i saw Margin Call last weekend on the net for free.../johnny
I got sucked into seeing Driver. DO NOT SEE THIS! It is horrible. I wish I had that two hours back.
because art imitates nature and the culture is dying.
The only good movies I’ve seen that were made in the last few years are foreign movies.
Very nice rant. Thanks.
I agree, there are very few new movies that are worth it.
There used to be this thing called "acting". Pity it's so hard to find these days.
I wouldn’t say movies are dying so much as movie *theaters* are. Ticket sales as % of a movie’s total earnings has been slowly declining for years. On Demand, Netflix, etc. not to mention the availability of first-rate home theater systems have made actually going out to a movie a second-choice option.
As for the latest Three Musketeers, the author shouldn’t have expected much more from a late October release of an action film. The better “popcorn” movies (better here meaning more likely to earn big money) are usually released in the summertime. Films bucking for an Oscar tend to be released in December and thereabouts. The other months are often (though not always) reserved for weaker films that wouldn’t compete in peak season, so they get released when there is less competition.
I would urge everyone to go see “Courageous”. It’s in theaters now.
It’s the latest movie from a Christian oriented film studio, Sherwood Pictures. This studio was formed specifically to make movies which reflect and reinforce traditional values.
Sherwood is based in Albany, Georgia. Maybe that’s part of their success so far, in that they are physically far away from Hollywood.
Sherwood is a small but growing company. Who knows, some years down the road, they may become a major film studio, and our multiplexes could be full of movies which reflect positive subjects and positive values.
1. There is little imagination. Sequels rule and the cultural literature to mined for imagery is now on the level of comics.
2. Any night out at the movies for a date or family will kill a sane budget for working families.
3. Actors (and actresses) are pigs and you can always see their snarky faces on the check-out rags or some sleaze show in the afternoon and they all moonlight as political commentators on the evening news.
4. Computers are a bigger and bigger part. Soon, the problem with number three (actors) will be resolved because the computer will supply and endless troupe of nubile maidens and heroic leads. Even still, computer imagery on your X-box will be cooler and you can interact with it.
5. Most people, even stupid ones, can smell a political sermon. Movies today absolutely reek with the fetid stench of rotting leftist idealism.
6. Everybody’s waiting for the ultimate in mass entertainment just over the horizon . . . gladiator combat to the death in a coliseum near you (in the off-football season, of course).
look at the gems made on the 70’s. Could they be made today?
Films today suck for the same reason music sucks - all the best ideas have already been done and re-done ad nauseum so everything seems stale because we’ve already seen it too often.
Secondly, films became all about special effects because that was the one thing that couldn’t translate to a smaller screen and made the audience want to watch on a huge screen. The best movies involve character and plot development but that takes a back seat too often to cheap (and crude) humor or splashy special effects.
I disagree on World Trade Center. Stone is a jerk, but the movie IS about heroism. It shows all those men marching into a building to do good in extreme danger, some of them already injured.
All that said, I was watching Destination Tokyo the other day and struck with the difference in tone about America with today’s movies - that one so positive, while todays are schizo and self-hating.
But the real reason adults don’t see movies today are simple. They are older, more responsible, and less likely to say, “I have to see that movie NOW!” Because if they wait, it will come on Netflix or Redbox for a dollar and there is such a choice at home.
They have control of the major TV in the house, so it’s silly to run out to a dirty theatre because you “can’t wait”. It’s something kids do because they are out with their friends, in love with Twilight, or they DON’T have control of the big TV - they watch the smaller one on their iphone.
Can’t argue with any of this. The country is in a severe and increasingly-rapid cultural decline.
Watching old films and even some vintage tv-shows, I’m often in sheer awe of their adultness and morality. It makes modern fare, with their perpetually infantile and self-absorbed protagonists and characters truly unpalatable.
Movies suck, Hollywood sucks, actors really ****in suck.
I bought my own popcorn maker and movie salt, now there is absolutely no reaon for me to go there.
I own all my old favorites on dvd and blu ray.
Most movies today suck because, like this recycled column, they are unoriginal.
i saw Margin Call last weekend on the net for free... 1. The cost of tickets--even matinee tickets--have gone through the roof.
2. The cost of getting to the movie theater isn't cheap, either.
3. The cost of concessions is just exorbitant.
4. Movie subject matter is not as good or interesting as it once was, with a few exceptions.
5. Why bother with often uncomfortable seating?
6. Why bother with often poor picture and audio quality?
7. Why bother with rude audiences that talk during the movie and don't bother to turn off cellphones?
8. Movies are too often "hacked up" to meet a certain MPAA rating.
9. Home theater systems with flat panel HDTV's, Blu-ray players and surround-sound speakers are often better than what you get in a theater.
No wonder why with just about all of the good Hollywood blockbusters of recent years, I've seen it first on home video on either DVD or Blu-ray format.