I have to agree - partially.
Neorealism - in movies, the practice of portraying the lives of the working class and poor, often on location and with non-professional actors, and with minimalist production and effects, minmal special lighting, no makeup - tends challenge a lot of viewers, and many who are used to quick cuts and glitzy presentation might not have patience for it.
OTOH, in music anyway, the heavily-produced album with non-natural effects has become an art form in its own right, I personally enjoy a well done track that can be devoid of all sense of realism.
I guess your question - can realism be appreciated by the typical modern listener / movie viewer? - gets us to look at exposure, school music programs, commonly available media sources - and ask if they are doing a disservice by focusing only on satisfying least-common-denominator expectations among watchers and listeners.
To me, the answer lies in the home. Every day at our dinner table, when our 4 kids were little, each one of them got a small spoonful of every dish served. To get dessert, each one had to eat one bite of everything on her/his plate, more of they wanted to, but no less. It usually happened, they got their dessert, and no one died from green bean poisoning. Now all four are adventuresome eaters, although each has types of food she/he does not care for as much. They were also all exposed to a wide range of music. How we have one who loves bluegrass, blues, classic rock, and plays guitar and banjo, one who leans to hip-hop and classic rock, one who focuses on jazz, fusion, complex rock, classical, and plays rock and jazz guitar and ukulele and is well on his way to becoming a master-level shakuhachi artist/performer/teacher (of which there are only 20 or 30 in the world), and one audiophile who listens to almost anything that is well recorded and - at 40 - is taking classical piano lessons. All 4 have their favorites and dislikes, but the range of variety covered by the 4 is impressive.