"RR" <***@hotmail.com> escribi� en el mensaje news:bk5u8g$pj311$***@ID-155984.news.uni-berlin.de...
<< I'd like to think that they don't try to be. As I said earlier, they're
substitutes for all those other more or less crap action movies we've been
having forever. >>
< Well they ~are~ that, yes...and I suppose in that regard, we should be
grateful. Of course, in a perfect world, as Pikemann mentioned, it'd be nice
if the money funnelled into these pictures was used to make 4 or 5 smaller
films. >
But don't blockbusters more or less help finance the others? I have no idea
how this works in the US, but in Spain, where I live, it's certainly that
way. At least indirectly, in the same way that advertising funds cinema, ie,
by paying outrageous prices to cinema people who then can work for almost
nothing on real cinema, or by having blockbusters maintain distribution
chains that wouldn't be able to stay in business otherwise and also
distribute the smaller films, etc. I've always read about the US how two
successful blckbusters make possible 8 smaller films.
Obviously, this only proves what you said - that this is not a perfect
world.
<< I dunno... you may very well be right. I personally think the true black
hole for the most commercial cinema was that time in the 80's where
everything had to be a stupid teen comedy... >>
< Let's just go a little further back and blame Lucas and Spielberg. That's
always a safe, easy bet. >
Ah no, that's my line in the sand, sir! I firmly believe that there actually
should be more Lucases and Spielbergs. I wish it was always people like
those two in charge of the light entertainment!
< Where are the Lynchs and Cronenbergs and Gilliams of today? They're
sitting at home or working some shitty video store job, not getting any
financing, that's where. >
Mmmm... that's a great question. I'd blame 50% on the way the industry
works, but another 50% on (excuse the cliché) the MTV generation, where most
new filmmakers know a lot about visuals and mostly nothing about anything
else.
< It's like the goal for ~everyone~ is to see who can sell out the fastest
and those who aren't willing to compromise don't get squat. >
Yes, that's the impression I get from reading about the subject.
< B-O-R-I-N-G. I'm holding out hope that the guy who did "Donnie Darko"
comes up with something good. >
And then, what you got with that is a million people saying the guy's an
idiot and the movie turned out to be so good by sheer luck...
<< That's why the best idea is what was accomplished with both X-Men
movies - not to make them completely stupid, and not to make them try to be
more than they can. >>
< Those were decent films. Then you've got "The League", which is just
textbook on how badly these films can go wrong. Which is likely a good
thing, because there were so many mistakes made on that film, that any
filmmaker churning out his or her comic book movie opus can just point to
LXG when the studio starts telling them to make changes. "Look - this is
what can happen if you don't shut the fuck up and let me do my thing!!!! And
I will NOT hire Sean Connery, OK!?!?!?!?" >
I still have to see the League movie. My comic-book side tells me every day
to go, and my cinema side tells me to see anything else... In any case, as
charismatic and whatnot as Connery is, these last years his presence in a
movie is most times a kind of disaster guaranteed. Not surprisingly if you
read any interview with the man about what his concept of cinema is.
<< In any case, Ghost World and Road To Perdition were both comic book
movies too... >>
< One of which rocked, and one of which sucked. But I see your point. Of
course the difference is most people who see either of those will never know
they were based on comics. American Splendor goes out of its way to show
that it's based on a comic, which was refreshing, because at the very least
many people who see it will have their mind expanded to the notion that
there's more to comics than triple D cups and men in spandex. The guy who
plays Crumb in the film is an absolute scream. You can tell he's watched the
Crumb doc repeatedly to get the mannerisms just right. >
If this was a forum about comics, I'd dust off my usual rant on how,
paradoxically, all measures taken to insure good, author, non-spandex comics
could get a better distribution and a chance at being known, actually
accomplished the exact opposite... but I won't bore you with that.
< The scary thing about this notion, obviously, is what are the kids of
today - the filmmakers of tomorrow - obsessed with? Video games. Even comic
books are a dying art - or rather they're far more geared toward adults than
kids anymore. 20, 30 years from now "Yu-Gi-Oh!" will be a live-action film,
because some kid grew up on it. >
No shit, if you pardon my French. You remind me of a friend who's trying to
convince a kid from his family to read comics - and the kid finds that's,
er, intellectually exhausting!
Which would bring me to another mini-rant of mine, about why even the
videogames that don't promote hand-eye coordination but "brain-brain"
coordination are also completely dead... including the only genre I'm
interested in, graphic adventures...
<< Also, I suspect that this super-heroes trend will diminish as soon as, as
it's happening now, the industry realizes that this is not per se the road
to great box office success. >>
< Yup, yup, yup. >
Sadly, the money won't go to the Cronenbergs and the Lynches and the
Gilliams... oh well.
Of course,
~Henry the Horse~
