5 ms·

They should make less expensive movies, than. Hundreds of millions of dollars for less than 2 hours of content is absolutely ridiculous, as are the wages paid t

They should make less expensive movies, than. Hundreds of millions of dollars for less than 2 hours of content is absolutely ridiculous, as are the wages paid to these so-called "celebrities" in them. Big movie business needs to die, and fast.

rayiner 8y ago
People want the big, expensive movies with big-name actors. How do we know that? Because that's what they pay for. That's the competitive market at work. With modern technology, digital cameras, digital editing, and digital distribution, you can make movies for a fraction of the price of Hollywood blockbusters. There's no barriers to entry stopping you from distributing your low-budget movies to hundreds of millions of people via Youtube, etc. But nobody wants to watch that indie crap. They want $250 million MCU blockbusters. Indeed, you're seeing the push towards higher production values in TV too. Low-budget weekly shows are being replaced by high-budget "prestige TV." Back in the day, "Lost" was expensive (for a new show with an unknown cast) at $3-4 million per episode. Today, Netflix and Amazon are blowing $50-150 million to pre-shoot an entire season of shows like House of Cards, the Crown, Altered Carbon, etc. And at the end of the day, it's all just entertainment. The market is structured to give people what they want, what's wrong with that?
yodon 8y ago
Entertainment is a hit driven industry where the returns are highly nonlinear and the increase in return (whether measured in viewership, popularity, or dollars) goes up dramatically as you move up the success curve. Audiences have demonstrated without question that they prefer bigger movies (yes, I know, my big fat Greek wedding and Clerks, these are six sigma outliers that are fun to talk about precisely because they are outliers). The people who make films make them (gasp) to make money, because if their films don't make money they can't raise the money to make another one and they want to make more than one. They need to raise money because no one wants to see a film shot on a $6 budget, and no one wants to invest all that time and creative energy in a film no one will want to watch.
- KozmoNau7 8y ago
  Some of my favorite movies were made on small budgets, such as most classic horror and splatter films. For a newer example, Primer was made on a tiny budget and it's great. I like films that aren't just yet another CGI blowout, and I'm not alone. Big budget cinema could die off today, and we would be better off.
  - rayiner 8y ago
    Better off by what metric? Nothing is stopping people from making and watching small budget movies. They just choose not to. The last movie I watched was Venom. $100 million budget. I thought it was awesome. If you could get everyone who watched Venom opening day to pay $1 you could shoot and distribute a real movie using modern technology. But those people don’t want to watch your $1 movie, they would rather pay $14 to watch Venom. You may not be alone in preferring small budget movies, but you’re clearly in a small minority.
    - KozmoNau7 8y ago
      Better off as in less focus on pointless bling and spectacle, more focus on storytelling and creativity.
tptacek 8y ago
They do make less expensive movies, and good ones, at that. They fail in competition in the marketplace.
harryh 8y ago
They do make less expensive movies. Lots of them. When GP said "I'm again left choosing between movies I don't really want to see" those are the movies he was talking about.

rayiner 8y ago

People want the big, expensive movies with big-name actors. How do we know that? Because that's what they pay for. That's the competitive market at work. With modern technology, digital cameras, digital editing, and digital distribution, you can make movies for a fraction of the price of Hollywood blockbusters. There's no barriers to entry stopping you from distributing your low-budget movies to hundreds of millions of people via Youtube, etc. But nobody wants to watch that indie crap. They want $250 million MCU blockbusters. Indeed, you're seeing the push towards higher production values in TV too. Low-budget weekly shows are being replaced by high-budget "prestige TV." Back in the day, "Lost" was expensive (for a new show with an unknown cast) at $3-4 million per episode. Today, Netflix and Amazon are blowing $50-150 million to pre-shoot an entire season of shows like House of Cards, the Crown, Altered Carbon, etc. And at the end of the day, it's all just entertainment. The market is structured to give people what they want, what's wrong with that?

yodon 8y ago

Entertainment is a hit driven industry where the returns are highly nonlinear and the increase in return (whether measured in viewership, popularity, or dollars) goes up dramatically as you move up the success curve. Audiences have demonstrated without question that they prefer bigger movies (yes, I know, my big fat Greek wedding and Clerks, these are six sigma outliers that are fun to talk about precisely because they are outliers). The people who make films make them (gasp) to make money, because if their films don't make money they can't raise the money to make another one and they want to make more than one. They need to raise money because no one wants to see a film shot on a $6 budget, and no one wants to invest all that time and creative energy in a film no one will want to watch.

KozmoNau7 8y ago
Some of my favorite movies were made on small budgets, such as most classic horror and splatter films. For a newer example, Primer was made on a tiny budget and it's great. I like films that aren't just yet another CGI blowout, and I'm not alone. Big budget cinema could die off today, and we would be better off.
- rayiner 8y ago
  Better off by what metric? Nothing is stopping people from making and watching small budget movies. They just choose not to. The last movie I watched was Venom. $100 million budget. I thought it was awesome. If you could get everyone who watched Venom opening day to pay $1 you could shoot and distribute a real movie using modern technology. But those people don’t want to watch your $1 movie, they would rather pay $14 to watch Venom. You may not be alone in preferring small budget movies, but you’re clearly in a small minority.
  - KozmoNau7 8y ago
    Better off as in less focus on pointless bling and spectacle, more focus on storytelling and creativity.

tptacek 8y ago

They do make less expensive movies, and good ones, at that. They fail in competition in the marketplace.

harryh 8y ago

They do make less expensive movies. Lots of them. When GP said "I'm again left choosing between movies I don't really want to see" those are the movies he was talking about.