I see they are still planning on moving ahead with "Fletch Won" the sequel to "Fletch" and "Fletch Lives". "The A-Team" is also still going ahead as planned and its making me sick.
I wanna see something original . I think that may never happen again. Hollywood is full of a bunch of losers who think we're stupid. So they keep giving us remakes and sequels.
Ok I'm tired of it now. I want to see something different. I'm just SOOOOO irritated right now!!!
Sorry if I went on a bit of a rant....
Posted by ISIS (Member # 1780) on :
Thanks for being the one to say it first this time...cause I say it constantly...and have for years now every time a movie comes out...my family says...when are they going to make something good-so it is rubbing off.
I saw the previews for the movie "The Exorcism of Emily Rose"...and if the movie is not a remake that they totally took and turned in to some kind of disgusting ,supposedly a comedy...which I think they need to come up with a new category of movies...if it isn't a remake...then it is horribly dark and creepy and scary and not even a slasher type movie...it is a creepy effects scary piece of garbage .
anyway...they either take a tv show: Bewitched, Dukes of Hazzard, Starsky and Hutch...and so many others....and make it awful...or they remake a movie that was already good.... Bad News Bears, Herbie, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.... what is going on for real??
Because I just bid on about 5 movies from the 80's...that I never even knew existed, but I look for ones that have alot of the same actors I like in them...and I like PJ Soles...and was looking for movies with her in them... I bid on Old Boyfriends, The Awakening of Cassie and The Possessed....they all look good. There are a few more that I wanted to get...Rock N Roll High School, Soggy Bottom USA, and Innocent Prey.
I also just bought Harper Valley PTA on DVD, I bid on Six Pack with Kenny Rogers and Diane Lane, and Still of the Night with Roy Schneider and Meryl Streep....now movies were made in the 80's left and right...and they were all original and they all had a real feel to them...they weren't full of CGI crap...the houses look like real houses-not these giant Mansions- that a decorator did....I thought of Eddie Murphy's roles in The Haunted Mansion and Daddy Day Care...and the houses they had, the vehicles, the way it was decorated(but he supposedly lost his job...people have lost the idea of what a family and their home should be, it is all about materialistic garbage. The only thing I thought about in Napoleon Dynamite was...that his house looked more like most people's.
I honestly don't believe that we will ever have the kind of movies that we use to...you can't replace the actors that we all loved...there is nobody up and coming that even fits the mold, it actually is very depressing.
Who can fit in to Clint Eastwood, Robert Redford, or Harrison Ford's shoes? Or Bruce Wilis, Sylvester Stallone or Arnold- for action movies...who Vin Diesel....man he creeps me out.
It will never be the same.
Posted by Illnero (Member # 4286) on :
Part one
Why?
Why?
"WHY?" you may ask.
Imagine if you will you were a teenager and you fell in love with someone. If you are a guy reading this, you fell in love with a beatiful girl who laughed at all of your jokes. If you are a girl reading this, he was a dreamy hunk with bedroom eyes. And everything is going hunky dory. You like them, they like you and because of your pitiful little teenage mind, you think that this will last forever.
Then tragedy strikes. They found someone else. Someone with funnier jokes. Someone who fawned over there looks more than you did. All right, it was probably someone who was older and drove an Iroc-Z. What's a person to do? First loves experienced in the years of adolescence do a lot to shape the person we become in our adult years. Even as we reach the emeritus, all of our relationships in life have a basis on that first one, no matter how much you try to run away from it.
Now let's say that a few years go by. You've become a bit older and wiser in those few years. Why buy a crap CD for $17 when you can download all the songs you want for free on the Internet? Ramen noodles aren't that bad when you build up an immunity to sodium. A few useful caveats here and there. Somehow, like a demonstration of some infinite mathematical theory, you're walking down the street and you see them.
Your ex-whatever.
You strike up a conversation, catch up on things. You find out that they moved into an apartment not to far from you and they're still single. So are you. And you haven't really gotten any in a while. Not only that, you're wrecked psychologically from that first tumultuous breakup and every subsequent relationship since has been marred by psychological trauma stemming from your first love. Somehow, you get the idea that if you can make it work with someone, why not them?
Now beyond the makings of a possible sequel to Sixteen Candles, what's the basis of this story? This little simile is the best way that I can offer my opinions on the state of modern cinema.
See, the decade that we love so much for all it's cheezy new-waveness has long been lambasted by the cinema literati as the death knell to the golden age of cinema in the 70s. And in a way they are right. Not neccesarily for quality but for the mindset of box office grosses for an opening weekend becoming jurisprudence over building up an audience slowly and surely for a movie. Think of all the times you've driven past your local cineplex and seen a poster that's been there for a whopping two-weeks. In my town, "The Pacifier" was here for a whopping eleven weeks. How funny is Vin Diesel changing diapers, really? It's because it's like a one-night stand (With me, you always get sex and relationships similes when I state my points. Be aware!). Hit it and quit it. Makes for bad movies with no real shelf life or even sembelance with reality.
And this paradigm of business has been in effect for the past twenty five years. Now the studios (which are now merely departments in a global corporations) have gotten greedy. A movie that opens at $25 million isn't as great. Especially when you have to pay an actor $20 million because they're "hot" or have "buzz." And somehow the audience got bored with it. We've seen all the CG and bad-*** characters walking in slow-mo towards the screen as an explosion rips in the background, and all the bad-one lines with nu-metal soundtracks.
Now here's where the relationship simile comes in. Hollywood is that kid who fell in love and the audience is their object of affection. And those big box-office numbers are the relationship. But sooner or later, a person can no longer merely be dreamy but must have some substance. Someone who you won't be embarrassed to wake up to in the morning and who will have a conversation with you about something anything. But Hollywood is spoiled and figures that by doing the same thing, something that was popular a few years ago, something that has a known track record of success, then why not do what we did already. And if that includes comic books, TV shows, remakes, sequels, remakes of sequels, remakes of foreign films, remakes of broadway musicals, remakes of broadway musicals based on films, then why not. Decision analysis has the ability to make the money men go "We can't lose."
Posted by Illnero (Member # 4286) on :
Part two:
But you can't totally blame Hollywood.
The audience has to take the blame for it as well. It's conditioning. It's like battered wife syndrome. How many times have we heard this from someone we know.
"Man, I watched that Dukes of Hazzard trailer. Boy, did that suck! Man, Hollywood has really run out of ideas. I wouldn't even watch a free screening of that."
"Yeah, but Jessica Simpson is hot. So I'm going to go see it!"
Or:
"Can you believe that they're making a remake of House of Wax. With Paris Hilton of all people! Man, I hate her."
"Me too. I hear she gets killed in it."
"Really? I'll pay money to see someone slit that slut's throat."
Or one of my favorites:
"Wait a minute. They're making a movie of Bewitched? Bewitched with the woman who was a housewife and a witch? I didn't like the show and I hate Will Ferrell and I especially hate Nicole Kidman. But, I've got nothing else to do so I'll see it."
That conditioned mentality. "We make crap that makes money. A lot of money. A lot of money over the weekends. And you're not in the know if you don't see it the minute it comes out. Not only that, but we'll take something and make sure that every Tom, ****, Jane, Harry, Ahmed, Juan, Wong, Sven, and Nanook the Eskimo will like it. Because they're nothing else for you to do."
Hook, line, and sinker.
Not everyone is ruled by this mentality. Just the mass populace. THe people who buy full-screen DVDs because they don't like the black bars on the top and bottoms of the screen. The people who don't watch foreign movies because they have subtitles that they have to read. The people who buy soundtracks to Hilary Duff movies. The people who think that big box office (a projected earning not necessarily written in stone, but fabricated like reality TV) necessarily means high quality, not taking into account not only produciton costs but also marketing costs for absolute marketing penetration for the final price tag for a movie.
This isn't the rant from a high-brow cinephile. This is someone who loves movies. Of all kinds from different places with different languages. I'll defend the Savage Steve Holland filmography as feverishly as I defend Last Year and Marienbad. But I can't fathom putting down my hard-earned $6.25 (I live in a really small town.) and sitting through twenty minutes of TV commercials (the devil's work), badly cut trailers, and an 80 minute flat comedy sequel just because they're nothing else playing. Especially considering the price of gas nowadays. Sure, the MPAA can blame illegal downloads all it wants. But if a night out to the cinema requires me to add more credit debt than I have at the moment and surpasses my student loan debts, then I'll sit my lonesome self at home and pop in my VHS copy of sex, lies, and videotape.
So as long as there's a contingent of the population that wants to see a movie because some hot star is breathing in it, chewing scenery like a grazing angus steer in a copy of the Iowa Crop Report, in a movie that's seen more doctoring than my grandmother after her Medicaid checks ran out; the fifteen screen adaptation of "Bored People Watch TV wearing Abercrombie and Fitch," shot in the most pedestrian ways by a former music video director who feels the need to use CGI to show the insides of a remote control as the buff 26-year old actor with a full beard plays a 15 year-old nerd without a date for the evening watches O.C. reruns on Tivo, then that's what the movies are gonna be. Same old song and dance, seemingly all scored by Hot Rod Herman's remix of Rob Zombie's Dragula. And as much as we all lament about times gone by and why don't they make better movies, for every one of you there are at least twenty of them with money to burn and popcorn husks to get stuck between their teeth.
Posted by Ali_with_an_i (Member # 27) on :
See the problem is people like seeing movies. Its an easy date thing to do, its great to take the kids once and awhile and if you cant figure out anything else to do, going to a movie theatre can be fun.
The movies are in a slump right now. Number 1 films at he box office are only making $16 - $20 milllion which aint alot in movies terms. The reason is, people wanna see movies but they are giving us any really good choices. They're passing out crap.
I always see a movie or two in the summer. This year I havent really been excited about anything that's coming out cuz none of it is great. There may be a few that are OK but nothing has really made me excited.
Pretty soon I think the box office will be in a worse slump than it is now. People arent gonna waste their time for a movie ticket when 4 months later than can buy the DVD for around the same price.
Even the popcorn and soda cost a fortune nowadays! Hollywood has really made it hard for the movie going public to have fun at the movies. Its too expensive and the movies arent so great anymore.
Thats the way I see it at least.
Posted by ISIS (Member # 1780) on :
Boy...you sure said a mouth full, but I happen to agree with all of it.
That's the thing about movies today...people have NOTHING else...there is no choices but what they give you, and you have to decide to either go and give them money...and they think you like their movie then...cause it made so much, when it really sucked, but nobody had anything else to go see.
I remember in the 80's, we couldn't even decide what movie to watch because there were so many good ones, now you can't figure out what to watch cause there are just nothing but bad ones.
It is sad, and I was talking to my mom about it...I guess me personally...I have to get it through my head that nobody is ever going to be ever as good as the stuff I liked, because the stuff I like is what it was, and it was original...if someone tries to copy it...they can't, if they try and use the formula..it won't work, and it goes the same way for tv shows and music...I was thinking today...there will never be anything like The Eagles...because the Eagles are the Eagles...nobody but that group of people...will ever top that...cause they are who they are, and some how I have to get it through my head...that I need to just appreciate what they have done, and cherish that, and quit wishing for someone else to come take their place...cause it is impossible...and that really goes the same way for everything.
Illnero....I am one person that absolutely despises Ramen Noodles(but I liked how you used it in your rant)...I think they are so GROSS...and I wonder all the time how people eat them by the case loads...except they are cheap and people don't know good food any more...they are conditioned to eating garbage...and they end up liking it.(It is exactly like the movies...you get it shoved in your face enough, and you don't know anything else...you take it and get use to it) I remember those things came out in the late 70's...cause I remember I ate them once in the 4th grade....and I threw up, and I see people eating them all the time, and so I tried some chicken flavored ones about a year ago...and I thought...this is food I wouldn't feed to a dog.
That's what the new category of movie should be called...It should be called : The Ramen Noodle
[ 01. September 2005, 13:03: Message edited by: ISIS ]
Posted by Illnero (Member # 4286) on :
EXCESS HOLLYWOOD: THE CURE FOR THE COMMON AUDIENCE by Doug Brunell
Source: Film Threat
I’ve been thinking a lot about Hollywood lately. In particular, why the movies coming from its diseased loins have been so mind-numbingly bad. I’ve come up with a couple of reasons that have to do with it, though it’s the last one that really steers the ship. Before I get to that, though, I want to touch on the lesser factors.
First and foremost is the product. Hollywood is experiencing a slump because the movies that have been coming out are pure garbage. That’s so apparent it’s almost ridiculous to point it out. It has to be mentioned, though, because it falls in line with the last reason. If you look at the films of the summer 2005, you saw comic book adaptations, remakes, and re-imagings of old television shows. Originality, with a few exceptions, was nowhere to be found. These movies weren’t exactly intellectually stimulating, either. To make a strange analogy, there’s a reason healthy people don’t make meals of candy.
Another problem is ticket prices. People see them as unreasonable. When I get to the solution stage, I’ll hit on this factor. Until then, however, we need to move on.
The MPAA is another Hollywood problem. What’s wrong with it? It’s worthless. Its rating system is killing films and audiences are starting to pick up on that. Why go see the ”censored” film in the theatres when the director’s cut will be out in six months? There’s no good reason. Let’s face it, a smart parent will read reviews of the film first before taking his or her kid to see it, and a movie with a title like “The Devil’s Rejects” obviously isn’t for kids. The ratings system stifles creativity and hinders advertising. It is dangerous to the purity of film and needs to be abolished. At the very least, it needs a drastic overhaul. It’s the equivalent of using chemo therapy to cure a sinus headache.
All these things are contributing to the death of big budget pictures and a studio system more concerned with money than art. But there is one factor that overrides all these things and actually has the ability to render them moot.
The audience.
That’s right, the audience is the main reason Hollywood is dying. The unobservant person would say that Hollywood underestimates its audience’s intelligence by releasing stuff like “The Dukes of Hazard.” The realist would say that Hollywood got it exactly right, and I’m a realist. The audience demands nothing from film anymore. People see movies they are positive will suck simply because there is nothing else to do, and they don’t care about plot or originality. They want familiar properties and special effects. The audience goes into movies with low expectations and is rarely let down. And Hollywood continues to pump out product to placate these slobbering masses, and the masses don’t care, either. They are happy to part with their money. The proof is right there in the weekly box office totals, but those dollar figures are declining, and that’s the beauty of the audience. Eventually it gets tired of the same old same old and moves on. The revenue being lost is going at a rate just above a trickle, but once the well runs dry – that’s it.
There are some solutions to this problem that I haven’t touched on before in previous columns. The first is ticket prices. I actually feel they are too low. I’ll repeat that in case you think you read it wrong. I actually feel they are too low. Let’s face it, would the “Fantastic Four” have done as well if you had to pay thirty bucks to see it? No. There is a threshold, even for the idiots. I would’ve paid thirty dollars to see “The Devil’s Rejects” because I believed in Rob Zombie’s vision. I paid nearly thirty dollars to see “Haute Tension” the way it was meant to be seen. Cinemaphiles will pay. Easily distracted pig people will not. Higher ticket prices, exceptionally higher ticket prices, will mean we’ll see less crap like “Must Love Dogs.” It won’t pay to make those movies. So how do you determine the price of tickets?
The ticket price should be set by the film’s budget. The higher the film’s budget, the more you should pay to see it. After all, Hollywood can use the excuse that the more money that is sunk into a film means the more you’ll get out of it. Let the audience figure out for itself if that is true. Bigger stars and bigger special effects will mean bigger ticket prices. The car industry works the same way. Luxury cars cost more, and blockbusters should cost more to see than indie films. I’d love to see this come into play, and I’d like all of you who agree to start promoting this idea in every forum possible.
The next thing we can do to change things for the best is to ridicule the people who see these garbage films and make a promise to never give in and watch a movie we just know will be bad before we ever see it. I’d even go so far as to say we should see nothing that isn’t original. No remakes. No adaptations. (Sequels are still okay.) I won’t pay to see something that isn’t an original story. You should do the same. And for those who insist on seeing a movie “that looks like crap” because they “have nothing better to do”? Scorn. Embarrassment. Shame. (At the very least, make them justify their decision.) These are powerful motivators and controlling mechanisms. Use them accordingly. If enough people do this, we can make an even bigger dent in Hollywood’s profit margin.
Let’s face it, for those who love film and consider it more than simple entertainment, these methods I’m proposing aren’t just there to get rid of the crap. They are there to educate the public about this art form we know and love. They will be used to open people’s eyes. They may seem cruel, but this is a battle for the integrity of film. It has to be cruel. If ticket prices have to soar to keep people from seeing garbage, then so be it. If a person has to be made to feel like a moron for taking in “Bewitched,” what better reason? Maybe they’ll think twice in the future. And, hey, if they really like seeing crap, then there’s not much you can do for them anyway, so you can just ignore them and their recommendations in the future.
Higher ticket prices and shame. Who would’ve thought these two simple things would be enough to solve such a huge problem? In the end, everyone wins. Hollywood will make a profit (but only after taking an initial loss) because it will finally be able to pinpoint exactly what will make it money. Film lovers who appreciate the artistic side of things will get more films they can watch, and the fools who like sizzle instead of steak? They can pay for it, and pay dearly.
The problem has provided the solution. Make the audience pay, Hollywood. And you Film Threat readers -- the ones who get what I’m saying -- you make them pay, too. It’s your duty. It’s your call. If you can stop one person from seeing “Stealth,” you’ve done your job. And if we can get Hollywood to make the experience a bit more painful in the wallet, we will have won.
Get in the trenches, folks. This one’s gonna be fun.
Posted by rocksteadyflamethrower (Member # 1065) on :
All the originality is being found in dramas and dramatic comedies nowadays. The well of humanity can constantly be visited for new stories to tell.
Here's an idea: Why not start fusing genres together and not just for the sake of jokes? For example, how about a horror musical? Not a joking one, but a genuine fusion of the horror and musical genres...I've heard that they're working on an adaptation of "Sweeney Todd", but how about a horror musical set in the modern day?
Sincerely,
John Kilduff
Posted by Illnero (Member # 4286) on :
Well all the great stories have always been the fusion of multiple genres into one new thing. That's not a new thing really. The only problem comes from the Johnny-Come-Latelys who want to ape the popularity of something that foung success and rip off the superficiality of it.
Take Die Hard. It's a jungle movie, like the old short story "The Most Dangerous Game" set in a corporate high-rise. After it's success, what happened. "Die Hard on a boat," "Die Hard on a plane," "Die Hard in a school," "Die Hard in a minature golf course."
Hell, so many people talk about how movies suck but don't do anything about it really. I figured I could write a short movie funnier than many features. So I wrote a short and now I'm gonna film my own short film. Will it get me into the big time? Probably not? But is it keeping me from watching the same old crappy movies? Most definitely.
Posted by Ali_with_an_i (Member # 27) on :
I think thats why alot of people appreciate independent films like "Napoleon Dynamite". A cinematic masterpeice it is not, but it's different from everything else that has been shoved down our throats. Thats why I think people liked it. I think people are sick of the same old same old. Movies like Sideways and Million Dollar Baby did very well because they went against the norm(the norm being all that crap that has come out recently). I dont think either of those two movies were spectacular, but they were different. I think that shows people want something different.
Posted by ISIS (Member # 1780) on :
I agree...on those movies being "different"...but just because something is different still doesn't make it good.
I liked that article...and what all the guy had to say...except for a Rob Zombie movie called The Devil's Rejects being something he'd pay $30 to go see...I know that movie is nothing I am thinking is the cure for the other bad movies...in my book it is just as bad.
I liked Million Dollar Baby...but the whole Poor White Trash mentality of people out there...overflows in to everything any more, and in that movie there was her mother...she didn't want a house...she wanted her welfare, she didn't want to go see her daughter...she went to Universal Studios...and that actually is a reality that I have seen, and it is the scariest part of the time frame we are living in, and what people have become, and how common they are, and how common these scenarios are, and how trashy people have become...and have no dignity, no morals, no pride, no sense of feeling for anybody but themselves...and that is reflected in the movies...and those are the people buying the mass amounts of tickets...I swear those people have taken over the planet...and it sounds really snobbish...but I don't even care. I just came from a huge fair, that gets over 300,000 people in a few days, it is the biggest fair that people have these tents they camp in for days...I never saw anything like it, and I look around at people constantly when I go places...and they are down right nasty...I said before..if you've got a big fat gutt and look 9 months pregnant- but your not-and you put on a crop top...you look like a slob...no matter what. I actually got cleaned up to go to a Fair...I put a nice shirt on , I curled my hair, and put more make on than normal, and I looked around at people...and thought...look at them...they don't care...women with no bras on, and no front teeth, and looking like that hadn't washed their hair in a month...and it was everywhere, it wasn't 1 or 2 people...infact I saw 1 nice looking guy the whole time I was there...and he's coming next week to give me an estimate on an inground pool....but other than that...people have just gone down the tubes.
And my mom and I just sit there and think...what the heck is this...and then we are sitting there at the concert...and this lady behind me was talking so loud...you could hear her whole life story...and it was all garbage...her son is getting a divorce,,,there's the major fight for the kids, the wife already is moved in with a new guy, and it is vicious...and I thought...geez is that EVERYONE'S life story any more, is this all we can relate to too...because like I said in another thread...do people say I love you anymore...because it doesn't seem it...it seems like everyone has this look on their face of disgust, and they are mean and vicious, and are scary.
I never take my life for granted...especially when I go out and see what other people are living like, and I look at my family and I think...my gosh I am so lucky.
I am a person who refuses to watch tv...and go to junkie movies...I had a friend who saw the Pacifier, and I said YUCK...and she said it made millions of dollars the first weekend it was released...and she said...alot of people had to love it...and I said..so what-what else was there to go see?? Nothing.
I really am so glad that Illnero and Ali and other people feel like me somewhat when it comes to what you think is quality, and that you don't just go to a movie because you want to be able to say you saw it to your friends, cause they saw it too.
Like Ali said...you want to be able to go to the movies...it is great to go to a movie, it can be the most fun, when your with your friends, and you see a great movie, and your all hyped up about it, and can't wait to buy it to watch it over and over...but you got to leave your house and actually go somewhere else...
The Summer Blockbuster movies...I use to live to see, I loved going to matinees in the summer. That never happens now. I loved when they put a bunch of holiday movies out at Xmas, and you'd be out shopping at the Mall with your friends, and you could go see a movie for a few bucks, my babysitter...used to take snacks with her in a big bag....and we thought she was so brave.
I loved the Drive-In cause you could take your own food, and you got 2 movies for the price of 1, you could take an airmattress (at least we did) and could lounge and be comfortable...except there aren't any movies to go see any more...that's the saddest thing, is having something cool...but not being able to use it.
Posted by Obscurus -Evil Dead- Lupa (Member # 2700) on :
Brothers Grimm wasn't bad. Posted by Chris the CandyFanMan (Member # 3197) on :
This is where I think I may be able to help some time down the line. I think (perhaps I'm self-delusional, but I have confidence) that some of my ideas are far enough out of place with a typical storyline that people would single them out if they make it to the screen (just as they seem to have done with March of the Penguins; I doubt anyone would have predicted that would be the bonanza it is). Even though one story I hope to adapt from a previous material, a book I loved as a child where a LIttle Leaguer gets assistance from a polar bear, it's a unique enough story, especially since the bear in question doesn't quite make it to the end of the story (in human years, he'd be about 98). I'd fight the money men on this point vehemently because it's laid out in the book in a way that would try to ease the pain, and I think this could be translated well to the screen and perform a humanitarian cause for younger viewers, something few films do today, needless to say.
As for my original ideas, have you ever heard of these happening before on the screen yet (and please don't filch if you have the means to):
-an autistic superhero defending a small city (since the big guys always take the megalopolises) out of the specific need to feel like he's making something special out of his life, evne though he already is by keeping everyone in town afloat with his family's toy company?
-a veritable Breakfast Club of youths living a satire of just about every popular fantasy story ever published in a parallel dimension, all the while trying to avoid the evil overlord of the land (whose associates include "Judge Roy Skreem") and their own personal problems that don't need a detention to come out?
-an ambassador to czarist Russia coming to terms with his place in the universe and finding it in a land that for much of its existence has had many of the same problems itself, especially as the monarchy was dying?
-fittingly, a burned-out film critic trying to get his own movie up and running while keeping himself from going stark-raving crazy abotu what's dumped into his theater every week (including of course Rocky XLIV, where the Italian Stallion's the world's last hope against the worst boxing alien in the galaxy)?
Keep your fingers crossed, with luck I may someday be able to ram these visions into theaters as undiluted as possible. Like Bogart says in the Maltese Falcon, it's the stuff dreams are made of...
Posted by Illnero (Member # 4286) on :
I don't know if "The Devil's Rejects" is your style or not ISIS, but I quite liked it. It's one of those grindhouse movies I would see at our one screen in town on friday nights I wasn't supposed to go, but I had an older cousin who would make like she was burdened to take me with her on her dates with her then-boyfriend, then the three of us would see kung fu movies, blaxploitation movies, and horror movies. This was back when my age had one digit.
It's funny. I'm one of the most introverted people that you will meet. I haven't been to the movie theater with another person in over six months, I usually go during the daytime for cheaper prices and I sit as far away from people as I can. But I love the feeling of being in a darkened room with a bunch of strangers watching 24 frames per second on that great big screen. Perish the thought of a dual release of a film on the big screen and on DVD. From Wal-Mart of all places. Hell, no! What I would give to live near a drive-in. There are three in my state, but they are all over 150 miles away. It really sucks living here in the middle.
But I really think that there may be a slight glimmer of sunshine peaking through a very dark cloud. What's most weird is the parallels between today and the 70s with war, distrust of authority, and the latest shortages of gas. Pretty soon, these studios are gonna run out of options and just end up giving the reins to some kids from film school or makers of a digital short a few million dollars and let them make their real cheap yet original movies. Just like Coppola, Scorsese, De Palma, Rafelson, Pollack, Altman, and the other movie brats.
Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but soon there's gonna be a new thing. I don't know what that thing will be, but years will go by and look at this time and go "Man, they don't make them like that anymore." Just wait.
Posted by Illnero (Member # 4286) on :
Damnit, CandyFanMan! Your autistic superhero is coming a little too close to my story "The Killer Priest: A Divine Comedy." Lucky for you I'm poor so I won't sue.
j/k Posted by ISIS (Member # 1780) on :
I don't think the parallel of now to the 70's, is going to lead us anywhere but in to a bigger mess of mass kaos.
They are already shutting down the pumps at gas stations around here, and we aren't sure why...and nobody can buy gas with out paying for it first...because of how many people are stealing gas- already.
The influences we had in the 70's weren't anything like today's influences. I was a kid in the 70's, and I walked to school and back every day, and home for lunch- where my mom was waiting for me, how many kids have anybody waiting for them anywhere anymore...I am serious that people take better care of their car than their children.
In the 70's...everyone seemed to be all at a more even level economically and there wasn't all this jealousy and envy over stuff.
Last night I watched a piece of something on VH-1 about the lifestyles of celebrity wives, and it just sickened me...that these people have that much money and waste it...when there are other people who are starving. Kobie Bryant was involved in that whole sex scandal thing...and went out and bought his wife a 4 million dollar diamond ring...as some kind of apology token...like as if that makes it ok...and all these people made it sound like it should have been ok then...and I don't know how a person can walk around with someone who publicly embarrassed them...and wear a ring that could feed how many starving people...I just can not get that mentality...and kids and even adults they look up to sports stars and celebrities as role models, but those people are more messed up than regular people, so there is nowhere kids are learning the right kind of values that they should be.
For me personality...an original movie today would be about a family that had both biological parents in it, and who seemed happy...I love the Wilderness Family movies...that's the kind of stuff you don't see...are families that are close to each other and that they stick together...people today treat their own families so terribly and they don't think anything of it because everyone else around them has the same sob story in life, and they see the same stuff on tv and at the movies....I don't know how it will ever be any different than now....if you look at life in the 50's and 60's and see how fast we have progressed from what a family unit was like to what they are like now...it is horrific to me, and nothing ever makes a turn around when it gets so out of control...cause people become desensitized to there even being a problem...because they don't know any other kind of life.
I have lived where I am now for 3 years...and I have had so much stuff to deal with in just this small town...and the people are so unfriendly, I am lucky because I meet people easily, and I can weed out good from the bad really fast...I always seem to get 1 really great neighbor that I couldn't ask for a better one, and then I get one neighbor from hell who just drives me crazy...I am up early this morning...cause the neighbor from hell chained his dog to a tree and left it there to bark all day, and went to work.
This weekend instead of hang out relaxing...my husband and I are going door to door with a petition to inact a barking dog ordinance...and we want to meet the whole town, and wether they support us or not, I just want to know who I am dealing with...because I have been working really hard to bring people to this community...and if the community is full of a bunch of un appreciative people...why would I want to invest my time and money into them.
I am so sick of nobody ever standing up for what is right...because they are afraid too, or they are too lazy.
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