David Thomson's 'A Sudden Flicker of Light' Blames Cinema for Societal Ills

In a new book, 'A Sudden Flicker of Light,' prolific film historian David Thomson offers a bleak appraisal of cinema, arguing that movies diminish human nature, falsify reality, and even contributed to the rise of Donald Trump. Thomson, who has dismissed canonical films, describes film as 'an engine of fantasy' and 'a parasite to reality.' The book, ranging from Georges Méliès to 2024's 'Anora,' is marketed as revisionist but functions more as a provocation, with hostile takes on directors like Ridley Scott and Stanley Kubrick. Thomson's three main critiques: the camera loves violence, movies are inferior to literature, and cinema spotlights the sensational over everyday life. He disdains the subject matter of Francis Ford Coppola and Martin Scorsese, and contrasts film unfavorably with the patience of books. However, the reviewer finds Thomson's arguments imprecise, noting that violence in film is not unique to the medium and that art forms should not be pitted against each other. Thomson endorses only eight contemporary directors and presents a list of female filmmakers jarringly. The book reflects an exhaustion with film, but the reviewer concludes that movies are not bad for us, citing personal emotional connections to classics like 'Psycho,' 'Phantom Thread,' and 'Casablanca.'