Jokers wild.

• Author: Gehring, Wes D.
• Position: Biographical motion pictures - REEL WORLD

LET US DEMONSTRATE the links between mainstream genres (such as romantic comedy, horror, science fiction, etc.) and art house movies (like Ingmar Bergman's "Seventh Seal," 1957, in which a disillusioned knight returning from the Crusades plays a chess game with Death). While this might not seem as intrinsically interesting as, say, the public's often perverse fascination with the self-destructive artist (a James Dean or Heath Ledger), all of these things, including the "die young and leave a good looking corpse" type, are interconnected.

Traditionally, a pop culture genre deals with "lived issues." Will Michael Douglas straighten out his love life in "Wonder Boys" (2000), or will Robert Redford hit the pennant-winning home run in ''The Natural" (1984), or how can Will Smith save the world yet again in "I Am Legend" (2007)? Art house movies are about intangible "raised issues," often a combination of "Why am I here?" and "Is there a God.'?" (a la that "Seventh Seal" picture), and a "seize the day" mantra, whether the "day" is late (the elderly professor of Bergman's "Wild Strawberries," 1957) or just beginning (the students of "Dead Poets Society," 1989).

At some level, everyone can relate to the "lived issue" phenomenon, looking for love, coming through in the clutch, and maybe pulling a Walter Mitty daydream about sacrificing one's self for the good of humanity (even if "Legend" simply morphed into a big budget zombie movie). These "lived issue" films are entertaining mind candy that act as a necessary balm, buffer, or boost to human morale.

In contrast, despite that wonderfully hoary axiom, "The unexamined life is not worth living," the "raised issue" self-conscious art film is leperlike to many audiences. Of course, this is inherently disturbing stuff'. These thinking films are open-ended; unlike John Ford's classic Western, "Stagecoach" (1939), the cavalry never rides to the rescue in any deep dish saga. Worse, haunting questions posed early never are answered, not even when Googled.

One might draw a comic comparison between classic art house movies and standard genres from Woody Allen's "Love and Death" (1975, which could be described as Bob Hope trapped in "The Seventh Seal"). Yet, whereas God always has laryngitis in Bergmanland, Allen forever is peppering the "Silence" (1963, Bergman) with pertinent quips: 'The mind [coffee house cinema] embraces all the nobler aspirations, like poetry [and] philosophy, but the body [the multiplex...