge fight-in-the-making over Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones, back in the Novogate days. Let's just say that an entire thread was deleted somewhere between the time I began reading it and the time when I considered replying to it. (I might have contributed a post or two to the early part of that thread, but I believe I had been away for a while when the storm really got brewing.) That movie REALLY stirred up some passions. I distinctly remember wondering if I was "losing my faith in Star Wars".

Edited by Peter T Chattaway, 23 November 2005 - 03:56 PM.

[Anders]

Re: arguments, I seem to recall narrowly missing out on a huge fight-in-the-making over Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones, back in the Novogate days.  Let's just say that an entire thread was deleted somewhere between the time I began reading it and the time when I considered replying to it.  (I might have contributed a post or two to the early part of that thread, but I believe I had been away for a while when the storm really got brewing.)  That movie REALLY stirred up some passions.  I distinctly remember wondering if I was "losing my faith in Star Wars".

IIRC, that was the one fight that I was involved in personally and got really upset about (suprrise, surprise it involved Star Wars). Ah, good to know I've made a contribution to "history."

[Doug C]

I'm wondering if everyone could do me a favor? For those who included my full name in their post, could you edit it to say "Doug" or "Doug C" instead? I don't want to be widely associated with the content of this thread.

Thank you.

[Peter T Chattaway]

Hmmm, so to use Russ's "totalitarian regimes" metaphor, it seems some people airbrush themselves out of the history books?

[Russ]

Ha, yeah. Henceforth, I want to be called/referred to/thought of as Jose Feliciano.