Just listened to an interview with Michael Hirschorn about his piece in the Atlantic Monthly about “Contemporary Quirk,” worth a read if you’re into indie film/music/culture.

He’s catching some flack for allegedly “attacking” talented directors like Wes Anderson and well-meaning artist/entertainers like Ira Glass of This American Life, but I understand where he’s coming from. In the interview, Hirschorn says that he likes, respects and enjoys the quirky charachters and meandering non-event storylines everywhere now (see Arrested Development, Flight of the Conchords, Napoleon Dynamite), but what started out as fringe culture (think “Ducky” from Pretty in Pink) now dominates the big and small screen. And while these fairly benign non-stories are usually fun today’s talent is capable of much more, if they didn’t use quirk as a crutch.

There’s an undercurrent of baby-boomer melodrama here (or maybe that’s the Gen X cynicism he writes about), but he’s right: instead of making movies with gravity and meaning, today’s top talent tell stories of hanging out and not much else.