The Official Movie Thread

[CiG]

It truly is amazing how much garbage is made after all these smaller non traditional Hollywood companies got into the movie making business.

Not really that different from before, also you have companies like A24.

 

[challenge_everything]

Too early to say if movie quality in general is declining, it's been an unusual 18 months due to COVID with lots of major releases delayed.

That said, I'm wondering what is the incentive to film-makers to really refine their final product when it's being released online only. Before streaming, a really good movie generated $$ through word of mouth and box office revenue and it made commercial sense for a movie to be "great" rather than merely good. Now it just needs to have enough outward appeal to generate clicks and renewed subscriptions. I'm not sure that model can encourage the Coppolas or Welleses of this day and age to obsess and recut in search of perfection.

 

[no country for old wainds]

i don’t think that follows. i don’t really see why the qualities that generate clicks and subs would be too different to what generates ticket sales. the correlation between quality/effort and box office revenue was declining long before the streaming era, and it could be argued it never really existed. welles is a particularly bad example to use as his entire career was a story of studios raping his work because obsessiveness and genius were not what got asses on seats even 70-80 years ago.

 

[rms]

Not really that different from before, also you have companies like A24.

Isn't a24 mainstream? All the shit of theirs I've seen was at a theatre

Too early to say if movie quality in general is declining, it's been an unusual 18 months due to COVID with lots of major releases delayed.

feels like it's been alot longer than 18 months

 

[Vegard Pompey]

I don't have any deep analysis about the current state of cinema, but 2019 was such a bonkers good year for movies that I have no doubt the medium will do just fine post-covid.

 

[rms]

Was wondering how but then I remember you like the comic book shit

 

[Vegard Pompey]

Yeah, all that comic book shit like Dragged Across Concrete, Parasite, Doctor Sleep, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, Glass, the Deadwood movie, The Lighthouse and The White Storm 2: Drug Lords. Definitely a year that is only notable for the comic book movies that came out during it.

 

[rms]

We ain't calling Glass comic book movie still??

Doctor sleep...lighthouse...once upon a time...idk, glad those movies get your rocks off. Must be a lot of good movie years.

But you fucks can't stay on topic. I commented on a Netflix produced film and about how the Netflix's and amazon primes aren't changing the film landscape and you goofs respond with popular Hollywood movies

 

[no country for old wainds]

2011, 2012 and 2015 were all-time great years IMO, at least going by IMDB year. don't think many of the best films in those years did well in cinemas though.

 

[Vegard Pompey]

We ain't calling Glass comic book movie still??

You can call it that if you wish. "Comic book movie" usually refers to a movie based on a comic book, which Glass isn't in any capacity. But it is a movie about comics. Regardless of how you define it, surely you would agree it's a far cry from the Marvel/DC glut...?

 

[CiG]

I think it's overstated. Since non-trad companies like Netflix and Amazon got into the filmmaking game there have been plenty of great films created. The ratio of junk to gems feels the same it has always been. A lot of dogshit was released in the 80's, don't let nostalgia blind you to that.

 

[Einherjar86]

Yeah, garbage has always been a side effect of mass culture. It’s just that today we’re seeing it all get made, whereas the bad shit from decades ago fades. It’s less visible.

I personally think it’s been a grand few years for horror, which really took a dump back in the ‘90s and ‘00s.

 

[Krigloch the Furious]

Army of the Dead was fun as shit

 

[CiG]

@Einherjar86 speaking of Netflix have you seen Stowaway yet?

 

[Einherjar86]

ack not yet, it's in my queue. Seems to be getting some decent reviews...

 

[challenge_everything]

i don’t think that follows. i don’t really see why the qualities that generate clicks and subs would be too different to what generates ticket sales. the correlation between quality/effort and box office revenue was declining long before the streaming era, and it could be argued it never really existed. welles is a particularly bad example to use as his entire career was a story of studios raping his work because obsessiveness and genius were not what got asses on seats even 70-80 years ago.

I did preface my comments by saying I didn't think quality had necessarily declined. I was more speculating about what the long term effects might be of the rise in streaming vs the decline in cinema. I'm the first to accept there have been plenty of good movies by Netflix and others.

What I mean by the Welles example is - even though he suffered at the hands of the studios - he existed, he had funding, he had a platform. I wonder how personalities like his will find a home amongst the streaming services.

At the other end of the spectrum, I also wonder what will happen to overblown, expensive, indulgent projects like Avatar (which of course was dogshit but let's leave that aside for now). At the moment movies like that still get cinema releases (Tenet being the most recent example I can think of) but I assume over time these films will move exclusively to streaming. I hope these type of movies are not lost because of some number crunching approach which reckons you can get almost the same amount of clicks by spending a quarter of the budget.

Maybe I'm just getting old and being alarmist.

 

[CiG]

I wonder if streaming companies will just start opening their own theatres. They already do limited big screen runs for their original projects.

 

[challenge_everything]

Rewatched this for the first time in ages. I remembered it being more non-stop action but I was surprised to see it was much more of a slow burn than I recalled. Good shit but I still prefer the icy claustrophobic tension of the first movie.

 

[challenge_everything]

I wonder if streaming companies will just start opening their own theatres. They already do limited big screen runs for their original projects.

I imagine the overheads for running and maintaining bricks and mortar theatres would overshadow any extra revenue they would get.

Went to my local cinema the other week and it's looking so dirty and run down. About 2 staff and a bunch of automated ticket machines running a 12 cinema megaplex. Clearly they're running on fumes.

 

[Einherjar86]

Rewatched this for the first time in ages. I remembered it being more non-stop action but I was surprised to see it was much more of a slow burn than I recalled. Good shit but I still prefer the icy claustrophobic tension of the first movie.

The buildup in Aliens is so good, I love the motion sensor shit in that one: “Look I’m telling you, there’s something moving and it ain’t us.” I kinda lose interest by about the time the third act rolls around, but it’s a damn good sequel.

The first movie is definitely more consistent, and the tension only escalates in the final act. It’s a real feat of narrative horror.