- Signe Baumane’s Rocks in My Pockets screens at the Gene Siskel Film Center through Thursday.
“People want to see representations of themselves,” said New York Times film critic Manohla Dargis in an interview a few years ago, reflecting on what inspires casual viewers to go to the movies. This is hardly a controversial opinion. I’ve encountered more than enough anecdotal evidence to support that claim, and I’m sure you have too. Even when it comes to period pieces or fantasies set in imaginary worlds, viewers will speak favorably of a movie if they can relate to the characters and the general worldview. (This would explain why almost any period piece says as much about the era in which it’s made as it does about the era it depicts—filmmakers working in the genre tend to address outmoded attitudes through the lens of contemporary ones so that the audience might still relate to the material.)
Ben Sachs writes about moviegoing every Monday.
