4 ms·

My 2c: They should stop concentrating on appealing to the broadest audience. Formulaic heros' journeys, franchises, predictable characters acted by the same nar

My 2c: They should stop concentrating on appealing to the broadest audience. Formulaic heros' journeys, franchises, predictable characters acted by the same narrow set of the the most-attractive people etc. Safety and mass-market appeal over creativity. For contrast: Books, non-AAA video games, and movies from smaller studios still produce high-quality, creative efforts I continue to be excited about. Big-budget movies (and games), and Netflix shows are mostly bottom-feeder stuff.

cyanydeez 7mo ago
not appealing to the masses is DEI; perfect robotic formula are just common sense. Obviously.
- groundzeros2015 7mo ago
  Are you sure? I thought DEI is making a movie for everyone with one representative from each major ethnic group and then saying only safe non-cultural things. Oh and then localizing for china.
xp84 7mo ago
I think it’s the finance people. They have decided every creative movie made represents resources and time that can’t be used for a “sure-thing” franchise schlock movie.
- embedding-shape 7mo ago
  "Data-driven" decisions seems to drive out any sort of creativity, seems to happen in all industries where metrics and numbers become more important that someone's vision. Same in software too really.
echelon 7mo ago
- Theatrical releases are how movies make most of their money, not giving them away for free on streaming. Box office margins are huge, but renting licenses to streamers is limited and fungible with all the other mountains of content they license. - Box office optimizes for novelty, streamers optimize for "don't churn" - very different criteria for investment. - Disney cannibalized the box office with Marvel Star Wars, which killed the mid market and killed innovation. This is your point. Disney's success and tentpole successes in general killed innovation and diversity and made the market more winner-takes-all. Comedy movies barely exist anymore. There are few $50-75M films now. Little original content. Now films are engineered for maximum audience penetration and maximum box office revenue. This changes how films are written and who they are written for. The answer is "everyone", and that means "safe", "predictable", and "repeatable". No gambles. Everything else has to fight for table scraps. - End of ZIRP puts us back in 2000. Money used to be free. Now it's expensive. It's not as easy to underwrite productions anymore. Less innovation. - Dopamine machines fit into your pocket and suck up time and attention. Gaming is also huge now. Less people going to the movies because plenty of alternatives exist. - The $400 80'' plus Netflix versus the expensive theater, concessions, and rude people have made theaters unattractive. Theaters are where film margins come from. Without that revenue, expensive movies will be scaled back. - Labor costs less in Europe and Asia, even with ample tax subsidy. The LA and American jobs and infrastructure are drying up. These are lifelong careers that are ending. - Global audiences want global stories. American culture isn't local, and local talent can now make high quality productions. Asia is turning out banger after banger. - Youth want youth mediums. Movies feel slow and boring. TikTok is where it's at. - AI is now a thing. All of the fundamentals have changed. I will debate one point you raised: > most-attractive people Most people prefer to look at attractive people. It's an almost universal preference. Tried and tested throughout time. In film, those attractive people also need charisma.
- ikr678 7mo ago
  What Hollywood considers most attractive (blinding white veneers, botox, fillers, blephs, steroid use etc) is not necessarily what the rest of the world finds attractive, and for some audiences can be distracting and immersion breaking.
  - echelon 7mo ago
    > what the rest of the world finds attractive People want to watch local. Local people, places, settings, and situations that have meaning to them. Hollywood could never deliver this. Content and distribution used to be hard and capital intensive. Netflix and YouTube solved distribution, but content still took millions to make. That's changing rapidly now. There's no more need for Hollywood.
awongh 7mo ago
Except that pretty much as soon as movies started being made, people have said this about movies :)
mpbart 7mo ago
There are some studios who do this already (A24 for example who have produced a number of relatively popular films). But agreed that the big studios have focused on sequels and formulaic content for the most part
- deleted 7mo ago
  [deleted]
madaxe_again 7mo ago
Sure, but Spider-Man CXXVI is a sure bet for a safe ROI. Nobody knows what Chopper Chicks in Zombietown will yield. Books are a great example - even popular books will now have a readership in the tens of thousands, at most. Nobody makes money - it’s an art, not an industry.
baxtr 7mo ago
I miss the inner journeys mostly. The heroic journey is boring if the hero doesn’t change.
- amelius 7mo ago
  Modern youth cannot relate to that. They just browse their smartphones without emotion. Inner journey is not a concept they understand.
- genthree 7mo ago
  [dead]

cyanydeez 7mo ago

not appealing to the masses is DEI; perfect robotic formula are just common sense. Obviously.

groundzeros2015 7mo ago
Are you sure? I thought DEI is making a movie for everyone with one representative from each major ethnic group and then saying only safe non-cultural things. Oh and then localizing for china.

xp84 7mo ago

I think it’s the finance people. They have decided every creative movie made represents resources and time that can’t be used for a “sure-thing” franchise schlock movie.

embedding-shape 7mo ago
"Data-driven" decisions seems to drive out any sort of creativity, seems to happen in all industries where metrics and numbers become more important that someone's vision. Same in software too really.

echelon 7mo ago

- Theatrical releases are how movies make most of their money, not giving them away for free on streaming. Box office margins are huge, but renting licenses to streamers is limited and fungible with all the other mountains of content they license. - Box office optimizes for novelty, streamers optimize for "don't churn" - very different criteria for investment. - Disney cannibalized the box office with Marvel Star Wars, which killed the mid market and killed innovation. This is your point. Disney's success and tentpole successes in general killed innovation and diversity and made the market more winner-takes-all. Comedy movies barely exist anymore. There are few $50-75M films now. Little original content. Now films are engineered for maximum audience penetration and maximum box office revenue. This changes how films are written and who they are written for. The answer is "everyone", and that means "safe", "predictable", and "repeatable". No gambles. Everything else has to fight for table scraps. - End of ZIRP puts us back in 2000. Money used to be free. Now it's expensive. It's not as easy to underwrite productions anymore. Less innovation. - Dopamine machines fit into your pocket and suck up time and attention. Gaming is also huge now. Less people going to the movies because plenty of alternatives exist. - The $400 80'' plus Netflix versus the expensive theater, concessions, and rude people have made theaters unattractive. Theaters are where film margins come from. Without that revenue, expensive movies will be scaled back. - Labor costs less in Europe and Asia, even with ample tax subsidy. The LA and American jobs and infrastructure are drying up. These are lifelong careers that are ending. - Global audiences want global stories. American culture isn't local, and local talent can now make high quality productions. Asia is turning out banger after banger. - Youth want youth mediums. Movies feel slow and boring. TikTok is where it's at. - AI is now a thing. All of the fundamentals have changed. I will debate one point you raised: > most-attractive people Most people prefer to look at attractive people. It's an almost universal preference. Tried and tested throughout time. In film, those attractive people also need charisma.

ikr678 7mo ago
What Hollywood considers most attractive (blinding white veneers, botox, fillers, blephs, steroid use etc) is not necessarily what the rest of the world finds attractive, and for some audiences can be distracting and immersion breaking.
- echelon 7mo ago
  > what the rest of the world finds attractive People want to watch local. Local people, places, settings, and situations that have meaning to them. Hollywood could never deliver this. Content and distribution used to be hard and capital intensive. Netflix and YouTube solved distribution, but content still took millions to make. That's changing rapidly now. There's no more need for Hollywood.

awongh 7mo ago

Except that pretty much as soon as movies started being made, people have said this about movies :)

mpbart 7mo ago

There are some studios who do this already (A24 for example who have produced a number of relatively popular films). But agreed that the big studios have focused on sequels and formulaic content for the most part

deleted 7mo ago
[deleted]

madaxe_again 7mo ago

Sure, but Spider-Man CXXVI is a sure bet for a safe ROI. Nobody knows what Chopper Chicks in Zombietown will yield. Books are a great example - even popular books will now have a readership in the tens of thousands, at most. Nobody makes money - it’s an art, not an industry.

baxtr 7mo ago

I miss the inner journeys mostly. The heroic journey is boring if the hero doesn’t change.

amelius 7mo ago
Modern youth cannot relate to that. They just browse their smartphones without emotion. Inner journey is not a concept they understand.
genthree 7mo ago
[dead]