Grantland on the state of the movie business in 2014

http://grantland.com/features/2014-hollywood-blockbusters-franchises-box-office/

Great article.

 

Yeah, this list of forthcoming movies is very sad and sobering:





WAY too many sequels and comic book movies (and/or action franchises). At some point, you gotta wonder, "where are the comedies? Where are the romance pictures? Where are the teen dramas? Where are the mysteries? Where are the serious adult dramas? Where are the historical pictures or biographies? Where are the musicals? Where are the movies about everyday life?

I think there's room for many different kinds of movies out there, but Hollywood seems to want to bludgeon us over the head with the same kind of bull**** predictable, cookie-cutter movies over and over and over again. I love comic book movies the way I love cheeseburgers: maybe two, three times a month at most. The rest of the time, it's nice to have a salad, or a turkey sandwich, or meatloaf, or steak, or Mexican, or chicken, or whatever. If I had to eat cheeseburgers every day, I'd die.

These same points were reflected in Lynda Obst's excellent 2013 book Sleepless in Hollywood: Tales from the New Abnormal in the Movie Business, where she basically says "it's no longer possible to make a mid-budget film in the $10M-$70M price range, because the studios can't justify marketing them. It's got to be a really cheap indie film made below $10M, or a very-costly action/superhero/sequel in the $70M+ range." And none of her films (like Sleepless in Seattle) fit that category... so she's had to switch to television. Lots and lots of projects that formerly would have been made as mid-budget films are now going to TV instead; I'd point to Mad Men and Breaking Bad as examples of TV shows that would've worked fine as edgy, modest-budgeted films.

 

They are obviously not on the lists you posted, since these are limited to those two categories of movies requiring a franchise.

 

Premium cable.

 

But not in theaters, which is the problem.

 

I think part of the problem is that we now have a plethora of screens on which to watch content and a lot of people don't enjoy the hassle and expense of going to the theater. They tend to only jump that hurdle if the movie is perceived to be larger-that-life-to-the-max-brah! Which is why we're getting moving comics movies.

 

As far as comedies and dramas are concerned, there is also the competition by TV series in this genre, which are getting better and very successful, so that movie productions tend to focus on genres where the cinema screen still has an advantage: big budget action movies with lots of special effects

 

I don't see why that's a problem, though.
There are still comedies and indy pictures and "prestige" pictures and all of that. Can you blame people for just waiting a bit to watch them at home?

At the same time there are more story telling options with serial short form television on streaming services, cable, etc.

It's called CHANGE, people- it's not necessarily a bad thing.

 

You are absolutely correct. In retrospect, it is stunning how quickly this has changed. Look at the 2005 Academy Awards. Of the four films nominated for best picture, three were in the price range of 10-35 million: Sideways, Ray and Finding Neverland. Other movies from this year include Million Dollar Baby, Hotel Rwanda and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Where are movies like this today? They exist, but not in the US. It is a complete disaster.

 

Can't wait to see Female superhero spinoff of Spider-man in 2017 or Untitled 20th Century Fox Marvel project in 2018. They sound great.

 

My take on it: it's going to be really easy to pick out the worthwhile movies in the near future.

 

Come on - "Untitled 20th Century Fox Marvel Project" is the hottest comic book out there right now.

 

I only go the theater if I want to see the spectacle-of-the-moment on the big screen. There is plenty of good drama and comedy, but it's coming from what used to be cable channels, along with Amazon Prime and NetFlix.

As a (former) huge comics fan, I look at that list and it looks like a chore.

 

Same here. I like an occasional comic-book movie, but having nothing but that to choose from is just too much.

 

A movie comedy that might have added to filmic variety seems to have been pulled - The Interview.

 

Yep. Flavorwire just had a piece last week on this trend, and the effect it's had on some fairly well-known filmmakers:

http://flavorwire.com/492985/how-th...al&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer

 

In the case of Breaking Bad or True Detective or older HBO shows like The Wire, it was the long-term character and plot development that made them work so well, IMO; sometimes a 2 hour film just isn't quite the thing.

 

I think the increase in Comic/action movies is a result of the expanding international market. These movies started to pickup steam right after the release of Battleship which was not well received critically due to its simple plot and even more simple dialogs however the plot and dialog was intentionally simplified by the studio so that it could be "internationalized" easily with voice overs or subtitles. It cost $200M to make and only took in around $60M in the U.S. but the international box office receipts more than made up the difference. Now all of the studios are cashing in on this surefire formula. This same global market formula is also spreading to the Disney films as seen with Frozen. Comedies and dramas with lots of dialogue are much harder to market internationally with lower profit margins on average so they make less business sense.

 

I fear that you may be right.

 

Their doing another Expendables because 3 did so well overseas.

 

Don't blame me, I hated the first one.

 

Expendables 3 only made $206M total and cost $90M + $50M to market it, so it still hasn't broken even by traditional Hollywood accounting. Expendables 2 made over $300M, so this was a big disappointment for the studio. I'd be very surprised if they make a fourth film.

I saw the first one, tolerated it, saw the second one, hated it, and won't see any more.