Just because something is new, people often want to say it is great. But while everyone’s praising something for being new, they must consider that the project might not actually have merit at all.

Actor Shia LaBeouf took on the monumental task of watching every single one of his movies, back-to-back, from noon on Nov. 10 to 6:53 PM on Nov. 12. It was done in a New York City public theatre and a live stream of him watching the movies was available online.

“All My Movies,” like many of LaBeouf’s strange activities, was met with bemusement from the public and cries of artistic genius from many critical circles. The former is a natural reaction, but the latter is a symptom of a faulty mentality that ignores quality to praise the appearance of originality.

This mentality is becoming prevalent as more celebrities try to expand into “high art.” In the past, if you were an actor, you acted. What we now refer to as “multi-hyphenates,” were few and far between. But in the present, with so many tools that make it easy to create and share, it is much easier to indulge in secondary interests.

These side-projects are met mostly with disdain from the people and critics, especially when the celebrities branch out into more arcane arts. The most obvious example is James Franco, who’s forayed into directing, fiction writing and painting, to name a few. However, most people claim his projects would never get disseminated if he wasn’t already so famous.

Everything LaBeouf did during the showing was analyzed. He fell asleep during “Transformers:” “what does that say about the nature of blockbusters?” He smiled through “The Even Stevens Movie:” “what does this say about the nature of the child star?”

The problem is it probably doesn’t say anything. Maybe he just smiled at “The Even Stevens Movie” because it’s funny and it’s nice to see ourselves when we were younger.

LaBeouf’s projects are intriguing, but that’s about it. Just because something’s “interesting” that doesn’t automatically make it “important.” Though LaBeouf’s projects may grab your attention, there is in fact very little rewarding beyond the immediate concept. Critics want to award LaBeouf for being original when they should be awarding quality.

This is one reason why the majority of Franco’s work is hated. “Palo Alto” is an amazing book, but it is noticeably of derivative of Bret Easton Ellis and Raymond Carver. “Child of God” is a pretty good movie, but it’s one critics like to see made by an out-of-nowhere rural director.

Franco is consistently derided as unoriginal, even when he does something that would seem on par with LaBeouf’s concepts. In the film adaptation of “Palo Alto,” Franco plays an adult man who has an affair with a girl that one of the central characters, who is clearly based on James Franco as a kid, is romantically obsessed with.

Instead of being praised as a fascinating statement on an artist using his work to resituate himself in his past, to my knowledge, this connection has not yet, to my knowledge, been publicly noted.

Franco actually wrote about LaBeouf for The New York Times in 2014. He noted LaBeouf must be “careful not to use up all the good will he has gained as an actor in order to show us that he is an artist.” But he shouldn’t even have to say that. These are people who should be allowed to use their tools to craft whatever projects they want, no matter if it’s just for personal interest or some higher goal.

As everyone continues to waste time deeming what is and is not art based on a perception of originality, they will be missing out on just sitting back and observing the level of the quality that is present with the creation.

Mark DiBona is a senior television, radio and film major. His column appears weekly. He can be reached at mdibona@syr.edu and followed on Twitter @NoPartyNoDisco.

Published on November 19, 2015 at 12:01 am