Oh That Movie Industry
It seems that when you get unSane started on the Movie industry, like he was in this post about the current difficulties screenwriters have finding work, you can keep him on the topic for hours. This tour is about some of what he said, good reading for anyone wondering why movies are terrible right now:
Well, I dunno if I’m A-list, but I suppose I’m at least high B-list and I’ve had no problem finding work over the last couple of years, thank God. But the screenwriting world is currently fucked.
What happened was this:
The writer’s strike. Not only did this mean you couldn’t earn while the strike was on, it killed every deal that had already been made stone dead. The industry took six months to get going again, which meant most of us were a year without pay. We all wrote specs of course, but the studios didn’t buy them.
The crash. Just as we were getting back on our feet, the crash hit. The studios continued to make money, but their corporate owners demanded the same austerity measures they did from other divisions. As a result, D-budgets were cut or frozen. I was asked to turn a pirate movie into a space opera for the price of a set of revisions, which I did under protest. Then the studio asked me to do another pass for free, at which point we parted company.
Avatar. This was the killer. Suddenly the only movies the studios were interested in were 3-D $200m+ blockbusters and low budget horrors/comedies. Dramas are dead and the numbers of projects under development are way down. This is the studios’ version of ‘risk averse’, but as they have discovered this summer, it is anything but.
It’s not all bad news because:
- This summer has been a fucking disaster for the studios. They’ve had a few hits but so many ‘sure things’ have crashed and burned. Studio heads have been reduced to touring round the agencies trying to get some ideas. The model is not working, and no wonder.
You have to understand the guys and gals who run the studios are not stupid or craven or idiots. I know several of them and they are mostly terrific people who care just as much about making good movies as anyone else. But they are working within the constraints of their corporate owners.
Screenwriting is as bad as it’s ever been. I pity anyone trying to break in right now. There are no spec sales. But… things always turn around. I know one head of production of one of the major studios who would love to do a massive family melodrama. They are desperate to find a way to do classic love stories. The massive over-emphasis on $100m + movies means there is a gap in the market for much lower budget material. Someone will exploit that.
It’s always darkest just before dawn, is my view. Things will turn. They always do. (#)
He continues on, responding to other people’s posts. Posts not by unSane are in italics.
Maybe if the pictures were a bit more peppy, the situation would be a bit less bleak. (#)
This meme that ‘if the writers just wrote better pictures…’ needs to die. Writers want to write fantastic pictures. The studios refuse to make them. That’s all there is to it.
Every A, B and C list writer has a pile of specs that you would just fucking adore if they were ever made into movies. Heartbreaking dramas, love stories, strange comedies, brutal war films, mindboggling flights of fancy, incredible personal stories. Shakespearian mob dramas, epic cop corruption tales, WWI ghost stories, fuck, I could go on and on and on.
The studios will not touch them with a barge pole. They are not interested. They want STRETCH ARMSTRONG, BATTLESHIP!, MAGIC 8-BALL (I am not kidding…those are all in development) and some more Twilight sequels. (#)
So why don’t all the screenwriters band together and start your own fucking production company? You’d not have trouble attracting funding, if every one of you has brilliant movies that everybody will love already pre-written, waiting to be made. (#)
Because our movies would not make money, given the current distribution system. If you really want to get into why the movies are like they are, you have to look at the fucked up way that movies make money, based on opening weekends in theaters, national advertising and so on. The studios have fought internet distribution tooth and nail because it would destroy this system, but the system may destroy them first.
Basically, it is set up so that only movies that appeal to 18-24 year old males will make money. You can make more money by appealing to more people, but that is your core demo.
18-24 year old males are 3.5% of the population. This is why movies suck, because that 3.5% of the population is all the studios care about. This is because revenues are driven by Friday and Saturday night box office at the multiplexes, and those young guys are the drivers there.
Studios are not irrational. They make shitty movies for a reason.
I don’t understand. Don’t more than that 3.5% go to movies? Don’t they buy tickets? Don’t some movies make a lot of money on the second, third, and fourth weekend, and sometimes even later when it comes out and becomes a hit in various other countries? (#)
In the current distribution system, the opening weekend drives everything else. The entire marketing budget is basically aimed at that three day window. The print budget defines how many theaters the movie can get into. Nobody cares how much you movie does on the second weekend if it didn’t win the first. This then becomes the metric by which every foreign sale, foreign advertising budget, DVD advertising budget etc etc etc gets judged.
18-24 yr old males drive the N. American opening weekend, and that drives everything else. Secondly, foreign sales are crucial, so nothing which is dialogue-heavy is going to travel. Plus, there are many great actors who don’t travel either. This is why Tom Cruise is such a dominant box office presence. In North America, we remember couch-jumping. In Laos, not so much.
So that 3.5% is half of the 7% of the 18-24 demo but has a much stronger influence on what is seen. The other demos typically do not go to movie theaters, so they belong to the (far less important) tail end of the revenue stream. Basically, if it doesn’t get into the multiplexes, it has almost no chance of making a bunch of money on DVD or streamed, because no-one has heard of it.
All of this changes if we get day & date releasing where the same movie is released in all territories and media on the same day. Suddenly that $5m heartwarming indie drama that even your mom could love can go head to head with STRETCH ARMSTRONG III: THE BREAING POINT.
Guess why studios are fighting it. (#)
“All of this changes if we get day & date releasing where the same movie is released in all territories and media on the same day” What’s stopping this? (#)
What’s stopping this is the old-fashioned way of dividing up territories and release windows. Basically, there is a hierarchy of exclusivities and each gets their bite at the cherry in turn. First, North American theatrical release. Then Europe. Then the Far East. And so on. Then first run cable. then DVD. Blah blah blah, probably got the sequencing wrong. But the whole industry is set up to respect this division and everybody knows how it works. If a movie makes X on its opening weekend, we can project our foreign sales, ad recoup, DVD numbers etc etc etc.
Day & Date is terrifying for studios because (1) they have no idea how to calculate the numbers (2) it involves rejigging all the contractual arrangements they have used for the last 50 yrs but most of all (3) once they are not in charge of the integrated distribution chain WHAT NEXT? HUMANS AND DOGS FUCKING IN THE STREET?
Let’s say you and I make a cute little $5m indie movie. Right now, our chances of getting it distributed are, frankly, nil. But in a world where every movie has to fight it out with every other movie on the day it’s released, on internet as well as in the multiplexes, well frankly it’s more of a fair fight. My indie movie vs. THE LAST AIRBENDER. O-Kaaay, let’s take some bets here.
The studios will not relinquish their power over the multiplexes until they are forced to by the internet routing around them. You though the MPAA thing was about lost DVD revenue? Are you kidding. The MPAA thing was about the whole business model.
Right now is actually a golden moment to pick up a camera and go make some movies. Honestly. (#)
“Guess why studios are fighting it.” Errr, I don’t know! I can’t guess! Tell me! (please) (#)
Didn’t mean to be opaque. In the current multiplex model, exhibitors (movie theaters) will only show movies which are heavily advertised and likely to attract the multiplex audience. This mostly means they have to have 3000 prints on release day and an advertising budget in the $100m range. Your $5m will not compete, except for the sporadic breakout like PRECIOUS or BLAIR WITCH, the chances of which happening to your indie movie are slightly less than being struck by lightning every Thursday for two years.
Moreover, of a $10 ticket price, the exhibitor takes $5 and the distributor $2.50, before the production cost, prints and advertising start to be paid off. So to recoup a $100m movie with its $100m P&A budget at the box office, you need to pull in (100+100) x 4 = $800m in box office returns, DVD sales, merchandising etc etc etc.
Actually this is not quite right because all these things split out differently but you get the idea.
This is why we can’t have nice movies.
Now let’s think about the $5m movie. In the current model the problem is that almost no-one will exhibit it. It needs to recoup about $20-40m before it is in substantial profit. It has no chance at all of doing that unless it is a breakout, which (to say the least) you can’t count on.
However in the download model, it can potentially find an audience. It’s still going to be an uphill battle, but it is at least available. More importantly, it is available to and targeted at an entirely different audience. All those $100m+ movies are aimed at teenage boys. But the indie drama, let’s say, is targeted at the audience — people like you — who are not addressed by Hollywood’s current output. Think of all the people with home theaters and disposable incomes who never go to the movies because the films are shit. Those people.
Moreover, it can potentially go day & date (release in all formats and territories simultaneously) because it doesn’t have to navigate through the Gordian knot of distributor agreements and custom and practice.
Let me be clear: this model DOES NOT EXIST FOR A REASON. The studios are entirely set up to exploit the current model. They know how to make billions of dollars a year that way. They are terrified of the internet because they saw what happened to the music business. They do not want STRETCH ARMSTRONG XII: THE TWIST going head to head with CONVERSATIONS WITH MY INUIT GRANDMOTHER. Because they are afraid they might lose. (#)
This is what I don’t understand - suppose you have to play to the 19-24 yo male. (so you will have a big action movie with explosions and bikini babes) And suppose you decide you will only make sequels and tie-ins etc (so your action movie will be called Battleship).
Still, you could make a good movie within those parameters. It wouldn’t hurt your appeal to the all-important demo to make it have funny joke rather than unfunny jokes, to close gaping plot holes, etc. (#)
Unfortunately this alone would not make it a good movie.
It is VERY VERY HARD to write a good movie within the action/adventure paradigm. You need a compelling and original concept. You need to go operatic in an original way every ten minutes, and you cannot have extended dialogue sequences (by extended I mean more than a page — that’s one minute — long. Moreover, if it is supposed to be PG13 — which it IS, trust me — you can’t show blood and you can’t have any real cursing.
You also can’t do anything which is going to offend, upset or confuse the audience. Your protagonist must be sympathetic at all points. He (and it must be a he) must be physically attractive and proactive. He must have a romantic interest with a female who must also be attractive. Your movie must not be too dark. Your character must follow a well-trodden hero’s journey. There must be a ticking clock and an existential threat (a thing-which-will-destory-the world). America must not be painted in a bad light. You must not use any long words.
You MUST have an up ending. You MUST continually throw twists at the audience (one every ten minutes, like the opera).
Oh, and your movie must also be directly comparable to the last two or three smash hits in its genre. Currently, Avatar, Dark Knight, Star Trek, Iron Man, all cool with the studios.
Believe it or not, none of this would be too bad if that were all that was required. These things are at least quantifiable. Existential threat? Check! Operatic action? Check! Compelling and original concept? Check!
But your movie must also be fresh, and edgy. Above all, it must be marketable.
Guess what? Execudroids — even the good ones — have no fucking idea whatsoever what these terms mean. And neither do I.
So, do you understand? Your movie must be fresh, but follow exactly the same formula as every other movie in Hollywood. It must be edgy, but not offend anyone. It must be sexy without any actual sex.
Oh, yeah. And marketable. Which means it must have two A-list stars (change weekly), lots of shiny things for the trailer, a clear and popular genre (only scifi/superhero/heist and a couple of others need apply) and a whole bunch of other stuff that marketing pull out of their ass to project foreign sales.
Oh, yeah, and they need to be confident they can attract an A-list director. Raimi, Greengrass, Howard, Cameron, one of the Scotts, you get the picture. Kevin Smith and Tarantino need not apply.
And they need to see this IN THE SCRIPT, before anyone is attached.
If your script does not supply ALL OF THESE THINGS you will be sent helpful notes from Your Dear Leaders describing ways you could put these things in the movie. And you will go away and attempt to do just that, repeatedly, without destroying what only you know is the heart of the movie, and the reason you got involved in the first place.
Does your brain hurt yet? Good. This is why they pay you the big bucks.
The miracle is not that movies suck, but that good movies are still made. DARK KNIGHT, for all its faults, was one of those miracles. Ditto IRON MAN. Ditto, well you get it. (#)
Did I mention that it must also be 3-D? (#)
