What went wrong?

Seanachai

I went to see 'Terminator Genisys' the other night and while I wasn't getting my hopes up too much based on the look of the trailer, I have to say I was really disappointed. I have been disappointed with sci-fi\action films in general for a while. I like the franchise and the story-line and T2 is one of my favourite films, opinion on the film is divided on the Genisys thread so I'm not alone in feeling let down by the way these films are being made lately.

I did some film studies in college and I'm a bit of a movie buff but I don't know enough about the industry to know what is going on with the studios. It seems like the magic and charm of the movies that existed up to the 90's has just disappeared. I have a friend who has done some film acting and is also disillusioned with film in the past ten years or so.

Maybe there's a new set of people after moving into movie production that just want to churn out films with the same lame looking cgi effects and dodgy scripts like a conveyor belt?. Maybe somebody on here who has some insight into the industry can explain it?.

BoJack Horseman

The bar is just much lower.

The world is richer than it was a generation ago.
Cinema goers can afford more frequent visits.

Studios don't have to be excellent to be financially successful.

ricero

My take of it is that the big Hollywood film studies are afraid to be adventurous as they all fear losing money. Also audiences in general I feel have become easier to please.

Tefral

Seanachai wrote: »

I went to see 'Terminator Genisys' the other night and while I wasn't getting my hopes up too much based on the look of the trailer, I have to say I was really disappointed. I have been disappointed with sci-fi\action films in general for a while. I like the franchise and the story-line and T2 is one of my favourite films, opinion on the film is divided on the Genisys thread so I'm not alone in feeling let down by the way these films are being made lately.

I did some film studies in college and I'm a bit of a movie buff but I don't know enough about the industry to know what is going on with the studios. It seems like the magic and charm of the movies that existed up to the 90's has just disappeared. I have a friend who has done some film acting and is also disillusioned with film in the past ten years or so.

Maybe there's a new set of people after moving into movie production that just want to churn out films with the same lame looking cgi effects and dodgy scripts like a conveyor belt?. Maybe somebody on here who has some insight into the industry can explain it?.

There seems to be an inverse relationship between the quality of TV Series and the quality of Movies. You see big name actors now in TV series and they are brilliant.

The problem I think is they cant write any original stories anymore, its all generic to appeal to the masses. Everything is PG-13 or max 15's to allow as many bums on seats as possible.

One of my favorite films over the last few years was Dredd. A violent 18s movie, yet it bombed at the box office due to crap marketing etc.

Id say risk assessments are done on films and unless the studios can make multiples of their money back it wont get greenlit, so they try mitigate the risk by appealing to as many people as possible. Which ultimately pleases no-one.

johnny_ultimate

Hollywood is an industry. They are churning out products for mass market consumption. Occasionally some cheeky art slips in there, but it's purely accidental. The market has shown it doesn't care.

But film is alive and kicking, as much or more so than it ever was. If one is fed up with the Hollywood product, here's the simple solution: dig deeper. Modern cinema is an incredibly diverse, exciting scene. One doesn't need to even look that far. Filmmakers like Wes Anderson, Spike Jonze, Steve McQueen, Alfonso Cauron, Richard Linklater, PT Anderson, Sofia Coppolla, David Fincher, Kathryn Bieglow etc... are working in the suburbs of the mainstream. Dive into the indie and world scenes and the list of wonderful filmmakers explodes exponentially. While they don't always make the multiplexes, digital means you can set your own watchlist.

Be an active viewer. Don't let Hollywood dictate the rules or what you watch. The cinema scene is alive with invention, talent and ambition.

Seanachai

cronin_j wrote: »

There seems to be an inverse relationship between the quality of TV Series and the quality of Movies. You see big name actors now in TV series and they are brilliant.

The problem I think is they cant write any original stories anymore, its all generic to appeal to the masses. Everything is PG-13 or max 15's to allow as many bums on seats as possible.

One of my favorite films over the last few years was Dredd. A violent 18s movie, yet it bombed at the box office due to crap marketing etc.

Id say risk assessments are done on films and unless the studios can make multiples of their money back it wont get greenlit, so they try mitigate the risk by appealing to as many people as possible. Which ultimately pleases no-one.

It's a great loss because while there has been some great TV lately it doesn't compare to that magic of seeing a good movie on the big screen. I think you're right in saying that they are appealing to too broad of an audience and unfortunately a lot of these people were raised on social media and have awful attention spans. It would certainly explain the rapid, flashy pace of a lot of what's out there.

Seanachai

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

Hollywood is an industry. They are churning out products for mass market consumption. Occasionally some cheeky art slips in there, but it's purely accidental. The market has shown it doesn't care.

But film is alive and kicking, as much or more so that it ever was. If one is fed up with the Hollywood product, here's the simple solution: dig deeper. Modern cinema is an incredibly diverse, exciting scene. One doesn't need to even look that far. Filmmakers like Wes Anderson, Spike Jonze, PT Anderson, Sofia Coppolla, David Fincher, Kathryn Bieglow etc... are working in the suburbs of the mainstream. Dive into the indie and world scenes and the list of wonderful filmmakers explodes exponentially. While they don't always make the multiplexes, digital means you can set your own watchlist.

Be an active viewer. Don't let Hollywood dictate the rules or what you watch. The cinema scene is alive with invention, talent and ambition.

I was referring to mainstream action\scifi more so than the indie side of things but I get what you're saying, I like my sci-fi and would love to see a decent sequel to T2 with actors that have some grit, a decent script and restraint shown on the special effects. There is some great drama out there for sure if you dig a little deeper.

johnny_ultimate

Seanachai wrote: »

I get what you're saying but I like my sci-fi and would love to see a decent sequel to T2 with actors that have some grit, a decent script and restraint shown on the special effects. There is some great drama out there for sure if you dig a little deeper.

Plenty of great everything if you dig a little deeper, not just drama! In sci-fi terms alone, what of stuff like Ex Machina, Snowpiercer, Wall-E, Mad Max: Fury Road, Under the Skin, Primer, The Congress, Looper, Inception, Paprika, the Evangelion films, Dredd, Cloud Atlas, Hard to Be a God, District 9, Children of Men, Gravity, Moon, Sunshine, Attack the Block, The Host, Her etc... etc... Again, many of those were very high-profile releases.

I would confidently state there is an absolute abundance of material out there for almost every possible taste.

Seanachai

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

Plenty of great everything if you dig a little deeper, not just drama! In sci-fi terms alone, what of stuff like Ex Machina, Snowpiercer, Wall-E, Mad Max: Fury Road, Under the Skin, Primer, The Congress, Looper, Inception, Paprika, the Evangelion films, Dredd, Cloud Atlas, Hard to Be a God, District 9, Children of Men, Gravity, Moon, Sunshine, Attack the Block, The Host, Her etc... etc... Again, many of those were very high-profile releases.

I would confidently state there is an absolute abundance of material out there for almost every possible taste.

I didn't like Mad Max Fury Road or Dredd tbh, Children Of Men was pretty good though, I know I sound like a complete contrarian but I think they've thrown the baby out with the bathwater. I miss the blockbusters that also had some depth to them, I still think mainstream sci-fi\action cinema has become really dumb and cheap. I'll have to check Snowpiercer out.

Fysh

Seanachai wrote: »

I didn't like Mad Max Fury Road or Dredd tbh, Children Of Men was pretty good though, I know I sound like a complete contrarian but I think they've thrown the baby out with the bathwater. I miss the blockbusters that also had some depth to them, I still think mainstream sci-fi\action cinema has become really dumb and cheap. I'll have to check Snowpiercer out.

I'm not convinced there was ever a time when sci-fi/action films as a rule weren't kind of dumb and a bit cheap - for every Alien or Aliens there are plenty of Starship Troopers, Dooms and so on.

Bacchus

Fysh wrote: »

I'm not convinced there was ever a time when sci-fi/action films as a rule weren't kind of dumb and a bit cheap - for every Alien or Aliens there are plenty of Starship Troopers, Dooms and so on.

Starship Troopers is neither dumb nor cheap. It's sequels may have been but the original was not.

Doom was so dumb though. So so dumb.

As for the OP's question, as has been alluded to already, it's just cheaper to slap movies together these days that have broad appeal to an audience that can afford to go to many movies over the course of the year. I think there is still plenty of good movies being made today but there has been an influx of sequels and reboots that are probably seen as "easy money" by Hollywood.

Mickeroo

I think nostalgia and rose tinted glasses has a lot to do with this kind of thing. There's definitely some truth to it but if you look at T2 for example, it is a lot less dark, more "fun" and was clearly made to have a broader appeal than the original movie too. The first film was low budget surprise hit that the studio didn't give a toss about initially, now the franchise is seen as a tentpole blockbuster, every film since the first has been modified to profit on that while trying to use its reputation to appeal to a wider audience including T2.

I'm not saying Genesys is good (ain't seen it yet) but you're not comparing like with like when it's compared to the original film.

johnny_ultimate

Mickeroo wrote: »

I think nostalgia and rose tinted glasses has a lot to do with this kind of thing. There's definitely some truth to it but if you look at T2 for example, it is a lot less dark, more "fun" and was clearly made to have a broader appeal than the original movie too. The first film was low budget surprise hit that the studio didn't give a toss about initially, now the franchise is seen as a tentpole blockbuster, every film since the first has been modified to profit on that while trying to use its reputation to appeal to a wider audience including T2.

I'd argue the very same point about Aliens, TBH - bit of a trend with Cameron I certainly wouldn't consider either among the sphere of cinema's great deep, intellectually provocative science fiction classics - not that they don't have their own pleasures, of course.

Ash.J.Williams

terminator- rated 18s
terminator genisys - rated 12a


i would imagine that alone is a major reason for the decline in quality.

Over use of effects has sucked out the life from sci fi for me.....i was watching some 80's sci fi recently and felt more effort went into the effects and more work and it benefited the movie better than having every second in CGI.

Mickeroo

Terminator 2 took an age ratings drop too and more importantly a budget increase.

Tefral

Seanachai wrote: »

It's a great loss because while there has been some great TV lately it doesn't compare to that magic of seeing a good movie on the big screen. I think you're right in saying that they are appealing to too broad of an audience and unfortunately a lot of these people were raised on social media and have awful attention spans. It would certainly explain the rapid, flashy pace of a lot of what's out there.

True,

I have to say the last time I was blown away in the Cinema was when Avatar came out in 3d. Sure the story line was a bit ****, but my god, if there was ever a movie made for a Cinema Screen that was it.

Seanachai

Fysh wrote: »

I'm not convinced there was ever a time when sci-fi/action films as a rule weren't kind of dumb and a bit cheap - for every Alien or Aliens there are plenty of Starship Troopers, Dooms and so on.

There was some turkeys, although Starship Troopers is a great social satire, but why did they have to make such a b**ls of the latest Terminator and Mad Max?. Looking at the casting and the trailer for Star Wars also it's not looking good.

Agricola

Yeah, the PG-13 rating says it all. It's all about mining that lucrative teen audience nowadays. Plus that audience actually has cash on the hip now where in previous generations it never had. When I was a kid, cinema trips were a rare treat. Now the cinemas are packed with teenagers as there is a lot more disposable income floating around. The hollywood industry is forever trying to tap into that.

CGI has made studios and film makers lazy. They have seen with all these superhero films that if they throw money at CGI they get a return, so thats what they do. Strong narratives arent as important.

The parallels with the music industry are interesting. Where once original ideas were championed and backed by the money men, now they rely on a formula which in the case of music involves simple catchy tunes sung by photogenic popstars with the asistance of a gaggle of producers and in the case of films, mainly spandex and CGI!

Seanachai

Ash.J.Williams wrote: »

terminator- rated 18s
terminator genisys - rated 12a


i would imagine that alone is a major reason for the decline in quality.

Over use of effects has sucked out the life from sci fi for me.....i was watching some 80's sci fi recently and felt more effort went into the effects and more work and it benefited the movie better than having every second in CGI.

100 % agree with you on the cgi, a lot of films are looking like the intros to computer games. It's not just a question of looking through rose tinted glasses, it's that the older effects just looked better imo, esp the animatronics.

Fysh

Bacchus wrote: »

Starship Troopers is neither dumb nor cheap. It's sequels may have been but the original was not.

Seanachai wrote: »

There was some turkeys, although Starship Troopers is a great social satire, but why did they have to make such a b**ls of the latest Terminator and Mad Max?. Looking at the casting and the trailer for Star Wars also it's not looking good.

Maybe not cheap, but having seen it twice Starship Troopers still scores as resolutely dumb for me. Dumb on purpose is still dumb, and for me the fascism allegory fell completely flat, with the visual references not being able to come close to pulling it back. I know there are a fair number of folks around here who see it differently, which is fair enough, but to lots of folks it's a high profile "Big and dumb" film whose superficial dumbness exemplifies what scifi/action is.

OTOH, I thought Fury Road was excellent, and exemplified as close to a sort of auteur blockbuster as I can imagine being possible. The last time I remember a cinema screening being such a viscerally great experience (and good enough for me to want to watch the film at the cinema again) was when I went to see The Raid.

johnny_ultimate

You're in a minority with Fury Road there - a quick look at the thread on it here or the professional reviews and there's little doubt it has been received as an uncommonly brave, bold and unhinged blockbuster.

Agricola

Seanachai wrote: »

100 % agree with you on the cgi, a lot of films are looking like the intros to computer games. It's not just a question of looking through rose tinted glasses, it's that the older effects just looked better imo, esp the animatronics.

Yeah Jurassic Park is a great example of that. The combined use of practical and CG effects made that film. Same with the Lord of The Rings trilogy. So much money was pumped into prosthetics, makeup, models of buildings/cities, it brought middle earth to life. By contrast, the Hobbit is just a CG explosion and it loses all sense of realism. You just know its actors in front of green screens.

Mickeroo

Agricola wrote: »

The parallels with the music industry are interesting. Where once original ideas were championed and backed by the money men, now they rely on a formula which in the case of music involves simple catchy tunes sung by photogenic popstars with the asistance of a gaggle of producers and in the case of films, mainly spandex and CGI!

That's a complete myth both for film and music, that's always been the case with the mainstream in both mediums. Terminator and Mad Max were never backed by the money men until their sequels due to them being surprise hits. Chart music has always been dominated by manufactured popstars singing catchy tunes. Westerns and War Movies were churned out endlessly when they were popular too.

Harry Palmr

China and Russia are the culprits! These are markets which only troop out to see Hollywood product if its easy to understand - ie lots of explosions and car chases. The squeezed middle is a phrase that can be applied to the film industry. Once the studios mainly made films that could be classed as medium sized, over the last 20 years they have gradually been removed from the production slate in favour of all or nothing productions. Of course it hard to be medium anything if your stars won't sign on for less than 20m dollars.

Ash.J.Williams

Seanachai wrote: »

100 % agree with you on the cgi, a lot of films are looking like the intros to computer games. It's not just a question of looking through rose tinted glasses, it's that the older effects just looked better imo, esp the animatronics.

bring back harryhausen!!

Agricola

Mickeroo wrote: »

That's a complete myth both for film and music, that's always been the case with the mainstream in both mediums. Terminator and Mad Max were never backed by the money men until their sequels due to them being surprise hits. Chart music has always been dominated by manufactured popstars singing catchy tunes. Westerns and War Movies were churned out endlessly when they were popular too.

Well by virtue of the fact someone had to hand James Cameron a few million dollars to make the film and it made it to cinemas worldwide, I would class that as backing it.
As Johnny mentioned there, people who are now looking for new ideas are having to explore online and dig into the indie scene. These films arent making the cineplexes anymore as they are drowned out with endless superhero dirge.

Similarly in music, record labels used to actually invest in bands once upon a time who would often go on to become huge in the charts. Now its wall to wall manufactured rubbish and people with zero artistic merit. Pop was always Pop, but it wasnt always shít.

Ash.J.Williams

Mickeroo wrote: »

That's a complete myth both for film and music, that's always been the case with the mainstream in both mediums. Terminator and Mad Max were never backed by the money men until their sequels due to them being surprise hits. Chart music has always been dominated by manufactured popstars singing catchy tunes. Westerns and War Movies were churned out endlessly when they were popular too.

No i do think the music end of things has gotten worse, but i do agree with you...just look back at music shows from the 70's (ie whole shows not just the best bits) and there was an awful lot of crap!!

Mickeroo

Agricola wrote: »

Well by virtue of the fact someone had to hand James Cameron a few million dollars to make the film and it made it to cinemas worldwide, I would class that as backing it.
As Johnny mentioned there, people who are now looking for new ideas are having to explore online and dig into the indie scene. These films arent making the cineplexes anymore as they are drowned out with endless superhero dirge.

Similarly in music, record labels used to actually invest in bands once upon a time who would often go on to become huge in the charts. Now its wall to wall manufactured rubbish and people with zero artistic merit. Pop was always Pop, but it wasnt always shít.

Record labels have always only invested in what's popular at the time(grunge, techno, hair metal, classic rock, disco etc) and we remember the bands or musicians from that group that happened to be good, and folks who are older than the target audience have always thought it was mostly crap at any given time too. Someone will be making the same arguments as you in 20 years time lamenting how good music was back in 2015.

The Terminator was essentially an indie movie by the way.

Seanachai

Harry Palmr wrote: »

China and Russia are the culprits! These are markets which only troop out to see Hollywood product if its easy to understand - ie lots of explosions and car chases. The squeezed middle is a phrase that can be applied to the film industry. Once the studios mainly made films that could be classed as medium sized, over the last 20 years they have gradually been removed from the production slate in favour of all or nothing productions. Of course it hard to be medium anything if your stars won't sign on for less than 20m dollars.

So they're using up all the chocolate AND ruining the quality of films, the noodle-munching blaggards!

Mickeroo

Ash.J.Williams wrote: »

No i do think the music end of things has gotten worse, but i do agree with you...just look back at music shows from the 70's (ie whole shows not just the best bits) and there was an awful lot of crap!!

Don't get me wrong, i think most of the stuff in the charts today is crap too

syklops

Ash.J.Williams wrote: »

terminator- rated 18s
terminator genisys - rated 12a


i would imagine that alone is a major reason for the decline in quality.

I came to this thread to post exactly this.

Seanachai

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

You're in a minority with Fury Road there - a quick look at the thread on it here or the professional reviews and there's little doubt it has been received as an uncommonly brave, bold and unhinged blockbuster.

It is not heresy and I will NOT recant! :P

Seanachai

"The problem with how digital effects are used in The Thing (2011) comes down to indexicality; the sense of direct connection between the horrifying object depicted, the characters interacting with it, and us out here in the real world. The unnatural smoothness of the effects whenever anyone gets ‘Thing-ed’ (a not-so-technical term for when the titular virus takes hold of its victim and mutilates them into a shrieking monstrosity) distances us from the fact that what we’re watching is a human body come undone. Fusing a real on-screen human with digital effects never seems to do justice to the viscosity and crunchiness of the human body."

http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2012/01/30/modern-horror-lay-off-the-cgi-and-bring-back-prosthetics/

Another great article on how special effects have declined

http://www.cracked.com/blog/6-reasons-expensive-films-end-up-with-crappy-special-effects/

Learnt a new word today also, 'indexicality'

ps3lover

I put most of the blame on Hollywoods obsession for making everything PG-13.

They look at something like the Fast And The Furious being really successful or the Marvel movies being really successful and then try to mimic those movies into franchises where it doesn't work.

Do we need an Avengers movie where the Hulk violently rips people in two while blood showers upon witnesses? Where Iron Man crushes someone's skull with his hand? Captain America slices people in half with his shield?
No we don't.
Same with The Fast And The Furious, the action is mostly insane over the top car stunts.

Unfortunately producers look at the success of these movies and think that kind of stuff will work for anything. So they mangle franchises and try to make them fit into something they are not just, then act surprised when there is a massive backlash and the film ends up under performing.

McLoughlin

I tend to point the finger to this discussion about change in films to 2 films Batman which was if i recall a 15 but they introduced 12 rating because you know Batman is a comic and kids read comics so must be for kids.

Then there was the Batman Returns merchandising row which show how much merchandising is important when a film comes out selling toys and stuff.

These 2 actions are the root of allot of problems films face these days.

Harry Palmr

Seanachai wrote: »

"The problem with how digital effects are used in The Thing (2011) comes down to indexicality; the sense of direct connection between the horrifying object depicted, the characters interacting with it, and us out here in the real world. The unnatural smoothness of the effects whenever anyone gets ‘Thing-ed’ (a not-so-technical term for when the titular virus takes hold of its victim and mutilates them into a shrieking monstrosity) distances us from the fact that what we’re watching is a human body come undone. Fusing a real on-screen human with digital effects never seems to do justice to the viscosity and crunchiness of the human body."

http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2012/01/30/modern-horror-lay-off-the-cgi-and-bring-back-prosthetics/

Another great article on how special effects have declined

http://www.cracked.com/blog/6-reasons-expensive-films-end-up-with-crappy-special-effects/

Learnt a new word today also, 'indexicality'

Lets face it these days a lot of actors only have a vague idea what they are fighting, running from or being torn to shreds by. CGI has so messed up the relationship between acting and actions.

Seanachai

Harry Palmr wrote: »

Lets face it these days a lot of actors only have a vague idea what they are fighting, running from or being torn to shreds by. CGI has so messed up the relationship between acting and actions.

Exactly, it's like the article says you can tell the difference between the interaction between real people\objects and the cgi. I'm not completely against cgi, I just think it should be used as little as possible.

ps3lover

Didn't Ewan McGregor say that making those Star Wars Prequels was horrible because most of the time he was acting against nothing.

Agricola

Mickeroo wrote: »

Record labels have always only invested in what's popular at the time(grunge, techno, hair metal, classic rock, disco etc) and we remember the bands or musicians from that group that happened to be good, and folks who are older than the target audience have always thought it was mostly crap at any given time too. Someone will be making the same arguments as you in 20 years time lamenting how good music was back in 2015.

Well God help those people if 2015 is ever looked back on with rose tinted glasses!

People's gripe with modern mainstream music goes much farther than the age old "those dang kids and their loud music, not like back in ma day"
The difference between the 60's, 70s, 80s, 90s and today is that many musicians who dominated the charts back them were actually musicians/artists. They often had something to say and said it through music. They were accomplished at what they did and could often perform live to a high standard, without any tech crutches.
Those people havent vanished, the problem is they are no longer breaking through to mainstream conciousness because they're not invested in (due to the revenue collapse brought about by file sharing / the end of physical media sales) and are drowned out by manufactured / lightweight popstars who have an army of PR people, songwriters and producers behind them.

Mickeroo wrote: »

The Terminator was essentially an indie movie by the way

Was waiting for that! It still required millions to be invested by a studio. Would such a film make it to cinemas today? No. Why? Because the budget required to make it would be enormous, no-one would take a punt on it and it would possibly be made as a B movie on a shoestring. Original concepts = Nil - Superhero Movie with big explosions 1

ps3lover

Another thing is, we, as audience members, should be feeling the business side of movie making but we do, we see it more as a business and less as entertainment due to the fact they keep making business decisions that people don't like.

johnny_ultimate

Agricola wrote: »

Was waiting for that! It still required millions to be invested by a studio. Would such a film make it to cinemas today? No. Why? Because the budget required to make it would be enormous, no-one would take a punt on it and it would possibly be made as a B movie on a shoestring. Original concepts = Nil - Superhero Movie with big explosions 1

Absolute nonsense. Plenty of smaller, riskier films still get made regularly, often funded, distributed or produced by major studio offshoots. Stuff like It Follows, Under the Skin, The Raid, Ex Machina, Inherent Vice, Cold in July, Boyhood, Blue Ruin to name just a few have enjoyed significant releases in recent times. There is still a robust and often incredibly worthwhile mid-tier 'prestige' film system too, not to mention mavericks like Megan Ellison pumping money into far more interesting far.

If there's no films exactly like The Terminator, there's a simple reason for that: a film like The Terminator would be by its very nature derivative. No point trying to simply emulate past glories (and honestly I think that lets otherwise well made far like The Guest down). The Terminator is what it is and always will be, I'm more interested in what else people have to offer.

e_e

People were literally saying things like the OP when Star Wars and Jaws came out, just saying. :pac:

Nothing went wrong, the big executives at Hollywood are just doing what they've been doing since the mid-70s. But thankfully there is still so much great cinema being made regardless.

e_e

e_e wrote: »

People were literally saying things like the OP when Star Wars and Jaws came out, just saying. :pac:

Case in point:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ky9-eIlHzAE

don ramo

one of the big problems is that their either continuing 30 year old franchises that have be drained of any worthwhile future content, or just trying to make everything a franchise,

any film that requires a 100 million plus budget is 90% of the time designed to be a franchise, you get the odd exceptions like Interstellar and Inception, but even nolan had a make a batman trilogy in order for a studio to finance those films, its give and take, and most directors these days just don't have the patience to deal with it,

look at soderberg, he said hes left the film side of things behind cause when he goes to pitch a film he doesn't go meet with a studio executive that's into films, he goes to meet a studio executive thats an accountant, and he wants a breakdown of demographics,

its at the point where it doesn't matter what you make, if you can show there's an audience out there for the film that can return 4 times the investment in a 10 week cinema run, your film is getting made,

even disney who make the avengers films have had multiple 100 million dollar failures the last few years, John Carter, Battleship and The Lone Ranger all cost the studio huge money, so their lucky they have avenger films the make 700 million plus each, but i suppose at least their trying,

i thought Star Trek 2009 was a great example of how to relaunch a franchise, until part 2 came out and they just shat all over all the good work of the first one,

you gotta think to of all the great sci-fi films youve seen, think of your all time top 10, and then see how far apart they were released, cause id be surprised if they were all released within 10 years, think 2001 was 68, star wars 77, terminator 1 and 2 were 7 years apart, as were alien and aliens, and id probably put interstallar in my top 10, seen it twice and was even more impressed second time around, thats nearly 50 years to fill my top 10,

Arghus

It's an industry were talking about here. At it's top level it's like anything else - all about the money. Questions of investment - versus risk - versus potential reward are the primary concern of those involved. Artistic merit and originality are by-products that provide wonderful ancillary benefits, if stumbled upon, but have dubious track records, in and of themselves, if you're talking about guaranteed return on your dollars invested.

Why are so many blockbusters watered down, soulless experiences? Because: money. It takes money to make money and that money doesn't like being put at risk, it wants to make more of itself. That's why your summers are increasingly filled with more rehashes of stale ideas, that have been assembled in boardrooms, with Franchise opportunities and cross-marketing potential for primary driving concerns. In this rarefied air of corporate group think, left field ideas such as the shock of something new represent an existential threat to commercial entertainment, that brings you in straight lines to wherever you've been many times. The business of assembling whatever hulking mass of a plus 3000 screen opener is best left to a committee, usually presided over by a hack of some sort, who should have at his disposal the use of an established brand, bulked up with weightless spectacle and airless CGI. Most genuinely good or original ideas are left to the marketing guys, who usually are breaking their own balls, from the sheer effort to convince everyone that we all want to see a version of something we've all seen before.

I think peoples expectations are also partly to blame - How many of us have paid money to see a blockbuster in the last few years, knowing full well that it is going to be, at best, just okay and, probably in all likelihood, really rather terrible? Until the day comes when people stop paying for crap and there's a definite undeniable correlation between new and exciting tent-pole fare and serious moolah, then things might change. I do think that day will eventually come. There's only so many times that you can go back to the well before people at large will tire of rebooted regurgitations. It could take ages, decades even, but it'll eventually arrive.

And yet there's never been more quality out there in the world of film, and with greater ease of access than ever before. I think people who make this argument are missing the point slightly. They're partly right and partly wrong. There's quality out there, but, unless you live in and around Dublin, best of luck seeing it in the cinema pal. That's for your home time. If you have money in your pocket and you want to do your favourite thing - seeing a movie, in the cinema - well then you better hope that it's one of those times during the year that something that promises to be in any way half-decent/interesting is on. That interesting movie that you read about in Sight and Sound can't get a look in because their showing Terminator Geriatrics over a dozen times a day, on four screens, biding time until Ant-Man arrives...Ant-Man... FML.

endacl

There was a time when a movie was an event. Not a massive marketing campaign, but an actual bona fide 'event'.

I remember when Jedi came out. We'd known it was coming for ages. We couldn't wait. We paid our cash and we were at an 'event'. If we wanted to see it again, we had to go to the cinema again. When the run was finished, to see it again we had to wait until Xmas, and hope that one of the three or four channels we had acces to would show it. And also hope that it wasn't clashing with something the auld fella wanted to watch on the one and only TV in the gaff.

Let's face it, Jedi isn't a great movie. It's not even 'very good'. But we made a myth if it because the movie was just the movie. The event was everything else: the wait, the anticipation, the 'you can't have it right now, and you won't have it for long'...

That can't happen now. Any current movie I want to see, a few clicks will get me to a download. If I'm strictly legal, sure I don't even have to wait till it's released on dvd. Some movie channel or other will pretend like having it on demand is some kind of 'event'. It's not. It's instant gratification, and instant gratification makes everything disposable.

'Meh. Next please. Now.' is the reason great movies aren't really made any more. Look what they did to poor Alien...


**Rant Ends**

e_e

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WjXCDgBdT18

Spot on video here on the state of cinema by Kermode. 3:42 goes for many of the posters in this very thread!

El_Duderino 09

OP what age were you when you saw the original Terminator? It's likely that you grew up in the mean time and your taste in movies changed.

It's great to look back at an old movie from years ago for nostalgic purposes but chances are the new movie is as good as the old in objective terms - that's to say not very good.

e_e

We get an equivalent to this thread every year or so and it always baffles me.

It's a bit like being in a town with all these amazing different places to eat opening up around you and then getting angry at the local McDonalds for not giving you fine dining. Great movies have never been so plentiful not to mention easy to access, really it only takes a tiny bit of effort to come across something interesting.

Case in point: We're only halfway through the year and I've already found enough films I've liked to make a top 50.

don ramo

the problem is access, fair play if your in dublin, im in cork myself, and you kinda used to get a good spread back along,

but now the cinemas are getting more streamlined and cute about how they do business, and now id say 90%of whats showing here is hollywood,

i remember going to see The Imitation game and Ex-Machina a few months back in half empty cinemas, 2 top class films, but noone is going to see them, and this the adding to the problem, if people wont go see these films on a regular basis then where is the incentive for the cinema to obtain these films for their patrons,

Love and Mercy is out today, but only 1 of the 5 cinemas near me is showing it, and thats mahon which has 13 odd screens,

i think its down to the individuals to educate themselves also, i complain myself of a lack of films, but i dont frequent enough sites in order to get a full look at what is available,

this forum is probably my main source for non-hollywood films, but at times i get annoyed here sifting through the threads of films that arent even gonna be released for another year or two, which is another problem we have, the 2-3 year build up to a film, from the moment its greenlit you will unquestionably hear about it at least twice a month for 2-3 years till its release, and then listen/read for another 6 months as its been torn apart, (which every single film that is released does bar none)

Arghus

e_e wrote: »

It's a bit like being in a town with all these amazing different places to eat opening up around you and then getting angry at the local McDonalds for not giving you fine dining. Great movies have never been so plentiful not to mention easy to access, really it only takes a tiny bit of effort to come across something interesting.

Great movies are abundant, but there are places in the country where if you want to "eat out", oftentimes the cinematic equivalent of McDonalds is your only option.