"I mean, and I'm not picking on anybody, but apparently for Netflix, Ryan Reynolds has made $50 million on this movie and $50 million on that movie and $50 million on the next movie for them," he told Deadline. "Well, good for him that he's making so much money. But those movies don't exist in the zeitgeist. It's almost like they don't even exist.
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I think this is spot on, and why not pick on Ryan Reynolds? The Netflix movies ARE paying him $50 million a pop evidently, and on top of that he's made a billion off some technology sale.
Stars like Humphrey Bogart and John Wayne got plenty rich in their time...but NOTHING like that. Wayne lost all his money to a bad manager and had to start over to get it back.
This "Netflix" era means that our very lucky movie stars(often minted via Marvel movies) get these insanely rich paydays and ..end up with not much of a "canon of work" at all.
Ryan Reynolds has a great handsome face(built more for comedy than drama) and the abs-fit body and charisma to burn. And the beautiful movie star wife. But what will he leave behind as a resume?
Consider Paul Newman:
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof(Oscar nom)
Exodus
The Hustler (Oscar nom)
Hud(Oscar nom)
Harper
Torn Curtain(for Hitchcock)
Hombre
Cool Hand Luke(Oscar nom)
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
The Sting
The Towering Inferno
Slapshot
Absence of Malice
The Verdict (Oscar nom)
The Color of Money(Oscar win)
Nobody's Fool(Oscar nom)
...but this is an unfair comparison to Ryan Reynolds because most of Newman's famous films were DRAMAS, not built for mass audiences; it was a different time and place. Ryan Reynolds will never get a chance to make all the interesting movies that Paul Newman did.
Still, I think QT's right on this one. We rarely get good films or classics from Netflix(perhaps only when the makers are major: Roma, Buster Scruggs, The Irishman)...we get vanity projects for movie stars that make them the richest in history..without much of a legacy.
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bozo_500 (13105)
a year ago
Nice analysis, RR has a pretty appalling movie resume tbh especially these recent near unknown Netflix movies he's been doing. i mean whats there of any note? The Deadpools?? they made a ton of money (biggest ever XMen movies even more than DOFP or Logan), but they were both trash really and DP3 will be the same even tho its got jackman back as Wolverine and no doubt a bunch of cameos (really they're really just R rated uber violent Spiderman movies), creatively he must feel quite empty so maybe why he's done all those business ventures (including Wrexham FC, a kind of save the club/save the town/save the people redemption tale to make him feel some worth)
And i don't think Tarantino will quit after his 10th film, yeah there will be a hiatus of like 5years where he's like 'nope I'm done for good, I mean it' then he'll come up with a new (theatre) movie , maybe Kill Bill 3 or Pulp Fiction 2 or he'll finally get offered Bond or Star Trek and he'll be like well these don't count as they're sequels or its not my franchise so its fine
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roger1 (3626)
a year ago
Nice analysis, RR has a pretty appalling movie resume tbh especially these recent near unknown Netflix movies he's been doing.
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I have Netflix and I've come to simply ignore the new RR films as they arrive. I can't even keep the titles straight. The Gray Man? Various action movies with car chases. "Red Notice" with its superexpensive team of RR, Dwayne Johnson and Gal Gadot -- major stars all -- anybody remember what it was about?
Striking Hollywood writers are upset that AI may start writing their scripts. I mean, isn't that ALREADY happening with RR's movies?
(By the way, this makes Tarantino SUPER valuable. He writes his own scripts, his dialogue is pretty unique and magical...HE isn't AI.)
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creatively he must feel quite empty so maybe why he's done all those business ventures (including Wrexham FC, a kind of save the club/save the town/save the people redemption tale to make him feel some worth)
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Movie stars have always made big money, but these Netflix paydays are insane. Any of us would take that pay, sure, but the overkill and overwealth probably "gets" to these performers in a world of abject poverty and strife. I recall Jim Carrey saying that at a certain point he had so much money "it feels like Monopoly money." Meaningless. But he kept it and stars sometimes NEED it to keep all those mansions and yachts paid up.
But wouldn't it be great if RR could make that kind of dough and have a "Cool Hand Luke" type drama on his resume? Or a buddy movie with a really good SCRIPT(like The Sting, not like Red Notice.) Probably impossible to do in today's Hollywood.
CONT
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roger1 (3626)
a year ago
I would like to add that even Paul Newman, with a "gifted" career that brought him most of the major projects in Hollywood in the 60s(there were few other leading men after all the old ones retired or died)...made quite a few stinkers to go with his classics, and felt being a movie star was somewhat beneath him. So he raced cars(very well) and he "did politics." (Back when it was more noble to do so.) Even HE felt guilty about being a star.
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roger1 (3626)
a year ago
And i don't think Tarantino will quit after his 10th film,
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I'm starting to think that ...nobody thinks this.
Tarantino has "couched this" by saying something like "well, this will be the last one of my serious work. Maybe I will do a few after that but they will be considered to be after my main period of work.)
Tarantino makes the point -- backed by the movies -- that once old-time directors like Hitchcock, Ford, and Wilder reached their 60's, they slowed down, their movies didn't fit the times and they turned in some of their worst movies. Yeah but that was then and this is now. Health regimens are better; lifespans are longer; guys like Spielberg and Scorsese and Ridley Scott and Clint Eastwood have made some great films while in their seventies(and even Hitchocck made a damn good one right near the end -- Frenzy.)
But as you say:
yeah there will be a hiatus of like 5years where he's like 'nope I'm done for good, I mean it' then he'll come up with a new (theatre) movie , maybe Kill Bill 3 or Pulp Fiction 2 or he'll finally get offered Bond or Star Trek and he'll be like well these don't count as they're sequels or its not my franchise so its fine
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There you go. QT can invent his own rules for what is "an OK exception to his rule."
Still, he has been clever about announcing this as his last. In some ways it is a preemptive strike: critics won't be able to say "he's old and out of touch." HE is already saying that he doesn't want to BE old and out of touch. Smart showman.
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