Trees wrote:Mr Sausage wrote:Do you see why people might have a problem with you making claims that you cannot prove and for which there is no evidence?
My OP did not make any claims or assertions. I posed a question:
I wonder if Tarkovky's overt Russian Christianity has had some negative effect on his historical stature? The kinds of "intellectuals" whose aggregate opinions author these rankings and lists might not be disposed to promote overtly religious filmmakers, especially not ones from Russia. You could argue that Malick seems to have escaped a similar brush-off from atheist intellectuals, but then again, you don't really see Malick dominating these lists either. Even if such a theory were correct, though, it would only partially explain away the issue ando has mentioned here. It could also be that Tarkovsky's films are indeed very dense and serious pieces of art that have either been overlooked, under appreciated or misunderstood by many film reviewers.
I was only speculating and asking questions, not making assertions or trying to prove anything. Even my OP is very clear in stating that if there was bias from atheists, the effect would be minimal. Just one small part of the puzzle, perhaps. I was only seeking to add one more possible factor into the equation that was being discussed by ando and others: why Tarkovsky was possibly perceived as being poorly represented on many of the "Greatest Director of all Time" lists. People seem to have a pretty strong reaction to my question and my attempt to raise the issue. It was not my intention to stir people up, just to discuss why Tarkovsky might not be as strongly represented on lists like these as, say, Kubrick.
You seem to've forgot that you were only speculating and asking questions by the time you came to write this:
trees wrote:My guess is that it has had some minor affect, but really, not a large enough one to get into a big debate about it.
Funny how in the same sentence that you admit that you believe it, you also try to forestall anyone from arguing with you about it, where you would no doubt have to give the proofs and evidences that you had no intention of giving us in the first place.
And even if you hadn't, do you not see why people might have more of a problem with you baselessly speculating about the motivations of others than if you had forwarded a claim that you had made a reasonable effort to support with evidence and argument?
All of your current positions and (pseudo)speculations are not tenable and are irritating everyone because you refuse to back down on them one inch. Nothing anyone else says, no reasonable bit of evidence to the contrary, has made you rethink what you've said. The most it has prompted is to've made you retreat from a later, stronger statement to the original qualfied one, pretend that you haven't retreated, and then only so you can downplay the effect and get everyone to move on--no sign of reconsidering the speculation (which is really your position) or admitting that it might not be tenable.
And this is to say nothing about your original proposition, which you have so far both come nowhere close to proving and nowhere close to reconsidering even a bit. Are you here to talk about ideas in fair debate or to convince everyone through sheer force of will that you, personally, are unable to be wrong?