Red Mosquito

durdencommatyler wrote:I'm not saying there is no precedent for this kind of thing (especially cynicism, if that's really what it is). What's disturbing to me is the amount and the lack of relief. The complacency. People just seem to be fine with it. And the number gets bigger and bigger.

Strat wrote:

durdencommatyler wrote:I'm not saying there is no precedent for this kind of thing (especially cynicism, if that's really what it is). What's disturbing to me is the amount and the lack of relief. The complacency. People just seem to be fine with it. And the number gets bigger and bigger.

Escapism could certainly be part of it, post 9/11. Though i vaguely recall there being quite a big Indie Movie push about 10-13 years ago. Or maybe i was just going to the uptown theatre more often and watching movies like "sideways".

but over the past 10 years or so its completely turned its head towards massive blockbuster super hero movies

Steve Albini wrote:Whenever there's active promotion on the part of somebody else, whenever I see somebody all dolled up for a fancy photograph and someone's handing out flyers or whenever there's active promotion for something like that, as an imposition on my day, I hate all those people and I want them to fail. I have a visceral reaction to advertising and promotion. There's just something about salesmanship that grates on me on a very base level and I react very negatively towards it. I want those people to suffer and I want their enterprises to fail.

tragabigzanda wrote:

BurtReynolds wrote:Technological factors are more to blame than social ones I think, but that's not a sexy answer.

Came here to post a variation on this. I don't think the guaranteed ticket sales of nostalgia films has anything overtly to do with 9/11, Vietnam, etc. I think it's simply a matter of:

1. The streaming/torrent model, when combined with the current quality of home cinema viewing, makes going to the movies a useless endeavor for many fans, and

2. The technology behind these films makes replication of FX, score, and post-production in general incredibly easy, so much so that it stifles innovation;

3. The US creative class has become so marginalized that there are two types of workers: rich kids who can tinker on their pet project as much as they like, and grunts who go work for Disney and draw 800 views of Woody the cowboy during their 9-hour shift.

If the only films that are guaranteed to put butts in theater seats are ones with big FX, then that's what the studios are going to keep making. And if it's considerably easier to pay your employees to churn out the guaranteed product, rather than encourage them to innovate, then wouldn't that path make the most sense for a large studio?

LoathedVermin72 wrote:

tragabigzanda wrote:

BurtReynolds wrote:Technological factors are more to blame than social ones I think, but that's not a sexy answer.

Came here to post a variation on this. I don't think the guaranteed ticket sales of nostalgia films has anything overtly to do with 9/11, Vietnam, etc. I think it's simply a matter of:

1. The streaming/torrent model, when combined with the current quality of home cinema viewing, makes going to the movies a useless endeavor for many fans, and

2. The technology behind these films makes replication of FX, score, and post-production in general incredibly easy, so much so that it stifles innovation;

3. The US creative class has become so marginalized that there are two types of workers: rich kids who can tinker on their pet project as much as they like, and grunts who go work for Disney and draw 800 views of Woody the cowboy during their 9-hour shift.

If the only films that are guaranteed to put butts in theater seats are ones with big FX, then that's what the studios are going to keep making. And if it's considerably easier to pay your employees to churn out the guaranteed product, rather than encourage them to innovate, then wouldn't that path make the most sense for a large studio?

This does not account for any kind of thematic or aesthetic content, though. The question isn't why big studios are pushing these movies (because that's obvious); the question is why "the only films that are guaranteed to put butts in theater seats are ones with big FX," and more specifically, why the type of FX-driven films that are filling seats are doing so.

Steve Albini wrote:Whenever there's active promotion on the part of somebody else, whenever I see somebody all dolled up for a fancy photograph and someone's handing out flyers or whenever there's active promotion for something like that, as an imposition on my day, I hate all those people and I want them to fail. I have a visceral reaction to advertising and promotion. There's just something about salesmanship that grates on me on a very base level and I react very negatively towards it. I want those people to suffer and I want their enterprises to fail.

LoathedVermin72 wrote:

tragabigzanda wrote:

BurtReynolds wrote:Technological factors are more to blame than social ones I think, but that's not a sexy answer.

Came here to post a variation on this. I don't think the guaranteed ticket sales of nostalgia films has anything overtly to do with 9/11, Vietnam, etc. I think it's simply a matter of:

1. The streaming/torrent model, when combined with the current quality of home cinema viewing, makes going to the movies a useless endeavor for many fans, and

2. The technology behind these films makes replication of FX, score, and post-production in general incredibly easy, so much so that it stifles innovation;

3. The US creative class has become so marginalized that there are two types of workers: rich kids who can tinker on their pet project as much as they like, and grunts who go work for Disney and draw 800 views of Woody the cowboy during their 9-hour shift.

If the only films that are guaranteed to put butts in theater seats are ones with big FX, then that's what the studios are going to keep making. And if it's considerably easier to pay your employees to churn out the guaranteed product, rather than encourage them to innovate, then wouldn't that path make the most sense for a large studio?

This does not account for any kind of thematic or aesthetic content, though. The question isn't why big studios are pushing these movies (because that's obvious); the question is why "the only films that are guaranteed to put butts in theater seats are ones with big FX," and more specifically, why the type of FX-driven films that are filling seats are doing so.

Steve Albini wrote:Whenever there's active promotion on the part of somebody else, whenever I see somebody all dolled up for a fancy photograph and someone's handing out flyers or whenever there's active promotion for something like that, as an imposition on my day, I hate all those people and I want them to fail. I have a visceral reaction to advertising and promotion. There's just something about salesmanship that grates on me on a very base level and I react very negatively towards it. I want those people to suffer and I want their enterprises to fail.

BurtReynolds wrote:

LoathedVermin72 wrote:

tragabigzanda wrote:

BurtReynolds wrote:Technological factors are more to blame than social ones I think, but that's not a sexy answer.

Came here to post a variation on this. I don't think the guaranteed ticket sales of nostalgia films has anything overtly to do with 9/11, Vietnam, etc. I think it's simply a matter of:

1. The streaming/torrent model, when combined with the current quality of home cinema viewing, makes going to the movies a useless endeavor for many fans, and

2. The technology behind these films makes replication of FX, score, and post-production in general incredibly easy, so much so that it stifles innovation;

3. The US creative class has become so marginalized that there are two types of workers: rich kids who can tinker on their pet project as much as they like, and grunts who go work for Disney and draw 800 views of Woody the cowboy during their 9-hour shift.

If the only films that are guaranteed to put butts in theater seats are ones with big FX, then that's what the studios are going to keep making. And if it's considerably easier to pay your employees to churn out the guaranteed product, rather than encourage them to innovate, then wouldn't that path make the most sense for a large studio?

This does not account for any kind of thematic or aesthetic content, though. The question isn't why big studios are pushing these movies (because that's obvious); the question is why "the only films that are guaranteed to put butts in theater seats are ones with big FX," and more specifically, why the type of FX-driven films that are filling seats are doing so.

because there is little reason for most of us to see other kinds of movies in theaters. We're viewing everything through the lens of movie theaters, but that's too narrow.

tragabigzanda wrote:Also, I think a lot of the superhero IP came with a hefty pricetag, and the studios that invested in that IP needs to show a solid ROI in a relatively short amount of time. So that's why they come up with a ten-year plan to release a Star Wars film every summer: not because we necessarily want one every summer, but because it was a fucking expensive purchase, and they need to make that money back ASAP, so they can then buy the next huge IP.

Steve Albini wrote:Whenever there's active promotion on the part of somebody else, whenever I see somebody all dolled up for a fancy photograph and someone's handing out flyers or whenever there's active promotion for something like that, as an imposition on my day, I hate all those people and I want them to fail. I have a visceral reaction to advertising and promotion. There's just something about salesmanship that grates on me on a very base level and I react very negatively towards it. I want those people to suffer and I want their enterprises to fail.

LoathedVermin72 wrote:

BurtReynolds wrote:

LoathedVermin72 wrote:

tragabigzanda wrote:

BurtReynolds wrote:Technological factors are more to blame than social ones I think, but that's not a sexy answer.

Came here to post a variation on this. I don't think the guaranteed ticket sales of nostalgia films has anything overtly to do with 9/11, Vietnam, etc. I think it's simply a matter of:

1. The streaming/torrent model, when combined with the current quality of home cinema viewing, makes going to the movies a useless endeavor for many fans, and

2. The technology behind these films makes replication of FX, score, and post-production in general incredibly easy, so much so that it stifles innovation;

3. The US creative class has become so marginalized that there are two types of workers: rich kids who can tinker on their pet project as much as they like, and grunts who go work for Disney and draw 800 views of Woody the cowboy during their 9-hour shift.

If the only films that are guaranteed to put butts in theater seats are ones with big FX, then that's what the studios are going to keep making. And if it's considerably easier to pay your employees to churn out the guaranteed product, rather than encourage them to innovate, then wouldn't that path make the most sense for a large studio?

This does not account for any kind of thematic or aesthetic content, though. The question isn't why big studios are pushing these movies (because that's obvious); the question is why "the only films that are guaranteed to put butts in theater seats are ones with big FX," and more specifically, why the type of FX-driven films that are filling seats are doing so.

because there is little reason for most of us to see other kinds of movies in theaters. We're viewing everything through the lens of movie theaters, but that's too narrow.

Yes, but again, that doesn't account for the type of FX-driven films we're seeing. It doesn't have to be superheroes. It could be any number of different themes and characters and settings and genres, but it isn't. It's superheroes. It's Star Wars. It's nostalgia. Technology alone doesn't account for that.