Access to classics crucial amid content deluge

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This article was published 30/06/2023 (1201 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny opened this week, which will make some movie-goers nostalgic for Steven Spielberg and George Lucas’s Raiders of the Lost Ark, which premièred way back in 1981. But the archeological layers go down much deeper than that, to the ’30s and ’40s movie-matinée serials the filmmakers watched in reruns when they were growing up.

This kind of longer, larger cinematic record has been the foundation of Turner Classic Movies since its launch in 1994. Showing old movies 24-7 — unedited and uninterrupted — TCM has become a valued repository of a whole art form, as well as an important historical resource, its films reflecting and refracting decades of social and political change. TCM isn’t just another cable channel. It’s a cultural institution.

Maybe that’s why so many fans got antsy when TCM was acquired in 2022 by Warner Bros. Discovery as part of one of those corporate mega-mergers that suggests the 1958 sci-fi flick The Blob, in which an amorphous entity absorbs and digests everything in its path. Movie buffs were worried things might change under WBD CEO David Zaslav, who seems less interested in cultural institutions and more interested in what he calls “content companies.”

News last week of a shakeup of longtime TCM executives seemed to confirm those fears. Joining in with a lot of anxious ordinary fans, directors Spielberg, Martin Scorsese and Paul Thomas Anderson — all hungry cinematic magpies whose films often dive into the past — met with Zaslav to share their concerns.

Sensing a potential backlash, WBD executive Kathleen Finch issued a calming statement: “While change is never easy and can create a sense of uncertainty, I want to assure you that we remain fully committed to this business, the TCM brand, and its purpose to protect and celebrate culture-defining movies.”

Now, this could be true. Let’s hope for a Hollywood ending here. But this message also sounds like something a cynical media conglomerate might put out — just before it screws things up with its single-minded grubbing after ratings and revenue. (I know this because I’ve seen Network — probably on TCM.)

And is change even necessary? TCM might not be a massive moneymaker, but it holds plenty of popular appeal. This is that rare media space where the 23-year-old film nerd and her 88-year-old grandmother can meet. The channel’s interpretation of the term “classic” has always been broad and generous, even a little kooky. TCM is happy to programme Plan 9 from Outer Space and Beach Blanket Bingo alongside Hitchcock’s Vertigo and Kurosawa’s Ikiru.

TCM can also deliver programming that hits that sweet spot between entertainment and education. The channel always features a “Star of the Month,” offering a deep dive into the work of one Golden Age luminary. Last month, it was Katharine Hepburn, with 27 films demonstrating the way the incredible angles of her face and voice stayed constant through ranging roles and six decades of work.

TCM also arranges movies in themed collections, basically setting up an accessible, friendly little film school in a viewer’s living room.

These groupings could involve important issues such as Hollywood’s depiction of disability (from The Best Years of Our Lives to Coming Home) or alcoholism (from Men Against the Sky to Days of Wine and Roses). Or it could be a complete roster of movies about gals trying to snag husbands (from Calling All Husbands to Come Fly with Me). Or — as we head into what could be a summer of record temperatures — a focus on literally hot movies, full of sweating men and sultry women in slips leaning against door frames (Bad Day at Black Rock, The Postman Always Rings Twice, Clash by Night).

Since 2019, TCM has also focused on “context, curation, culture and connection” which seems crucial, considering the channel kicked off back in ’94 with a screening of Gone With the Wind, a movie that requires a whole lot of contextualizing.

This isn’t just a nostalgia fest. The rotating hosts, along with commissioned documentary series and loads of supplementary material on the TCM website, often look at issues of race, gender and sexuality in Hollywood, helping to reframe old films and film history in interesting, contemporary ways.

Billed as the place “Where Then Meets Now,” TCM has always brought together cinema’s past and present.

Let’s just hope it can keep going into the future. In this age of streaming, with its infinitely expanding choices and constant churn of new content, TCM — more than ever — feels like a necessary refuge.

alison.gillmor@freepress.mb.ca