Emphasis on stupid movies, lack of attention to great movies, certain cliches, anything you want... Curious to read your responses.
shareCash cowing on movies, after making a great movie in a series.
Not bringing enough new talent on board and recycling actors/actresses (some of who are not even that great at acting).
The only problem I have is the lack of diversity. It seemed unfair and stopping progress. There are so many potentially great actors that deserve an opportunity to entertain us.
Although Hollywood is making changes, so I have no pending issues anymore.
Merchandise.
shareThe complete lack of artistry and class on every level.
shareDavid Lynch just said he doesn't envision making any more movies because what the industry wants isn't what he's interested in making. Sadly, since home video died... there no longer is a safety net for the industry to take risks on films that bomb.
This means artists like Lynch that flourished before the piracy era... are no longer marketable. We are doomed to see more reboots and pre-existing franchise films... and less auteur driven art. I thought with the advent of a hd camera on every smart phone... that the barrier of entry would be lowered, and we'd see a plethora of amazing homemade films. So far this hasn't happened... but who knows maybe that will eventually evolve.
The internet killed everything. It's official!
share"Sadly, since home video died... there no longer is a safety net for the industry to take risks on films that bomb."
You hit the nail on the head. Look at the quality of films released in the 1990s at the height of home video. There will never be another era when studios (large and small) will have the financial wherewithal to make movies that are now considered too non-commercial or 'artsy'. Home video revenue to the studios was the best thing ever for film lovers and enabled studios to take chances and greenlight risky non-theatrical programing.
I'm glad you see this... it's frustrating because people always try to argue that piracy has no effect on the industry by pointing out the overall numbers... e.g. Guardians of the Galaxy or Logan's box office numbers but ignore the fact that Lynch, Soderbergh, Wenders, Kevin Smith, Rodriguez... all the indie darlings of the 90s barely make films anymore. Bryan Singer went from cool films like Usual Suspects to superhero films... Same with Doug Liman. I'm just thinking of names off the top of my head, so maybe there are other reasons for this... but the fact that the studios have become risk averse seem pretty obvious... and films have just become less varied and more generic.
shareYou said it all so I don't even need to say it.
The same issue happened earlier with the music industry. Because song files are smaller, so file sharing for music was rampant before movie file sharing. You didn't need a high speed connection to collect music on Napster and it's successors.
The smaller indie bands and non mainstream music that flourished in the 80's and early 90s, college radio, etc. Bands like that cannot make any money from selling records/cds/digital albums/etc. they can only make money playing live, and many have to tour almost constantly.
In the early 2000's I thought that the ease of burning your own cds would break that entry barrier as you said- I thought 'wow who needs a record company now, every little garage band can just produce their own music and this will be a golden age of variety and diversity and DIY.'
NOPE
But instead, the whole music industry died, except for huge blockbuster mainstream artists that you see at every awards show every year. They don't even make their money off recordings either, they make it off tours, merchandise lines, commercial work, etc. They need to become a BRAND and have their own clothing lines and shoe lines and all kinds of non-music stuff.
Basically the musical equivalent of the blockbuster film franchises.
Yes, you'd think it would be easy for someone to become a star... and a few have on YouTube... but people have always underestimated the promotional abilities of these respective industries.
Imagine a bunch of talented basketball players from the New York playgrounds or Venice Beach saying they wanted to start a new league to compete with the NBA. Is it possible? Sure... but also extremely unlikely.
The old system, though often corrupt... did a good job of creating excitement in both the film and music industries... Now as you said we have either huge but artistically empty blockbusters or a mass of homemade clips that may be good at times but rarely find their audience. Also because there is no clear path to success other than maybe music competition shows... less people are motivated to turn to careers in those industries viewing them now more as hobbies than a viable career. Why would you want to become a writer, journalist, film director, recording artist... if you know most of it will be stolen anyway? The only people left at that point are desperate attention whores where fame more than art is the driving force.
It's definitely not the future I imagined when the internet age started.
:(
I didn't get the memo about home video being dead. I design custom home theater systems and business is going strong.
shareI meant the revenues the television and film industries generated from physical media... they make some of it back streaming... but very little... like spotify compared to cds and vinyl.
Glad you're doing well though...
Okay, I understand better now. You're referring to a shift in the media paradigm and not saying that people no longer watch movies in their homes. You're absolutely right that home theater use has rescued many a disappointing theatrical release, and also let us enjoy big hits even more than when they were in theaters, allowing for things like Directors' Cuts and Extended Editions. No one's bladder would last all the way through the extended edition of The Return of the King if stuck in a theater chair, but, at home, hit Pause, hit the bathroom, raid the 'fridge, visit the wet bar, sit back down, hit Play, and life is good.
One thing I can assure you, though: all of us will be dead before hard media vanish completely. Did you know that last year my industry sold more turntables than CD players? Not only will hard media not die, ANALOG will not die. (Has to do with the fact that music comes out a loudspeaker and a loudspeaker is an analog output device. If we keep the signal path analog all the way, from recording through amplifier and to speaker, the sound is clearly improved.) I love showing people how much better their entertainment experience can be.
Oh I can see a niche market for vinyl... I also see a possible situation where if screen resolution increases more rapidly than bandwidth... that one might favor an 8k or 16k physical disc over streaming. But then again Google fiber might eliminate that worry assuming it remains affordable. Net Neutrality also is an issue as its potential demise might reign in piracy which might create a market again for intellectual property. However, I wouldn't bet on any of these things happening as I believe the powers that be like the low crime rate caused by a medicated public... so for the foreseeable future I think media will be ruled by the pirates.
shareThe mass market will always choose convenience over performance, that is true. Neither does the mass market care about, nor can spell, intellectual property. The medication of the masses includes not only pharmaceuticals but also cell phones, tabloids and religion; also sex. This is why I don't work with the mass market. My guess is that neither do you, Sentient.
shareMost of my career I've done or owned small businesses but I have nothing against the mass market in theory. I think the key is to avoid things that can be duplicated by machines or computers. Working with your hands like you do is a good thing. Most people in retail industries can no longer compete with the tech companies.
shareThank you, but I'm not in retail. I'm in customer service, system design and bespoke.
shareAgreed... I hope the Apple TV model allows for some recovery of this kind of filmmaking through rentals and digital purchase... I don't know if this is enough...
It seems UHD discs/blu ray will not be a large enough market... Even though they are amazing quality
I'm tired of shoved down the throat feminism and homosexuality in modern movies. I mean, Moonlight is great and I love it (and I'm glad it won Best Picture instead of La La Land). It's a quality movie which happen to have a story about a homosexual guy. I myself is maybe a closeted bisexual. I already have a wife and children though, so I don't really care.
Homosexuality is fine and I applaud Hollywood to bringing it out in movies. What I don't like is the forced ones, for example the Star Trek Beyond's controversial scene. That was unecessary and just stupid. And it only lasts for a few seconds, has nothing to say and achieved nothing too. It ruined the character and may even contributed to the already mediocre movie's demise.
What bothers me is this trend seemingly continues and more scenes like this will be annoyingly put in movies for totally random reasons.
I agree that it sucks when they try to shoehorn in social agendas like that. It's just bad art. Some films do a great job of making a social statement without compromising, like Brokeback Mountain.
shareAn anecdote regarding Brokeback Mountain... My ex-girlfriend's father was a huge western movie fan. He has hundreds of western DVDs. But he's an Asian and older generation of Asians tend to not take homosexuality seriously. They make fun of it and can't bear the shame if one's son is gay.
The moment he watched Brokeback Mountain DVD, he told me, that he's like WTF?!
However, he enjoyed and rated it high among his collection. This is how you make a statement. This is how you infuence people to start considering that the issue is real and to see it not only as a joke through art.
Pushing scenes randomly does not. In fact, it may even hurts the cause. Also applicable to feminism, equality, diversity or whatever issue that can be brought up using a film medium.
Just like everyone else since the dawn of moviedom.... guns that never run out of bullets. Can't fucking stand that!!
shareBut they always run out of ammo at the appropriate time! 😂
shareEven more annoying!!!! 😂😂😂😂
shareAnd how about those drivers that leave the car's headlights on and then they are unable to start it up? It's like "Come on."
*I stole this from another thread way back.*
The price of the tickets and popcorn in theaters! No kidding. I hadn't been to the movies in a few years and the first time I went back, wow, could not believe the prices! And that was about seven years ago!
We don't have a theater in this little town ,so it's a thirty minute drive to the nearest Cineplex. If I really want to see a film, I just rent it from a nearby Redbox for a dollar. I manage to find some good "little" movies, not the blockbusters which get all the big ad money.
I am sick of the overhyped films with expensive fx, too much swearing, gratuitous sex and violence ,etc. Guess I am getting to be a fuddy duddy in my old age. That's probably why I mostly prefer old movies, a lot of the old classic comedies and dramas.
Was this post to the OP?
Your response was not relevant to my particular comment.
Sorry, thought it was clear that I was responded to the OP! The question was "anything" related to the movie industry.
I also think you meant my response "wasn't relevant" or "didn't have relevance" to your comment. "Has not relevant" makes no grammatical sense!
I am not sure why I have been having that problem. In all my posts, I look back and see that one letter screws up everything. You may have caught it as well.
"Sorry, thought it was clear that I was responded to the OP!"
"I was responded"
I would like to see more asian actors. Kal Penn is not enough
shareNow they are splitting Indian and Asian actors. When you say Asian, people think Korean, Chinese, Japanese, and Indonesian..etc.
shareok I mean to say indian
sharePeople would then say, "Well then why do they not just go back to their country and star in Bollywood films?"
Even as that would be extremely rude, they do have a point. Bollywood is like the second highest film industry whatever, next to Hollywood.
Bollywood actually produces more movie per year than Hollywood. Multiple times as much in fact.
For example, in the year 2012 alone, Indian film industry churned out more than 1,600 movies! Compare that with The U.S. that managed a mere 476 films.
I understand but there is a lack of versatile genre movies and 35+ actors can't get roles.
shareThat actually works against what Mahadevan wanted. People would just say "Look, they make more movies and there would be more of a chance to land a role in your country of ethnic background."
For me, it was always the language and that is a huge barrier. Most Indian movies are in broken English/Hindi. You could get by if you were only suppose to say one worded English phrases; however, I am sure it is a requirement to know the native tongue.
I was just stating a trivia.
share