7 ms·

> everyday people are catching on to the fact that they're just being resold the same stuff they've already bought. But Hollywood have always done this - recyc

by goto11 7y ago

> everyday people are catching on to the fact that they're just being resold the same stuff they've already bought. But Hollywood have always done this - recycling old ideas in new wrapping. And Hollywood have always been criticized for being vapid entertainment, empty spectacle etc. "catching on to the fact" suggest that this is some secret insight which undermines the enjoyment of the movie. But I'm pretty sure most people who goes to the Disney remakes go because it is remakes of movies they already know and love. They want to see the same thing in a new way. According to Wikipedia, Aladdin grossed "$923.7 million, against a production budget of $183 million". So despite you and your nephew, Disney seem to manage OK. Hollywood does have problem, but it is not due to lack of originality. Hollywood produces plenty of original stories still, but it is the remakes and franchises which grosses the most. Because the consumers likes this stuff.

magduf 7y ago
>But Hollywood have always done this - recycling old ideas in new wrapping. Yes, but I think it's safe to say that there were a lot more original movies a few decades ago than there are now. Hollywood used to take more risks. >According to Wikipedia, Aladdin grossed "$923.7 million, against a production budget of $183 million". So despite you and your nephew, Disney seem to manage OK. Exactly. People are bemoaning the current state of Hollywood, but it's extremely profitable, and that's all that really matters to them. There's no shortage of paying customers willing to see the latest sequel/prequel/remake/reboot. Sure, they might lose a few ticket sales from people like me and this OP and his nephew, but it's more than made up for by countless others who just don't care and want entertainment. And yes, they might make more profit on a really great original movie (like the original Star Wars in 1977), but that's also a big risk and it might flop and be a giant loss, so they tend to shy away from such things now and make safer movies that have an almost guaranteed profit, even if it isn't as much.
- BurningCycles 7y ago
  Just to be clear, out of the gross $920 million, Disney get ~50%, and the production budget of $180 million does not include advertising/promotion which is reportedly in the range of $50-100 million for big releases such as this. That said it's still making good money and will make even more after the box office run.
- liber8 7y ago
  "Hollywood" has never, ever taken more risks than they are taking today. Netflix alone spent $12 billion on new content in 2018. They expect to spend $15 billion in 2019, and expect this to hit almost $18 billion in 2020.[1] There is more new, original content being produced than anyone could ever expect to watch in one lifetime. Compare this to a few decades ago when you had 3 or 4 networks on TV each making a dozen or so shows each year, and a handful of studios producing movies (many of them remakes from the 30s, 40s, and 50s). Everyone seems to view "Hollywood" with rose colored glasses. The medium through which people consume entertainment certainly seems like it is starting to change, but that doesn't mean "Hollywood" is dead or dying. The exact opposite is happening. [1] https://variety.com/2019/digital/news/netflix-content-spending-2019-15-billion-1203112090/ https://variety.com/2019/digital/news/netflix-content-spendi...
  - ravenstine 7y ago
    What are we defining as "Hollywood" here? Is Netflix really considered the same thing as the studios that produce the blockbusters?
    - jedberg 7y ago
      They share the same offices and employees move back and forth between them, so yeah, I'd say they're the same.
    - liber8 7y ago
      Your statement begs the question. The OP said "Hollywood" doesn't produce as much original content as it did decades ago. When I point out that there is more original content being created today than ever (probably on the order of several magnitudes) simply because it's cheaper than ever to produce original content, the only thing you mention is "blockbusters". Clearly, the production of blockbusters has nothing to do with the amount of original content being created. Why differentiate Netflix from the rest of "Hollywood"? (Remember, Netflix won an Oscar last year.) For that matter, why overlook the dozens of smaller or independent shops that are producing original content in staggering amounts, regardless of how that content is being distributed? But, if you want to talk about more traditional blockbusters, Netflix makes plenty of those (arguably more than many traditional studios).
- majormajor 7y ago
  > Yes, but I think it's safe to say that there were a lot more original movies a few decades ago than there are now. Hollywood used to take more risks. It's harder to get people to go to the theater due to a bunch of factors like improved TV tech and increased competition for time, but "hollywood" is also capitalizing on those things. Look at how many original series are on Amazon, Hulu, Netflix, etc, and compare that to what we had 30 years ago between theaters and TV.
  - scarface74 7y ago
    Not according to the numbers. https://www.boxofficemojo.com/yearly/?view2=ytdcompare https://www.boxofficemojo.com/yearly/?view2=ytdcompare
    - TylerE 7y ago
      That doesn't take inflation into account though. You'd expect it to go up 3-4% in $ terms even if sales were the same. That the number is actually flat over the last 4 years does mean sales are down a bit. The $6.05B 2016 figure would be about $6.45B in 2019 dollars. Box office trends have been shifting over the last decade or so... the big blockbusters (superhero movies especially) are bigger and bigger, but the mid-budget stuff that was a mainstay of the 90s and early 2000s (think stuff like Will Ferrell and Adam Sandler movies) is getting squeezed pretty hard. To give one look at the distribution.... last year the 100th best performing movie did ($21.7M / $700M) = 3.1% of the #1 movie. In 2010, ($26.5M / $415M) = 6.38% In 2000, ($18.7M / 260M) = 7.19%
- goto11 7y ago
  > I think it's safe to say that there were a lot more original movies a few decades ago This probably depends on your definition of original. Franchises dominates today, but lots of older movies are based on books or plays or are remakes of even older movies.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
- TylerE 7y ago
  > Yes, but I think it's safe to say that there were a lot more original movies a few decades ago than there are now. This is false. Sequels and book adaptions have dominated the top 10 every year for decades and decades.
  - mc32 7y ago
    Right. Movies don’t come out of thin air. They all need inspiration whether a book, a story, news item, etc. Its not writers making movie scripts ala SNL sketches.
    - icebraining 7y ago
      I'd say all art needs inspiration, but there are certainly plenty of screenplays (just like theater plays) that don't come from a single item. As a random example, Woody Allen came up with the title "Midnight in Paris", then wrote the whole screenplay from the title.
- WalterBright 7y ago
  I complained to Trekkie friend that nothing since Star Trek TOS has Star Trek been any good. He asked what evidence I had. I said the lack of quotable lines. I know a long list of TOS quotable lines, and exactly one from after ("KKKAAAAAAHHHHHNNNNNN!"). No quotable lines means the writing is crummy and the shows are not memorable. The same for Star Wars. Who quotes any lines from other than the first one? I stopped watching the SW new movies, too. Zzzzzz....
- JetSpiegel 7y ago
  > Yes, but I think it's safe to say that there were a lot more original movies a few decades ago than there are now. Hollywood used to take more risks. Casablanca was a remake of another Casablanca 10 years before, but I believe this previous Casablanca is now lost.
l33tbro 7y ago
>Hollywood produces plenty of original stories still I'd love to see you back this up with data in comparison to previous years. Even a cursory glance at opening weekends over the years on Box Office Mojo tells me you're misinformed.
- patrick5415 7y ago
  You’ve asked for hard data, and then make a contrary assertion for which you have no data either. No, glancing at a website periodically doesn’t count.
  - l33tbro 7y ago
    Conversely, you made a broad claim that runs contrary to popular consensus. Cursory glance or not, the onus is on you to back up your initial wild claim with a source. Regardless, are you really going to double-down on Hollywood producing more original stories than ever? Hollywood studios today are in the business of SASOR (sequels, adaptations, Spin-offs, Remakes). That is their primary business model. They may buy up an original productions at festivals like Sundance & SXSW, but that is only for distribution and a light spend on P&A.
    - patrick5415 7y ago
      I’m not the op. But I see you doubling down on your own claim, still without providing any data. What makes the op’s claim any more wild than your own? Why is the onus them, rather than you? You have presented no data to back up you claim that greater than 50% of people (popular consensus) believe Hollywood produces less original content than at some time in the past. Even if you did, the fact that most people believe something is distinct from that thing actually being true. For what it’s worth, my intuition says you’re right. But intuition is not data. Confirmation bias is real...
    - goto11 7y ago
      To even discuss this quantitatively, we have do define what "original" means. Is a movie based on a book, play, or comic original? What about a sequel with an original story but existing characters/universe?
closeparen 7y ago
An old story in a new telling and interpretation is a different thing from a remake.
JohnJamesRambo 7y ago
I can’t watch the original stuff they are making if it doesn’t come to my theater. My theater is a bunch of sequels and remakes, the Hollywood you are describing seems completely foreign to me in this era.
luckydata 7y ago
> But Hollywood have always done this - recycling old ideas in new wrapping. And Hollywood have always been criticized for being vapid entertainment, empty spectacle etc. Not to this degree. The last good year for movies was 1999. This is the list of major releases that year: The Matrix Fight Club The Sixth Sense Toy Story 2 The Green Mile American Beauty Being John Malkovic Office Space The Iron Giant Magnolia Austin Powers American Pie The Talented Mr. Ripley Eyes Wide Shut Dogma Galaxy Quest The Insider Notting Hill Man on the Moon Analyze This Detroit Rock City Mystery Men Bicentennial Man This is not even the entire list, just the ones I enjoyed and I'm bothering to type. You can't look at that list and honestly say nothing has changed, because it's just not true. The energy and creativity has clearly moved somewhere else, to TV and streaming services. This year alone there's two FANTASTIC shows, Chernobyl and Stranger Things S3 that definitely deserve praise.
- webwanderings 7y ago
  Good point. I think “Hollywood” got eaten up by globalization (China) and easy route of super hero movies all-the-time. The Disney’s and big studios alike have no patience to make money off of creativity. Why do we even need Toy Story 4 to begin with? And how many super hero movies one need to drive same points again and again?
- nappy 7y ago
  This is anecdotal to the point of being noise. How about comparing the top X grossing movies of 1999 vs. last year? Still subjective, but a step forward from "just the ones I enjoyed and I'm bothering to type" and two Netflix releases.
- fouc 7y ago
  That's almost 20 good new movies in 1 year. I feel like I have trouble finding 20 good new movies for the recent years.
- goto11 7y ago
  Why did you exclude the highest grossing film that year from the list? It seems you just selected the movies you thought helped you point. Movies among the top ten grossing which you left out of the list: - Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace - Tarzan - Big Daddy - The Mummy - Runaway Bride - The World Is Not Enough - The Blair Witch Project https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_1999_box_office_number-one_films_in_the_United_States#cite_note-2 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_1999_box_office_number... I do agree Hollywood is different today, but rehashing ideas is nothing new. The Godfather was a book. Twelve Angry Men was a play. Ben Hur (1956) was remake of Ben Hur (1925). All the songs in Singing in the Rain was recycled from previous movies. The Lion King was the first Disney animated movie with an original story (and even then people say it was plagiarized from Kimba). As for TV shows and made-for-streaming, do you exclude this from Hollywood? It is increasingly the same talent writing producing and acting, so it is more a question of format and distribution.
Retra 7y ago
>According to Wikipedia, Aladdin grossed "$923.7 million, against a production budget of $183 million". So despite you and your nephew, Disney seem to manage OK. That's not an objective way to look at things. If there were only 1 model of car being sold this year, you can bet it will sell with record numbers and produce more profit than any other vehicle in the past. The fact that records are being broken so rapidly is a bad thing; it means there's very few films worth watching, so everyone is going out to see the same thing.
- goto11 7y ago
  But the number of movies released has been steadily growing, not shrinking.
  - Retra 7y ago
    "Released" isn't really important; "marketed and/or advertised" is.
NeedMoreTea 7y ago
Originality? Hah! Even remaking Frankenstein every 20 years or so brought a new take to it, whether Boris Karloff, Bela Lugosi or Robert de Nero, they all brought something new. More than any point I can remember before Hollywood now turn every movie and remake into the exact same movie. There was always some degree of fashion, but there's no contrast any more - it's all highlight, so it drags and drags by being boring and samey (but loud). Highlight is now just the dull background. The loudness wars, movie edition. Doesn't matter what it is, a current film (or Netflix high budget, Game of Thrones etc) will have: + An absurdly overblown inspirational speech inspiring the troops (or children, or escapees, or office colleagues)! This will take 5-10 ear-bleeding, cringing minutes. If unlucky, you'll get two or three of these in one show! + An absurdly artificial, but highly 3D friendly chase scene with no production value other than hype. This will take 5-15 minutes. It stopped being interesting after Blues Brothers' piss take of chase scenes! + Ditto, ditto fight scene. Super slow motion. I always think of Adam West's TV Batman, complete with music - Zap! Pow! OWWW! Biff! 300 enemies die, town levelled, 342,000 rounds of ammunition spent, hero hasn't broken sweat. Just about the only recent exceptions I can think of are Deadpool and Sin City. Damn, the sequels were disappointing. + Ditto, ditto villain's death or capture. I wait for them to land on Netflix, then go make tea, tidy the kitchen or watch some paint dry in all those "highlights". Independents with next to no budget can still do original though.
- goto11 7y ago
  This is getting close to "all the new music is crap and sounds alike, the music when I was young and impressive was much better". Every generation says that, regardless of when they were born. Maybe those older movies just didn't seem so derivative to you because it was new to you then?
  - NeedMoreTea 7y ago
    It was interesting from 50+ years before I was born, through B&W B movies of the 50s, to maybe early 00s. Independent movies don't have the same absurd tendencies, and often still have lots of contrasts. Sure, some of those are just poor too. Independents have changed too, but haven't magically ended up with the same framework every time. Hollywood didn't used to. There were always derivatives, themes, fashions, but without dull homogeneity. Too much chasing what sells, I have no idea why, but it seems to have reached self parody with succession of predictable remakes that add the standards and take away what made the original interesting in the first place. e.g. Total Recall I still regularly find new bands and music. shrug.

by goto11 7y ago

magduf 7y ago

>But Hollywood have always done this - recycling old ideas in new wrapping. Yes, but I think it's safe to say that there were a lot more original movies a few decades ago than there are now. Hollywood used to take more risks. >According to Wikipedia, Aladdin grossed "$923.7 million, against a production budget of $183 million". So despite you and your nephew, Disney seem to manage OK. Exactly. People are bemoaning the current state of Hollywood, but it's extremely profitable, and that's all that really matters to them. There's no shortage of paying customers willing to see the latest sequel/prequel/remake/reboot. Sure, they might lose a few ticket sales from people like me and this OP and his nephew, but it's more than made up for by countless others who just don't care and want entertainment. And yes, they might make more profit on a really great original movie (like the original Star Wars in 1977), but that's also a big risk and it might flop and be a giant loss, so they tend to shy away from such things now and make safer movies that have an almost guaranteed profit, even if it isn't as much.

BurningCycles 7y ago
Just to be clear, out of the gross $920 million, Disney get ~50%, and the production budget of $180 million does not include advertising/promotion which is reportedly in the range of $50-100 million for big releases such as this. That said it's still making good money and will make even more after the box office run.
liber8 7y ago
"Hollywood" has never, ever taken more risks than they are taking today. Netflix alone spent $12 billion on new content in 2018. They expect to spend $15 billion in 2019, and expect this to hit almost $18 billion in 2020.[1] There is more new, original content being produced than anyone could ever expect to watch in one lifetime. Compare this to a few decades ago when you had 3 or 4 networks on TV each making a dozen or so shows each year, and a handful of studios producing movies (many of them remakes from the 30s, 40s, and 50s). Everyone seems to view "Hollywood" with rose colored glasses. The medium through which people consume entertainment certainly seems like it is starting to change, but that doesn't mean "Hollywood" is dead or dying. The exact opposite is happening. [1] https://variety.com/2019/digital/news/netflix-content-spending-2019-15-billion-1203112090/ https://variety.com/2019/digital/news/netflix-content-spendi...
- ravenstine 7y ago
  What are we defining as "Hollywood" here? Is Netflix really considered the same thing as the studios that produce the blockbusters?
  - jedberg 7y ago
    They share the same offices and employees move back and forth between them, so yeah, I'd say they're the same.
  - liber8 7y ago
    Your statement begs the question. The OP said "Hollywood" doesn't produce as much original content as it did decades ago. When I point out that there is more original content being created today than ever (probably on the order of several magnitudes) simply because it's cheaper than ever to produce original content, the only thing you mention is "blockbusters". Clearly, the production of blockbusters has nothing to do with the amount of original content being created. Why differentiate Netflix from the rest of "Hollywood"? (Remember, Netflix won an Oscar last year.) For that matter, why overlook the dozens of smaller or independent shops that are producing original content in staggering amounts, regardless of how that content is being distributed? But, if you want to talk about more traditional blockbusters, Netflix makes plenty of those (arguably more than many traditional studios).
majormajor 7y ago
> Yes, but I think it's safe to say that there were a lot more original movies a few decades ago than there are now. Hollywood used to take more risks. It's harder to get people to go to the theater due to a bunch of factors like improved TV tech and increased competition for time, but "hollywood" is also capitalizing on those things. Look at how many original series are on Amazon, Hulu, Netflix, etc, and compare that to what we had 30 years ago between theaters and TV.
- scarface74 7y ago
  Not according to the numbers. https://www.boxofficemojo.com/yearly/?view2=ytdcompare https://www.boxofficemojo.com/yearly/?view2=ytdcompare
  - TylerE 7y ago
    That doesn't take inflation into account though. You'd expect it to go up 3-4% in $ terms even if sales were the same. That the number is actually flat over the last 4 years does mean sales are down a bit. The $6.05B 2016 figure would be about $6.45B in 2019 dollars. Box office trends have been shifting over the last decade or so... the big blockbusters (superhero movies especially) are bigger and bigger, but the mid-budget stuff that was a mainstay of the 90s and early 2000s (think stuff like Will Ferrell and Adam Sandler movies) is getting squeezed pretty hard. To give one look at the distribution.... last year the 100th best performing movie did ($21.7M / $700M) = 3.1% of the #1 movie. In 2010, ($26.5M / $415M) = 6.38% In 2000, ($18.7M / 260M) = 7.19%
goto11 7y ago
> I think it's safe to say that there were a lot more original movies a few decades ago This probably depends on your definition of original. Franchises dominates today, but lots of older movies are based on books or plays or are remakes of even older movies.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
TylerE 7y ago
> Yes, but I think it's safe to say that there were a lot more original movies a few decades ago than there are now. This is false. Sequels and book adaptions have dominated the top 10 every year for decades and decades.
- mc32 7y ago
  Right. Movies don’t come out of thin air. They all need inspiration whether a book, a story, news item, etc. Its not writers making movie scripts ala SNL sketches.
  - icebraining 7y ago
    I'd say all art needs inspiration, but there are certainly plenty of screenplays (just like theater plays) that don't come from a single item. As a random example, Woody Allen came up with the title "Midnight in Paris", then wrote the whole screenplay from the title.
WalterBright 7y ago
I complained to Trekkie friend that nothing since Star Trek TOS has Star Trek been any good. He asked what evidence I had. I said the lack of quotable lines. I know a long list of TOS quotable lines, and exactly one from after ("KKKAAAAAAHHHHHNNNNNN!"). No quotable lines means the writing is crummy and the shows are not memorable. The same for Star Wars. Who quotes any lines from other than the first one? I stopped watching the SW new movies, too. Zzzzzz....
JetSpiegel 7y ago
> Yes, but I think it's safe to say that there were a lot more original movies a few decades ago than there are now. Hollywood used to take more risks. Casablanca was a remake of another Casablanca 10 years before, but I believe this previous Casablanca is now lost.

l33tbro 7y ago

>Hollywood produces plenty of original stories still I'd love to see you back this up with data in comparison to previous years. Even a cursory glance at opening weekends over the years on Box Office Mojo tells me you're misinformed.

patrick5415 7y ago
You’ve asked for hard data, and then make a contrary assertion for which you have no data either. No, glancing at a website periodically doesn’t count.
- l33tbro 7y ago
  Conversely, you made a broad claim that runs contrary to popular consensus. Cursory glance or not, the onus is on you to back up your initial wild claim with a source. Regardless, are you really going to double-down on Hollywood producing more original stories than ever? Hollywood studios today are in the business of SASOR (sequels, adaptations, Spin-offs, Remakes). That is their primary business model. They may buy up an original productions at festivals like Sundance & SXSW, but that is only for distribution and a light spend on P&A.
  - patrick5415 7y ago
    I’m not the op. But I see you doubling down on your own claim, still without providing any data. What makes the op’s claim any more wild than your own? Why is the onus them, rather than you? You have presented no data to back up you claim that greater than 50% of people (popular consensus) believe Hollywood produces less original content than at some time in the past. Even if you did, the fact that most people believe something is distinct from that thing actually being true. For what it’s worth, my intuition says you’re right. But intuition is not data. Confirmation bias is real...
  - goto11 7y ago
    To even discuss this quantitatively, we have do define what "original" means. Is a movie based on a book, play, or comic original? What about a sequel with an original story but existing characters/universe?

closeparen 7y ago

An old story in a new telling and interpretation is a different thing from a remake.

JohnJamesRambo 7y ago

I can’t watch the original stuff they are making if it doesn’t come to my theater. My theater is a bunch of sequels and remakes, the Hollywood you are describing seems completely foreign to me in this era.

luckydata 7y ago

> But Hollywood have always done this - recycling old ideas in new wrapping. And Hollywood have always been criticized for being vapid entertainment, empty spectacle etc. Not to this degree. The last good year for movies was 1999. This is the list of major releases that year: The Matrix Fight Club The Sixth Sense Toy Story 2 The Green Mile American Beauty Being John Malkovic Office Space The Iron Giant Magnolia Austin Powers American Pie The Talented Mr. Ripley Eyes Wide Shut Dogma Galaxy Quest The Insider Notting Hill Man on the Moon Analyze This Detroit Rock City Mystery Men Bicentennial Man This is not even the entire list, just the ones I enjoyed and I'm bothering to type. You can't look at that list and honestly say nothing has changed, because it's just not true. The energy and creativity has clearly moved somewhere else, to TV and streaming services. This year alone there's two FANTASTIC shows, Chernobyl and Stranger Things S3 that definitely deserve praise.

webwanderings 7y ago
Good point. I think “Hollywood” got eaten up by globalization (China) and easy route of super hero movies all-the-time. The Disney’s and big studios alike have no patience to make money off of creativity. Why do we even need Toy Story 4 to begin with? And how many super hero movies one need to drive same points again and again?
nappy 7y ago
This is anecdotal to the point of being noise. How about comparing the top X grossing movies of 1999 vs. last year? Still subjective, but a step forward from "just the ones I enjoyed and I'm bothering to type" and two Netflix releases.
fouc 7y ago
That's almost 20 good new movies in 1 year. I feel like I have trouble finding 20 good new movies for the recent years.
goto11 7y ago
Why did you exclude the highest grossing film that year from the list? It seems you just selected the movies you thought helped you point. Movies among the top ten grossing which you left out of the list: - Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace - Tarzan - Big Daddy - The Mummy - Runaway Bride - The World Is Not Enough - The Blair Witch Project https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_1999_box_office_number-one_films_in_the_United_States#cite_note-2 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_1999_box_office_number... I do agree Hollywood is different today, but rehashing ideas is nothing new. The Godfather was a book. Twelve Angry Men was a play. Ben Hur (1956) was remake of Ben Hur (1925). All the songs in Singing in the Rain was recycled from previous movies. The Lion King was the first Disney animated movie with an original story (and even then people say it was plagiarized from Kimba). As for TV shows and made-for-streaming, do you exclude this from Hollywood? It is increasingly the same talent writing producing and acting, so it is more a question of format and distribution.

Retra 7y ago

>According to Wikipedia, Aladdin grossed "$923.7 million, against a production budget of $183 million". So despite you and your nephew, Disney seem to manage OK. That's not an objective way to look at things. If there were only 1 model of car being sold this year, you can bet it will sell with record numbers and produce more profit than any other vehicle in the past. The fact that records are being broken so rapidly is a bad thing; it means there's very few films worth watching, so everyone is going out to see the same thing.

goto11 7y ago
But the number of movies released has been steadily growing, not shrinking.
- Retra 7y ago
  "Released" isn't really important; "marketed and/or advertised" is.

NeedMoreTea 7y ago

Originality? Hah! Even remaking Frankenstein every 20 years or so brought a new take to it, whether Boris Karloff, Bela Lugosi or Robert de Nero, they all brought something new. More than any point I can remember before Hollywood now turn every movie and remake into the exact same movie. There was always some degree of fashion, but there's no contrast any more - it's all highlight, so it drags and drags by being boring and samey (but loud). Highlight is now just the dull background. The loudness wars, movie edition. Doesn't matter what it is, a current film (or Netflix high budget, Game of Thrones etc) will have: + An absurdly overblown inspirational speech inspiring the troops (or children, or escapees, or office colleagues)! This will take 5-10 ear-bleeding, cringing minutes. If unlucky, you'll get two or three of these in one show! + An absurdly artificial, but highly 3D friendly chase scene with no production value other than hype. This will take 5-15 minutes. It stopped being interesting after Blues Brothers' piss take of chase scenes! + Ditto, ditto fight scene. Super slow motion. I always think of Adam West's TV Batman, complete with music - Zap! Pow! OWWW! Biff! 300 enemies die, town levelled, 342,000 rounds of ammunition spent, hero hasn't broken sweat. Just about the only recent exceptions I can think of are Deadpool and Sin City. Damn, the sequels were disappointing. + Ditto, ditto villain's death or capture. I wait for them to land on Netflix, then go make tea, tidy the kitchen or watch some paint dry in all those "highlights". Independents with next to no budget can still do original though.

goto11 7y ago
This is getting close to "all the new music is crap and sounds alike, the music when I was young and impressive was much better". Every generation says that, regardless of when they were born. Maybe those older movies just didn't seem so derivative to you because it was new to you then?
- NeedMoreTea 7y ago
  It was interesting from 50+ years before I was born, through B&W B movies of the 50s, to maybe early 00s. Independent movies don't have the same absurd tendencies, and often still have lots of contrasts. Sure, some of those are just poor too. Independents have changed too, but haven't magically ended up with the same framework every time. Hollywood didn't used to. There were always derivatives, themes, fashions, but without dull homogeneity. Too much chasing what sells, I have no idea why, but it seems to have reached self parody with succession of predictable remakes that add the standards and take away what made the original interesting in the first place. e.g. Total Recall I still regularly find new bands and music. shrug.