Can Feel-Good Art Save Us?

Will Gluck’s film “Anyone But You” took moviegoers by surprise. While scathing reviews from renowned movie critics cited little appeal beyond Sydney Sweeney’s skimpy outfits and Glen Powell’s abs, social media in general has reflected a very different impression of the film. What appeared to be a light-hearted film about two sexy people caught in a love triangle in Australia became something much more in the eyes of the Gen Z audience. Numerous TikTok users posted videos of themselves dancing to Natasha Bedingfield’s “Unwritten” —the theme song of the film — with some people even cartwheeling outside the movie theater.

“Anyone But You” may not be intellectual or profound. It may not be thought-provoking enough to be assigned as an essay topic in your film study class. But the film is good, simple, and uncomplicated — and it is just the thing that everyone seems to be craving.

Audiences are witnessing a large-scale return to the feel-good era of art, from the romantic comedies of “Ticket to Paradise,” “Holidate,” and “Set it Up” to poignant sports dramas like “The Boys in the Boat” to rose-tinted gastronomic films like “The Taste of Things,” starring Juliette Binoche. Beyond the silver screen, trends like “cottagecore” (for warmer climates) and “cabincore” (for colder climates) celebrate the idea of simple living — a return to the countryside and an idealized life spent outdoors, free from the nonstop stresses of modern life.

It is no coincidence that these trends emerged in full force during the COVID-19 quarantines. Feel-good media and trends have always had their place in each generation — for instance, the ’90s were a golden age for romantic comedies and beloved sitcoms like “Friends.” In the past, immersing oneself in the alternate reality of feel-good art was a fun, temporary, and optional escape because viewers could easily recognize it to be a curated fantasy, allowing one to return later to their daily lives. Today, on the other hand, feel-good art seems to transcend its optional status. Now more than ever, feel-good art has become critical to spiritual survival, and perhaps even artistic salvation.

There is no doubt that previous generations have faced their own set of problems — existential and otherwise — but Gen Z has inherited a novel kind of baggage. This baggage consists not only of an impending climate crisis, geopolitical demagogues, the threat of mass shootings, another global pandemic, and the looming threat of AI, but it also involves a sobering, individual struggle with deriving true meaning, mystery, and beauty from the world as it is today. The toll that a tumultuous present and an uncertain future has taken on Gen Z is evident in the numbers. Compared to millennials and prior generations, Gen Z are more likely to report mental health concerns and experience frequent stress and anxiety.

Society today is constantly awake and moving. The excitement and mystery that used to come from intimacy and romance is now limited by the trend of hookup culture. Work hours have intruded into home hours. Social media has paradoxically made originality and creativity harder to come by through the way it has rendered ideas readily available.

This plethora of information — a blessing as it may be — can also be a labyrinth to navigate. What is real and not real? What is ethical and unethical? What is right and what is wrong? And, perhaps most crucially, when there are so many voices in the conversation, how does one listen intently to their own?

Art in the past has been used in a variety of ways — as a conduit to establish authority, a tool for political power, and a method of sharing religious doctrine. But this trend in feel-good art demonstrates that different artistic media are perhaps now being used in the purest and arguably most basic form: or — to establish genuine connections and meaning with the contemporary world we inhabit. Art takes the noise of the world, with all its complexities and dramas, and drowns it out — not with the purpose of erasing or eliminating it — but with the mission of carving time and space for something truly beautiful. Art, in its most intellectual form, inspires and challenges. Art, in this high form, begs and requires to be analyzed. But art in its feel-good form does not.

Feel-good art, in demanding so little of its consumers, soothes and provides a kind of sedation — a kind of pause in the torrent of indiscriminate information. This pause provides viewers’ brains and psyche with a much-needed respite. Ultimately, the consumption of feel-good media does not have to be a kind of escapism or distraction — it can instead fuel one to collectively take on the numerous obstacles ahead with grace and courage, providing humanity with a clearer vision of what the world could be. Art is unity, connection, and wonder. It is the feeling of leaving the movie theater happier than when one entered. And sometimes, that is all it needs to be.