movies

The market of “Content”

People are starved; starved of good quality movies. Post-Millennial movies are filled with laziness and money mongering tactics, so much even the lame attempt at humour sounds funny. Oblivion is a strike in every music score and dialogue. Take, for example, Justice League and how Joss Whedon butchered the aim of Zack Snider. But this was not always the case, for there have been a significant number of movies in the modern age that can be called masterpieces; Interstellar, Inception, Avatar. So what happened?

Reasons Behind the Decline Of Good Movies

  • Lack of economic pacing and natural sense: Movies earlier used to be of 90 mins to 2 hours maximum. The short time ensured a crisp, on-point message without too much repetition. But movies now are usually 2 and a half or 3 hours long, resulting in repeated plot points and boring delivery.
  • Political agendas and woke culture: Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong with movies portraying social and political issues to create awareness. But how atrociously it is performed is astonishing. For example, Marvel forcing upon the Female Avengers team-up scene makes no sense at all. Or when studios and directors encompass people of race into their movies just for its sake. The characters generally add no value other than showing to how woke they are. Woke culture is the main reason why movies are trash.
  • Studio monopoly and feuds: Studios are moreover adding to the problem of bad movies. The freedom of directors and actors have gone to oblivion as they are mere puppets. Star Wars are a good example of this. Also, Justice League shows how a director’s vision is thrown out of the window and instead, a copycat movie is made. Feuds between Sony and Marvel over the ownership of Spiderman and other characters also cause significant damage to movies and the emotions of people. Studios care about money and for that, they are willing to make reboots after reboots of original films making the franchise unwatchable. Terminator and Final Destination are good examples of such causes.
  • Over editing and Use of CGI: Nowadays there is a trend of quick cuts and over-editing. Well choreographed action scenes contain cuts back and forth making them difficult to follow and confusing. Also, CGI usage has doubled, with Marvel being a famous name in it, and it gives a feeling of fakeness to the movie. It makes the audience believe that nothing is organic in the movie.

Are We Running Out Of Movie Ideas?

There are arguments that Hollywood is less creative and uninspiring. This argument premises on a nostalgic notion of the golden days of movies. Sure movies are grossing but that doesn’t necessarily mean that people are enjoying it. Hollywood is habitually rehashing movies to create a “new” movie, like for example changing “Park” to “World”.

Conglomerates are taking over movie companies. They are attracted to high profile society. But they didn’t grow up in the show business milieu. This result in brand based film making. The sole purpose of the movies is to generate merchandise and sequels. Profit is the only driving force. The shocking thing is that rotten pictures too make money. Therefore making better movies for studios might jeopardize their position.  Studios rarely break the tested and tried process. Black Panther is an exception as it received Oscar nominations and critic awards.

Most studios rely on a steady stream of formulaic instruments resulting in identical films.

Rebooting is IN in Hollywood. Rebooting works on nostalgia. Studios reboot a franchise so people go to the theater for the sake of nostalgia. For example, The Matrix Resurrections. This clearly shows laziness and a lack of creative vision. Count how many Cinderella movies are there: way more than it should be. They change just time period and call it a new Cinderella movie.

Live-action remaking of movies are also killing the originality of movies. Movies like Mulan and The Lion King completely destroy the classic 90s feeling.

How Original Are Hollywood Movies?

movies

According to a study, between 2005 and 2014, 39% of them were original. Original means, it is not an adaptation of a book, comic or any movie or story.

The biggest 10 movies of the year 2013-14 were all adaptations. None of them were original. The highest grossing original in the time period were Avatar, Up, Cars, Inception, The Hangover and Gravity.

The Top 10 Worst Movies of 2020.

  1. The Last Days of American Crime.
  2. Blum House’s Fantasy Island
  3. Tax Collector
  4. Dolittle
  5. Songbird
  6. Jiu Jutsu
  7. Force of Nature
  8. Brahms: The boy 2
  9. Half Brothers
  10. Artemis Fowl