Sometimes the Glass Really IS Half-Empty

It's become fashionable these days for every self-appointed lay-philosopher to constantly remind us to be "glass-half-full people" rather than "glass-half-empty people". What this basically means is that we should suspend our critical faculties and pretend that garbage is actually gold so that everyone feels really good about themselves. This positive thinking idea has been with us for a number of decades. It seems to go in cycles and I fear we are currently experiencing a cyclic peak where, to express a critical, or "negative" opinion is as socially frowned-upon as smoking or eating carbohydrates. But there is an important place for critical thinking, particularly in the creative process. It helps filter out bad ideas and stops them from becoming bad things. A few days ago I was reminded of what can happen when bad ideas get mistaken for good ideas when I was unfortunate enough to catch the 1980 film: "Xanadu" on TV.

Xanadu is the worst film ever made; a crudely hacked-together mish-mash of disparate, transitory, early 80's popular culture concepts washed over with a lurid flouro sheen of crappy special effects and set to the most appalling soundtrack ever conceived. There were numerous opportunities during the gestation of this project where, had anyone utilised their critical faculties, the entire thing could have been canned, but instead the optimists had their day and the world is a poorer place as a result.

Xanadu casts Olivia Newton-John as a roller-skating Goddess from mythical Olympus, who becomes the romantic interest of a dispirited young commercial artist (Micheal Beck - don't worry, you're not supposed to have heard of him), who assists Gene Kelly, a clarinet-playing ex-businessman, to manifest his dream of creating the Xanadu night club, which in true 80's fashion ends up being a huge disco roller-rink. All of this is set to a sound track by ELO, who, despite a remarkable run of hits during the 70's, were by this stage well and truly on their own critical and commercial downward spiral.

Now, you can just imagine the glass-half-full thinking behind all this: "It'll be great: it's got magic (everyone loves magic), it's got roller-skating (everyone loves roller-skating), it's got Livvy (she was great in Grease) - It's got ELO (biggest selling UK act of the late 70's), and if all that doesn't work, it's even got Gene Kelly to dazzle up the dance numbers". Under the impressive weight of all these positive factors, no-one ever bothered considering that:

a) Olivia Newton-John couldn't look less like a Goddess from Olympus if she tried;
b) Neither she, nor Michael Beck could roller skate to save their lives;
c) Dance numbers on roller skates are a stupid idea anyway;
c) Gene Kelly was just shy of 70 and, it's fair to say, had committed his best work to celluloid at least 20 years earlier;
d) ELO sucked, and
e) The story was completely and utterly stupid.

Xanadu is a potent example of how we all need to be constantly on our guard against positive thinking, particularly in times when it seems everyone else is seeing the glass as half-full. Imagine, for example, how many thousands of Iraqi and American lives could have been spared if, during the patriotic fervor of pre-war 2002, more key decision makers had utilised their critical faculties and dared to point out that: "hey, maybe this isn't such a great idea after all".

If Xanadu is to have any value at all, at least let it stand as a reminder, that sometimes the glass really is half-empty.