Intolerance

I'm struggling to come up with a suitable metaphor for D.W. Griffith.  Was he the Brian Singer or Michael Bay of his time?  He certainly had their gift for pandering, for filling a slapdash script with car chases, tits, and explosions.  Or is he more analogous to Brett Ratner and James Cameron, with an ego big enough to actually stamp his initials on the narration slides, and infuse this mess with a pedantic air that convinces one he thought it was a public service? 

At any rate, it's clear that Griffith's gifts did not lie in scriptwriting, and this heavy-handed attempt to make Literature recoils from the mirror when seen in that light.  His titular subject is seemingly chosen at random, although no doubt influenced by the public's reaction to his earlier travesty, Birth of a Nation.  Of the four stories chosen to illustrate his subject, only one of them is even remotely relevant, and even that of the Bartholomew's Day Massacre was likely recommended by its picturesque potential, rather than its thematic relevance. 

I came to this film with an analytical eye, primed by name recognition, purported significance, and thematic potential to see layers of meaning in the film, carefully woven narrative threads, resonant confluences of character and plot.  I spent far too much mental effort trying to decipher the patterns hidden in the color washes he used for the various themes.  Were the green overlays meant to invoke jealousy?  The purple ones lust?  But there was no pattern, neither in color nor in anything else. 

If I had not come prepared to take the film seriously, I might have enjoyed it.  The sound stages are fit out in regalia that would still be impressive today.  No expense was spared, and one staggers to imagine how he convinced backers to put up 2.5 million in 1916 dollars.  A modern viewer can also find much to amuse in the laughable deaths of main characters, filmed seemingly in one take with 19th century stage props.  If I had brought as much mental effort to the viewing as I do to that of an X-Men movie, all of which are guilty in smaller portion of the same sins, I might have simply forgotten about it.  But I came to it with the mistaken hope that it might be good--as much a mistake as doing the same with any of the aforementioned modern directors.