Earlier this month, Disney executive Andy Hendrickson declared that visual spectacle; not a good script, is what draws audiences to movies. The chief technical officer produced a chart showing revenues for the twelve highest grossing films of all time as evidence.
Hendrickson's announcement begs the question of why story is losing to spectacle. One disturbing answer is that western society is outright losing the ability to tell stories. This argument gains some traction when you consider Aristotle's Poetics, in which he laid out the basic principles of what makes good stories work. All of his points boil down to this: because the satisfaction derived from a story depends on the feeling of catharsis achieved in the resolution, and since that catharsis arises from the validation of the audience's shared values, it's very difficult to satisfy an audience that can't agree on which values are important. In the absence of engaging stories, filmmakers are appealing to the lowest common denominator.
I'm inclined to take Hendrickson's pessimistic assessment with a grain of salt. There are still movies like The Return of the King, Toy Story 3, and The Dark Knight on that list. Sure, they ain't exactly Shakespeare, but all of them feature solid characters and thought-provoking plots. Hendrickson is also referencing the worldwide box office numbers. Checking the US records adds the likes of Star Wars and E.T. to the list. Both of those films certainly boasted impressive special effects, but they also epitomize master storytellers Spielberg and Lucas at the height of their creative powers.
Frankly, the USA figures surprised me. I'd expected to find it populated with even more mindless CG-fests than infested the world market. Then I pondered the reason for my initial prejudice and the situation started making sense. The current crop of money-driven, committee-written productions has made me forget that the likes of Spielberg, Lucas, and Cameron once produced genuine works of art to critical and commercial acclaim. Another look at the list reveals a second interesting phenomenon. Highly creative and popular films are still being made, Americans just aren't making them anymore.
Hendrickson's outlook seems symptomatic of the profit chasing that's robbed Hollywood of its vision. The studios have abandoned the concept of making films for the love of the art. Luckily, enterprising outsiders like Sir Peter Jackson, Guillermo del Toro, and Christopher Nolan have stepped forward to pick up the torch.
I think the record shows that you can still make a story-driven movie centered around a well-written script and solid performances. It probably won't outperform the next bloated, gimmick-laden, rehashed tentpole flick; but as long as the world gives people common experiences to share, storytellers will always have an audience.
Monday, August 22, 2011
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4 comments:
People were blogging the same kind of stuff about big loud action movies in the early 2000's. I'd be more worried if stuff like 'The Smurfs' was taking first through twelvth place, but thankfully, they're not. It seems to me the world still digs a well-woven plot.
Let's briefly talk about numbers 1 and 2 in the top 12.
Avatar:
Sure, Avatar was a visual marvel (especially in Real3D--best money I ever spent), but also I felt it had wicked world-building and a clever story that raised some intriguing questions (What if you could scientifically measure and prove the existence of God? Would people still disrespect it?) AND excellent dialogue and a killer musical score (although Avatar does get a bad rap due to some of the heavy-handedness toward the environmental message much like Waterworld, and that makes me a sad panda). But this is one of those movies you really have to experience yourself to draw your own conclusions.
Titanic:
Titanic wasn't really a 'visual marvel' until the actual ship is breaking apart near the end. 99% of the movie consists of real actors standing on sets with nothing but good old fashioned storytelling and great acting to keep us interested. And a killer soundtrack. Also, the movie was an emotional roller coaster. So it doesn't really fit in with Hendrickson's hypothesis (Unless, of course, he hates Titanic and Avatar, which I'd wager he does.)
I declare shenanigans on the list of all time grossing movies. They are not adjusted for inflation, like this list. But let us put that aside for the moment and address a different aspect of these numbers. Instead of how much money a movie has made, I would love to see a list for total number of tickets sold.
There is no equation to adjust for ticket price from city to city and region to region. How much do you guys pay for tickets in Peoria? Yeah, it is slightly different in southern California and Chicago (the two places I've most recently lived and seen movies).
The list of top ten grossing movies also does not take into account IMAX and 3-D versus normal screenings. This really ought to be mentioned when talking about revenues, because 3-D and IMAX cost more per ticket to the public. A movie could sell more regular tickets than a 3-D movie and be overshadowed if the 3-D was geared especially towards that format. This does not necessarily mean that the 3-D movie performed better, just that it cost more; hence my apprehension to these lists.
But to relate within the ballpark of your actual topic, I fall towards the opinion that there are some dudes making some really good movies still. I thought Tron: Legacy was a great movie and a fitting sequel to the original; and it came out of Disney of all places.
Nick, for the record, I respectfully disagree with your opinion of both Avatar and Titanic. As insulting as Titanic was, it was at least rooted in something James Cameron has had an interest in for some time. But Avatar? Really? Unobtanium? And Pandora? Just because a movie is commercially successful does not mean it has any merit. The problem is, this all comes down to opinion after a while. But can you really take my word for anything? I'm a dyed in the wool Stallone fan.
Good research, Mick. Nick and I were talking further about Hendrickson's argument, we agreed that he's just trying to cover for Disney's recent failures.
I had also heard that 3D ticket inflation helped push Avatar over the top.
@Mick: Yeah, I said what I said knowing there's plenty of people who will disagree with me. Those two movies in particular are either love it or hate it kind of movies.
@Brian: It did. It also pushed Alice in Wonderland over the top (#9 on the list), which, incidentally, was the first 3D movie to follow Avatar.
It was also the first movie on that list that really jumped out at me as being an example of what Hendrickson was talking about (I can't speak on Transformers since I haven't watched any of those). Ironically, Alice is the only movie on that list that Hendrickson was directly involved in.
Alice was simply in the right place at the right time to cash-in on the temporary 3D craze. Now audiences are jaded: No movie studio can seems to make 3D look as good as it did with Avatar, (though Pixar does come close).
What it boils down to is cutting-edge graphics still doesn't sell a movie without good writing to accompany it (or brilliant marketing). Otherwise movies like Sucker Punch would be in the top 10.
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