Just watched 12 Monkeys (1996), and it’s a little uncomfortable seeing Bruce Willis portray a character struggling mentally, know of his real-life problems with frontotemporal dementia. It’s not the time of year yet, but I’m wondering if my enjoyment of Die Hard will be reduced, since the hearing loss he suffered on that film may have been a contributing factor.
The Crow (1994) - on which Brandon Lee died, and Rust (upcoming) - on which Halyna Hutchins died - aren’t films I’d normally watch anyway, so I don’t know how the deaths would have affected my decision to watch them. Conversely, Kevin Spacey is in a lot of films I like, but it’s a bit queasy seeing his performances, with the suspicion that we all now know why he’s so good at portraying creeps.
So do you just try to enjoy a film as a film, or does real-life events ever stop you re-watching them?
To me, NO. Good movies are art, like any other art, painting, music, poetry, etc. In general art can’t be judge by its creators lives. Extreme examples: Marquis of Sade or William Burroughs in literatura. Movies are a team work, to me “mistakes” from one member do not spoil the whole movie.
Frequently great artist are not good persons, if that were true almost everybody will be a (great) artist.