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| re: Anyone else think we're about to enter a cinematic dark age? This is where I think you're wrong. You think that just because there is a public outcry against something that it will somehow cease to exist. People have hated on violent video games and suggestive lyrics since the 90s and are games are more violent and our music more explicit. Studios are a money making business and will never forget what makes them money. As long as gory, violent, morally ambiguous movies continue to score big at the box office, they will continue to make them no matter what the public sentiment is. The media can cry havoc all they want, but as long as people still show up at the theater asking for a ticket, violent movies will get made. I do agree with you on premise, that we are entering a dark age of cinema. However, I do not agree that the demise of cinema will be because there's not enough violent, morally ambiguous films being made. I argue that the decline will be based on a lack of creativity, a lack of willingness by the industry to take risks with innovative ideas, and a continuously shrinking market share as innovation brings direct to viewer movies on a much wider scale. The truth is, the movie industry is on te verge of hard times. I believe that 2012 will go down as the "pride before the fall", the great long summer that they thought would last forever. Don't be fooled, winter is coming...and zombies, don't forget zombies  Reply • Back to Top |
| I do think my premise on China though will happen. The shootings is still in the air and we won't be able to see its effect (if any) for about a year or two. China wants to frick over any major release that doesn't meet their requirements. They're release it if they go through something that makes the MPAA look like a cool stoner parent. R-Rated films generally aren't allowed to be shown in China, although they made an exception for Prometheus on the grounds that they edit out all the good parts. China wants the American film system to be more or less ruled by China. No over-the-top violence, minimal use of guns, no cursing, only have movies with a very clear good and bad guy, make the governments into the good guys, the hero easy to relate to instead of a complex individual that may not translate over cultures very well, and always have the good guy win with a Happily Ever After bull shite. That's the direction we are about to head my friends with big studio releases. If they don't do that, China will still let the film be released (if its edited and butchered to hell for their release), but they'll also pit it against another Blockbuster. The Dark Knight Rises for instance was released on the same week as Spider-Man, Prometheus, and The Expendables 2, which needless to greatly hurt all their potential box office gross. The Hobbit and Skyfall will be released in February in the same week, right when everyone has already seen it and got good bootlegged copies of it already in their living room. They're sending a message to Hollywood in telling them that in order to get as much money as they deserve, they'll have to have the government in on the film in the beginning. Chinese officials were supervising the Avengers and Looper (which mind you is completely different overseas), and they had a good month to themselves and thus grossed a shit-ton of money. Didn't you notice all the stuff said about China in the film, despite the fact that I don't know why China has anything to do with this? This post was edited on 2/4 at 4:18 pm Reply • Back to Top |
quote: NOOOOOOOO Reply • Back to Top |
Posted by JabarkusRussell on 2/4 at 10:25 pm to OMLandshark Sorry but I don't see American studios trying to appeal to Communist regimes. Reply • Back to Top |
quote: If the studios can make another 10-20 million dollars out of it, I certainly see them appealing to the communists. They already are. Watch Battleship and tell me they aren't trying to. Reply • Back to Top |
Posted by JabarkusRussell on 2/4 at 11:37 pm to OMLandshark No body watched Battleship. If anything, that showed trying to appeal to them failed.Reply • Back to Top |
Posted by Tim Taylor on 2/4 at 11:54 pm to JabarkusRussell The only movie that changed not to offend the Chinese was Red Dawn and really it made more sense for it to be North Korea than China anyways. If anything we are entering a better era of movies. Pre-60's it was all a producer's game producing the same box office draws in the same plots over and over and over again. The few standout films were either adapted from or based on novels. I don't get why people shite on sequels. It's easy to come up with an original story that stands alone. It's hard to take that story and take it a step further in a great creative way. Speaking of originality, let's take a look at the Best Picture nominees this year: Zero Dark Thirty is a docudrama about real life events. Nothing original. Argo is based on a declassified cia mission. Lincoln is based on the last few months of a President's life. Life of Pi was adapted from a book. Les Miserables was adapted from a play. Beasts of the Southern Wild is from a play too. Silver Linings Playbook is from a book. Only 2 of the 9 nominees are original ideas/stories. Meanwhile, comic book movies and comedies are shunned because they aren't snobby elitist films but are easily more entertaining and provide more bang for the buck than their wine and cheese counterparts. Reply • Back to Top |
quote: Now that is a helluva post my friend.   But just like the mindless regurgitators of the "sequels/franchises suck" crowd, be careful not to paint the "wine and cheese" counterparts with too broad a brush. There are great movies and horrible shitty movies being made on both ends of the spectrum. It's the idiots that can't see both sides of the coin that make things miserable for themselves and try to make everyone else just as awful. Kind of a microcosm for what is wrong with our country today. All sensationalism, hyperbole, and rhetoric with no real perspective. Take a stroll down the middle every once in a while. The view is great This post was edited on 2/5 at 5:56 am Reply • Back to Top |
| TLDR Hollywood knows what sells. They will never stop pumping out a bit of the ultra violence and sex. Never. Reply • Back to Top |
quote:  10/10 You're nearing Wiki level my friend You're not Walt, but there is no shame in that, for he is the Jerry Rice of the art Reply • Back to Top |
| The studios would re-make A Triumph of Will if they thought there was money in it. Of course they kowtow to China on their big-budget tentpole films. That said, that's such a small portion of what comes out in cinema these days. The system is so decentralized and so many films come from outside the traditional studio system. There's almost no barrier to making a film. distribution is still the big issue, but indie films regularly make it to multiplexes now. It's not a complete bar anymore. Reply • Back to Top |
quote: And that movie bombed spectacularly. Sure Hollywood wants Chinese money, but right now America is the country that spends the most on the movie industry. That's who they will continue to cater to. Now in 15-20 years will that be different? I don't know, but it does seem right now and in the foreseeable future it will continue to be America. Reply • Back to Top |
quote: Stop hijacking this thread. Take that shite to the poli board. Reply • Back to Top |
quote: I love you won't you tell me your name? Reply • Back to Top |
quote: It worked out well for them in Looper. Granted I'll give these guys the benefit of the doubt, since really they made two films: one more targetted at Americans, and the other more towards Chinese where the backstory on Old Joe is greatly expanded on and he becomes more the main character in the process. Reply • Back to Top |
Posted by Tim Taylor on 2/5 at 12:31 pm to OMLandshark China isn't the second audience that Hollywood is concerned with right now. The UK is. Yeah China and India have a metric shitton of people, but they don't have the middle class wealth or the number of quality theaters to cater to them. Speaking of sequels/remakes/whatever, I wouldn't mind seeing a modern take on Back to the Future. Not a sequel, not a continuation, and not a remake. Set it in 2015, with the main character (hell change the teen lead to a chic so I get some eye candy) and she goes back to 1985. Lots of people are nostalgic about the 80's, so why not? There are plenty of good writers out in Hollywood who can churn out the right script. Get a decent cast, the right script, the right director and boom. Good movie. Reply • Back to Top |
quote: They're basically the same audience as the US. They can use the same strategies, scripts, and actors in the UK as they can with the US. China and India require a completely different approach. quote: China certainly has a middle class (in the cities at least) and has more than doubled the amount of theaters in their country in the past 2 years and viewership of films increases 20% each year, with no sign of stopping. quote: You're completely suggesting a remake. Reply • Back to Top |
Posted by Tim Taylor on 2/5 at 1:12 pm to OMLandshark quote: Most people believe a remake is nearly the exact same story with the exact same characters set in the exact same timeframe. My idea is a modernization of the tale with a different story, different characters, and a different timeframe. The only connection to the BTTF series would be the general outline. Reply • Back to Top |
quote: It certainly didn't bomb spectacularly. It didn't make tons of money, but I would guess it recouped production ($209MM) and marketing costs (less than half that I'd imagine...maybe 70-80) from the box office alone ($302MM). Reply • Back to Top |
quote: I'm thinking it probably lost a bit of money due to marketing costs, but it didn't bomb enough to where they won't try that again. Reply • Back to Top • Refresh |
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