Where have all the stories gone?

Jim Brennan said:
Hollywood isn't about creativity. It never has been. Sure, there are creative people and creative moments, but that is not why Hollywood is in business. It creates a product it can sell, Period. It just happens to sell a product that can require a certain amount of creativity. But just like the company that makes plastic widgets, it's going to use the least amount of the required material necessary to make a profitable product.
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I understand what you're trying to say but it's not true. It's all about creativity. It's impossible to make a film without some degree of creativity, even a bad one. Films aren't widgets because they are all unique. Once a widget company designs a successful widget, they stamp out millions of identical copies. Try as Hollywood might you can't make every film identical to the last. You HAVE to create something new every time. The degree of how much is new can be up for debate, but saying Hollywood isn't about creativity isn't accurate. Even the most craven studio exec would admit creative novelty is the engine that keeps the Hollywood machine alive.
 
Jim Brennan said:
I agree with where you're going, but I don't see it as the other side of the coin. No doubt that lots of creative people work on even the worst films and I don't mean to sound like I am diminishing that. But Hollywood as a whole has no interest in putting any more of its raw materials (whether that is cash, creativity or ca-ca), into a product than they have to in order for it to create a profit. It has been a successful business model for a century. I have no problem with it.
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No I didn't mean you're diminishing it. We're talking about the same thing, I probably just expressed myself badly when I said the other side of the coin.
 
Batutta said:
Try as Hollywood might you can't make every film identical to the last. You HAVE to create something new every time.
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Not only this, but even the decision to create an exact duplicate of something is ALSO ultimately a creative decision.

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Batutta said:
Yes...but a stupid one.
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You know, it's funny.

I was at a seminar with Van Sant recently, where he talked about his entire career for a whole day, showed a lot of rare stuff and then answered audience questions for like an hour.

Not one mention that whole day about Psycho. From anybody.


The thing about that film is... if you made Van Sant's Psycho now, today, and it was EXACTLY that same film and it had Vince Vaughn as Norman Bates - It'd work as a brilliant ironic comment to Hollywood's remake trend.
 
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djkarn105 said:
That's what theatre showings, Home video, Television Syndication and VOD are.
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Yes, but the difference is that once a company has a successful widget, they don't alter the design much. It's the same product. They can make the same exact thing for years, decades, and keep turning a profit. McDonald's has made billions making the same few burgers for 50 years. Film studios are dependent on the constant production of NEW widgets. One movie has a small window where it makes huge sums of money, then tapers off. That NEW movie has no value unless it offers something measurably different to the viewer.
 
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Batutta said:
Films based on board games are TRUE examples of Hollywood's creative bankruptcy, because it lays bare the truth that they don't care what the story is. All they care about is brand recognition. I thought movies based on TV shows was bad enough, but at least the success of a TV show is based on narrative content that can be transferred to film. Board games have no narrative content. They are just a familiar brand. They might as well be making Diet Coke: The Movie.
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You know I think Batutta summed up why this whole remake/brand recognition trend annoys me.

I'm fine with adaptations of something that already has some narrative element to it. Look at all the novels, comic books, TV shows, and plays out there that have never been adapted that might make fantastic films or TV series. Hell, since this was sparked by Hollywood announcing they are going to do a Missile Command movie, throw more recent, narrative driven video games into the pot as well. The fact is, there is so much material already out there that could be adapted that already has a story to draw from, but they are intent on grabbing the most illogical material like board games, and old video games that are so simple and have no real narrative to draw from.

I really won't be surprised if, five to ten years from now, we'll be seeing trailers for films like Mr. Clean starring Bruce Willis, or Aunt Jemima starring Halle Barry in a fat suit. Or how about a 500 million dollar 3D IMAX extravaganza about the Green Giant vs. Godzilla, where during the climactic battle the Green Giant beats Godzilla to death with humongous frozen vegetables?

The irony is that the screenwriters hired to adapt this kind of material will have to make up some sort of narrative out of thin air to be the structural bones of something like a Missile Command or Battleship movie. It makes me wonder, why not just produce an original film then? It is all because of brand recognition. Which brings up something else. Who really hears this news and goes, "oh yes, there is gonna be a Missile Command movie!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I've been waiting like 25 years for this."

It is as if the studios pick the most undesirable and so-far-from-the-current-zeitgeist brands to turn into movies. It makes me wonder if the Illuminati is behind all this. Maybe it is just one big secret joke that they can all laugh about when they have their clandestine meetings. "We're making billions off of people watching crap like Transformers and Missile Command. This is too easy."
 
Batutta said:
Five years? How about last year?

http://www.firstshowing.net/2010/taylor-lautner-cast-in-universals-stretch-armstrong-movie/
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Well, in this case I'd rather see a Mr. Clean movie starring Bruce Willis. Maybe I should prepare a pitch?

MR. CLEAN

Bruce Willis stars as MIB* (Men-In-Black) Agent X, but goes by the alias Max Clean during an undercover operation in the cleaning solution industry to uncover a conspiracy that involves aliens secretly rotting the brains of unsuspecting citizens through undetectable alien fumes that are present in house hold cleaning products.

When one of the CEO's of one of the alien infiltrated companies hears of Max Clean's valiant efforts that ends up saving an entire factory of cleaning solution workers, the CEO invites Max to be their new company spokesperson and mascot for a new product line. The CEO is so impressed with Max, that he has the name of the new floor cleaning solution changed from Shine-O to Mr. Clean.

Will Max be corrupted by fame and fortune, or will he discover the root of the alien infestation and sever it for good, thus saving millions of lives and keeping floors across the nation squeaky clean?

* There could also be some nice cross-promotional cameo opportunities for Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones to appear in a scene or two as MIB agents.
 
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Batutta said:
I understand what you're trying to say but it's not true. It's all about creativity. It's impossible to make a film without some degree of creativity, even a bad one. Films aren't widgets because they are all unique. Once a widget company designs a successful widget, they stamp out millions of identical copies. Try as Hollywood might you can't make every film identical to the last. You HAVE to create something new every time. The degree of how much is new can be up for debate, but saying Hollywood isn't about creativity isn't accurate. Even the most craven studio exec would admit creative novelty is the engine that keeps the Hollywood machine alive.
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All of that is true. My point is not whether a new movie takes creativity. My point is that creativity is the asset (or at least one of them) that creates the commodity. And like any manufacturer they are constantly trying to minimize the amount of expense and assets it takes to create their product. Granted it's not apples to apples because a ton of steel has a set cost whereas creativity (or the illusion of it) can be very expensive, but it can also be had on the cheap. Still, films are looked at as balance sheets. Whatever has the potential to increase the value (meaning sell more tickets, toys and DVDs) will be added. Anything seen not doing that will be removed as an extraneous expense. That may include a story that seems to be too obtuse, deep or personal to maximize the investment.

I don't believe that the people are demanding crap, but they are rewarding it. Why wouldn't the studios make more of it? I would.
 
Jim Brennan said:
All of that is true. My point is not whether a new movie takes creativity. My point is that creativity is the asset (or at least one of them) that creates the commodity. And like any manufacturer they are constantly trying to minimize the amount of expense and assets it takes to create their product. Granted it's not apples to apples because a ton of steel has a set cost whereas creativity (or the illusion of it) can be very expensive, but it can also be had on the cheap. Still, films are looked at as balance sheets. Whatever has the potential to increase the value (meaning sell more tickets, toys and DVDs) will be added. Anything seen not doing that will be removed as an extraneous expense. That may include a story that seems to be too obtuse, deep or personal to maximize the investment.

I don't believe that the people are demanding crap, but they are rewarding it. Why wouldn't the studios make more of it? I would.
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I agree with you. The fact is, when it comes to making movies "creativity" = "risk". The more you try to be creative, the more unsure you'll be of your return on investment. This is why so many remakes and sequels are being done. Making something truly new and different is a risky business.

Hmmm.......maybe it's time for a 'Risky Business' remake! :)
 
I personally have been very disappointed by a lot of the mainstream output of Hollywood lately, and I was planning on writing a long rant about it when I looked over at my DVD collection shelf. Let's see... "The Hurt Locker", "Children of Men", "No Country for Old Men", "There Will Be Blood", "Memoirs of a Geisha"... Those DVDs are the most recent flicks I own, and they all have a pretty good story. Yes, mainstream Hollywood's primary output pretty much sucks, not unlike the current available product on network TV. However, there is still very high quality stuff being made. Just like TV, you may have to go from the networks to cable channels to find quality programing. Instead of the multiplex, look into the local art house venue, or film co-op for better movies. I am lucky living in the Detroit Metro area in that we have multiple alternative cinema venues available. However, alt cinema is not just available in big cities. Look around where you are. I am sure that it will not take long before you can find a quality motion picture to go and see.
 
What was wrong with the movie Clue (based on the board game)? I thought it was good time romp.

"I'm going home to sleep with my wife!"

To me, if 1 great film is being produced every year and 5 great novels are being produced every ten years the human race is pretty much on track and maintaing the status quo. I think people have gotten a bit spoiled. If you compare the genre films of old to the genre films of today, things have improved dramatically. I think the bigger issue we're seeing in film is that there aren't enough good novelists anymore. So many of the really great stories on film came from really great novels. Now we get our movies from video games and comic books (which I am a complete WHORE for, don't get me wrong), but their innate design dictates that they not be based in great storytelling -- they're episodic, which demands that they not have equally strong beginnings, middles and ends and the arcs that a truly great story demands.

I think there's a larger question of "Where have all the writers gone?" The world can't possibly have less of them.

But as for Hollywood producing films with less story time value, I'd say that's a big whopping falsehood. Every decade you look back and pick the best of what was. I don't think the 00s had any less solid films than did the 90s or 80s. If you can list 20 movies you love that came out of any single decade, that decade couldn't possibly have sucked as much as you thought.
 
Chamber005 said:
Every decade you look back and pick the best of what was. I don't think the 00s had any less solid films than did the 90s or 80s. If you can list 20 movies you love that came out of any single decade, that decade couldn't possibly have sucked as much as you thought.
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I could find 20 movies I love from each year of the 1980's.
 
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