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You're not helping your argument though. Those were great films, however, they were niche. 'Superbad' was a big, hollywood thing. A cultural touchstone that w

You're not helping your argument though. Those were great films, however, they were niche. 'Superbad' was a big, hollywood thing. A cultural touchstone that we remember, make jokes about, memes. Very few people ever saw Booskmart or The Death of Stalin. The Globalization of Hollywood - and increased cultural sensitivities have changed this. Comedy doesn't cross borders as well as Thor. Without going into details, cultural sensitivities and fear of Twitter mobs is a 'fundamental' issue. It's not a side issue it's a primary driver. Have a listen to the podcasts and talks by various comedy writers, you can see the evolution. People with power have their knives out to destroy others - some of them obviously need to be cancelled, and some others raise some questions, but there are very, very few left with the power to make the jokes they want. Everyone else has to kowtow in fear. Comedy requires 'absolute safe spaces' in order to work, particularly writers rooms, which, if we could record what they say ... my god we'd all be offended. I'm hoping that this will just be a 'phase' but I'm afraid it may not be as the issues overlay with ostensibly historical issues of social justice, and as soon as we broach that domain, everything becomes deadly serious and we all act like good corporate citizens. It may very well take an established 'provider' like a different kind of Netflix with a different set of sensibilities. Edit: listen to Tina Fey and Judd Apatow podcasts and less public interviews, they hint at the shift while being very polite about it.

pdpi 5y ago
Death of Stalin, Booksmart, Jojo Rabbit are definitely smaller independent comedies, but compare: The Artist: $130M gross, $15M budget Knives Out: $311M gross, $40M budget Birdman: $100M gross, $18M budget Grand Budapest: $173M gross, $25M budget Midnight in Paris: $154M gross, $17M budget Superbad: $170M gross, $20M budget All of those are in the same rough ballpark, but Superbad had 70% of its box office revenue in the US+Canada. Compare Grand Budapest and Birdman, which only saw 40% of their takings in NA. Midnight in Paris comes in at 37%, and, as a European production, The Artist saw only 35%-ish of its revenue in NA. Even Knives Out, the most hollywood-y of the lot, came in at 53% revenue from NA. Superbad is a Hollywood movie with Hollywood sensibilities, so it obviously performed best in the US, and it's obviously become a cultual touchstone there — but I personally only even heard about it relatively recently. All the other films performed much better elsewhere so obviously don't seem to have had as much of a cultural impact from a US-centric perspective.
- jollybean 5y ago
  I don't understand what point you are making? 1) Superbad was sleeper hit - it did well in the theatres but far better in the long run. It launched a bunch of careers into the mainstream. It's also a broad comedy. It was no more or less 'Hollywood' than the films you listed. 2) The films you listed are mostly Oscar Winners - which get a massive, global boost from that kind of exposure. They're also 100% 'artsy' kind of comedies made by highly respected auteurs - they're not broad comedies like Airplane or Animal House (or Superbad). 3) They're also mostly from the 2000's era, in which the general point is being made about 'challenging to make comedies' these days. 4) I don't think the box office differential rally helps that much as conceivably Superbad is going to naturally appeal a little bit more to North American audiences for the reasons you stated. Here is a Hollywood reporter take on it [1] the decline of comedy is not a controversial idea. "It’s been a decade since any comedy launched a blockbuster franchise. " "The studios have backed away from comedies, just as they have mid-budget dramas, perceiving both as far harder to sell than tentpoles. " "Even a comedy superstar like Will Ferrell has had trouble getting movies made. “It’s becoming a little finicky,” he told the podcast Armchair Expert in early June. “I’ve recently come across things where I thought, ‘Boy, what a great idea,’ and went around town and everyone just went, ‘Nope.’ “" ... [1] https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/general-news/comedy-box-office-dwindles-but-is-netflix-blame-1219121/ https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/general-news/comedy-b...
  - ryandrake 5y ago
    Comedy is way too broadly defined. Maybe my definition of comedy is too narrow, but I at least expect to laugh out loud during a comedy once in a while. Too many comedies lately just reach for the "cynicism" and "dark comedy" tools rather than genuinely make you laugh. Another thread put it better: We need more slapstick. We need more irreverence. We need a modern Mel Brooks or David Zucker / Leslie Nielsen combo to come back and show moviegoers how to totally run out of breath laughing again. Be able to poke fun at people, or companies, or institutions, or at least something outside of politics, and not worry so much about the Twitter mob sharpening their knives.
    - 5y ago
runarberg 5y ago
> there are very, very few left with the power to make the jokes they want. I guess Spike Lee (Blackkklansman, 2018), Boots Riley (Sorry to Bother You, 2018), Taika Waititi (Jojo Rabbit, 2019), etc. are one of the few people left with the power to make the jokes they want. Or are those not the kinds of jokes you were thinking about? (TW: next paragraph) I get the sense that you are simply wrong about this. I don’t know of any examples where a good comedy was ‘cancelled’ because of a twitter mob. If you are afraid that the era of the prison rape joke is over, then I hate to brake it to you, that joke was never funny, and even if it was, it certainly isn’t any more[1]. 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uc6QxD2_yQw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uc6QxD2_yQw
mezentius 5y ago
You should not be downvoted for this—you are correct. These are exactly the conversations that film executives are having internally, especially on the buying side. They don’t see it as a Twitter thing entirely, but as an engagement with the social “conversation” and the realities of the marketplace. However, the incentives are primarily fear-based. Why court the risk of a backlash when you could develop something else (they think)?

pdpi 5y ago

Death of Stalin, Booksmart, Jojo Rabbit are definitely smaller independent comedies, but compare: The Artist: $130M gross, $15M budget Knives Out: $311M gross, $40M budget Birdman: $100M gross, $18M budget Grand Budapest: $173M gross, $25M budget Midnight in Paris: $154M gross, $17M budget Superbad: $170M gross, $20M budget All of those are in the same rough ballpark, but Superbad had 70% of its box office revenue in the US+Canada. Compare Grand Budapest and Birdman, which only saw 40% of their takings in NA. Midnight in Paris comes in at 37%, and, as a European production, The Artist saw only 35%-ish of its revenue in NA. Even Knives Out, the most hollywood-y of the lot, came in at 53% revenue from NA. Superbad is a Hollywood movie with Hollywood sensibilities, so it obviously performed best in the US, and it's obviously become a cultual touchstone there — but I personally only even heard about it relatively recently. All the other films performed much better elsewhere so obviously don't seem to have had as much of a cultural impact from a US-centric perspective.

jollybean 5y ago
I don't understand what point you are making? 1) Superbad was sleeper hit - it did well in the theatres but far better in the long run. It launched a bunch of careers into the mainstream. It's also a broad comedy. It was no more or less 'Hollywood' than the films you listed. 2) The films you listed are mostly Oscar Winners - which get a massive, global boost from that kind of exposure. They're also 100% 'artsy' kind of comedies made by highly respected auteurs - they're not broad comedies like Airplane or Animal House (or Superbad). 3) They're also mostly from the 2000's era, in which the general point is being made about 'challenging to make comedies' these days. 4) I don't think the box office differential rally helps that much as conceivably Superbad is going to naturally appeal a little bit more to North American audiences for the reasons you stated. Here is a Hollywood reporter take on it [1] the decline of comedy is not a controversial idea. "It’s been a decade since any comedy launched a blockbuster franchise. " "The studios have backed away from comedies, just as they have mid-budget dramas, perceiving both as far harder to sell than tentpoles. " "Even a comedy superstar like Will Ferrell has had trouble getting movies made. “It’s becoming a little finicky,” he told the podcast Armchair Expert in early June. “I’ve recently come across things where I thought, ‘Boy, what a great idea,’ and went around town and everyone just went, ‘Nope.’ “" ... [1] https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/general-news/comedy-box-office-dwindles-but-is-netflix-blame-1219121/ https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/general-news/comedy-b...
- ryandrake 5y ago
  Comedy is way too broadly defined. Maybe my definition of comedy is too narrow, but I at least expect to laugh out loud during a comedy once in a while. Too many comedies lately just reach for the "cynicism" and "dark comedy" tools rather than genuinely make you laugh. Another thread put it better: We need more slapstick. We need more irreverence. We need a modern Mel Brooks or David Zucker / Leslie Nielsen combo to come back and show moviegoers how to totally run out of breath laughing again. Be able to poke fun at people, or companies, or institutions, or at least something outside of politics, and not worry so much about the Twitter mob sharpening their knives.
  - 5y ago

runarberg 5y ago

> there are very, very few left with the power to make the jokes they want. I guess Spike Lee (Blackkklansman, 2018), Boots Riley (Sorry to Bother You, 2018), Taika Waititi (Jojo Rabbit, 2019), etc. are one of the few people left with the power to make the jokes they want. Or are those not the kinds of jokes you were thinking about? (TW: next paragraph) I get the sense that you are simply wrong about this. I don’t know of any examples where a good comedy was ‘cancelled’ because of a twitter mob. If you are afraid that the era of the prison rape joke is over, then I hate to brake it to you, that joke was never funny, and even if it was, it certainly isn’t any more[1]. 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uc6QxD2_yQw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uc6QxD2_yQw

mezentius 5y ago

You should not be downvoted for this—you are correct. These are exactly the conversations that film executives are having internally, especially on the buying side. They don’t see it as a Twitter thing entirely, but as an engagement with the social “conversation” and the realities of the marketplace. However, the incentives are primarily fear-based. Why court the risk of a backlash when you could develop something else (they think)?