A Few Words In Defense of Modern Cinema

aerostarmonk · April 28, 2011, 10:03am

I would’ve posted this in the film thread, but seeing as it has a rather annoying habit of eating posts I’ve thought to set up a separate topic just to address the issue.

This seems to be a point of contention not just on this forum but across the entire Internet. And frankly, I’m a bit sick of it and thought I should express how I feel about it.

There has been no time in history, and you can go back and look too, where there hasn’t been sequels, prequels, remakes, adaptations and reinterpretations in media. It’s how things have run for millenia and how they will continue to run until people just stop making things. The most famous stories you’ve ever known were spawned from stories you’ve never heard of and they often had quite a few sequels and spin-offs that you never even knew existed.

There are plenty of old tales masquerading as new. And no, I’m not just talking about the monomyth as outlined by Campbell. I mean tales that are pretty much direct re-interpretations of famous stories that are thought to be wholly new to folks unfamiliar with the earlier versions or who’ve just never thought of such things in the first place.

Romeo and Juliet was pre-dated by something called The Tragical History of Romeous and Juliet by about 30 years. That story itself borrowed heavily from Tristan & Isolde. All of which were filtered directly into West Side Story.

O, Brother Where Art Thou is simply the Odyssey if set during the Depression and starring George Clooney. And this isn’t conjecture or fan theory, The makers have said as much!

13th Warrior = Beowulf from the viewpoint of an Arab. The story of Cinderella dates back centuries before Grimm. The current Arthur myth as we know it is actually something of a 3rd generation remake of the tale as filtered through French, not English, sources. The Illiad spawned sequels that kicked off franchises of their own.

Do not judge films for their pedigree. Judge them for their execution. What may seem old hat on the surface may be altogether new in ways you probably didn’t even consider. And all the things you consider brand new are most likely old hat in ways you didn’t even consider as well.

Everything is a rip-off to somebody.

Sorry if that came off too harsh.

thedriveintheatre · April 28, 2011, 12:48pm

If this is in response to my comments in the Thor thread, I apologise if I came off as overtly critical. I realize that my statements may have sounded hypocritical as one of my enduring maxims is there’s nothing original anymore. Allow me to elaborate.

This axiom is not to be interpreted in the fatalist sense, but more as a ‘fact of life’. People always bemoan about how movies are hardly original anymore, and that Pixar is the last bastion of creativity and innovation. But the reality is, Pixar’s stories are hardly original themselves. A Bug’s Life was based on the Japanese classic ‘The Seven Samurai’. A lot critics say that Toy Story 2 and 3 are rethreads or expansions of the original film’s themes of loss, acceptance, and forgiveness. Wall-E references many science-fiction entities like Silent Running, a Mad magazine issue of ‘The Blobs’, and most prominently, 2001: A Space Odyssey. Up is reminiscent of ‘Howl’s Moving Castle’ and the cult classic ‘Fitzcarraldo’ (both of which I have watched and can vouch for their themes and plot similarities). And of course, the Pixarians are such fans of Miyazaki that they included a Totoro cameo tribute in Toy Story 3.

Cars 2, in turn, will be a homage to classic spy films, Alfred Hitchcock, and the character James Bond.

Lest you think I am picking on Pixar, Dreamworks has also been accused of plagiarism. Some like Antz are obvious ploys by Katzenberg to one-up on Pixar, while others like Madagascar’s similarity to ‘The Wild’ are divine coincidences. Same goes for ‘Happy Feet’ and ‘Surf’s Up’, ‘Shark Tale’ and ‘Finding Nemo’, and ‘Alpha & Omega’, ‘Newt’ and ‘Rio’.

The last two, in particular, have received controversy when people think that Blue Sky was ripping off Pixar, when in fact, it was divine coincidence and Pixar graciously relented to Carlos Saldanha’s personal tribute to his homeland in lieu of their lack of narrative focus (which was one of the official reasons stated for their cancellation of Newt).

And then we have Avatar, the blockbuster epic people claim rips from Pocahontas, Dances with Wolves (or should we say, Viperwolves?) and The Last Samurai, among other ‘white man saves the natives’ narratives. I thought Avatar was incredibly original for its intricate world-building, deep characterisation, and bold cinematic vision. Others would think that it was cheesy, predictable and two-and-a-half hours too long.

‘Unoriginal’ movies can be good. We have Spiderman 2, Iron Man, The Dark Knight as stellar examples of superhero movies done well. ‘Lord of the Rings’, ‘Die Hard’ (as I have been reminded, it’s an adaptation of a novel I’ve been meaning to read a few years ago), ‘The Town’ (based on ‘Prince of Thieves’, a novel which I have read a bit and is pretty cracking) and questionably, ‘Legend of the Guardians’, as excellent book adaptations. ‘The Departed’, an adaptation of the Hong Kong cop thriller ‘Infernal Affairs’.

Original movies can be bad. Reign of Fire. Waterworld, although I have a soft spot for it in my heart. Questionably, Sucker Punch. ‘The Love House’, an adaptation of the Korean romantic film ‘Il Mare’.

So what are we left with? As the original poster has said, the execution. I agree with this. I know I’ve said that I’m jaded with Hollywood’s reliance on remakes, sequels, spin-offs and adaptations, and I still would love to see something as daring and courageous as James Cameron, Quentin Tarantino or Martin Scorsese’s works instead of more of Michael Bay, Jerry Bruckheimer and Brett Ratner.

Nothing is original anymore, and I’m being honest here and not sarcastic. Nothing is original, because chances are, the greatest stories are the most well-worn ones. What we need to embrace is the heart of the story, and how it moves us in its infinite variations.

aerostarmonk · April 28, 2011, 2:45pm

Posting this from the Thor thread:

Not sure about Europe but in the largest producers of content in Asia they’re even more sequel crazy than the West.

Bollywood and Hong Kong thrive on knock-off franchises, adaptations, remakes, remixes, sequels, spinoffs and everything in between. Not that they don’t have tons of originality as well. They’re industries out-pace ours IIRC, so that’s something that’s bound to happen. Especially since one of those has to do everything under some of the strictest of government restrictions.

Japan will come back to stories they’ve done not even a year before with the came characters and even the same actors and writers and do them again but differently.

This is before we can get into the whole convoluted thing where we hire those same people to make those things yet another time for Western audiences. This is a global thing to be honest though.

The Great Mouse Detective is actually based on another property that was itself an homage to another property that was itself based on a real person. I had a few of the Basil Of Baker Street books and loved them dearly. It’s a remix of Holmes to be sure. But not as much as Treasure Planet.

I actually find it interesting that Stargate and Atlantis have the same storyline for the most part and are fairly close to even sharing the same protagonist. This is fairly coincidental though. As I’m sure both productions were unaware of each other when being made.

By original stories being scarce I meant there are/were few films in Hollywood you couldn’t trace back to previous productions, source material, or abandoned sequels to franchises or even different films entirely. That’s still true today.

But what I mean is that things that seem fresh and new regardless and don’t automatically reek of the sort of thing you were talking about haven’t decreased. They just don’t come from Hollywood. There are hundreds of films that are released in America alone that are just original properties. They may not make it overseas or even to every part of the country, but they do exist and plenty of them are worth watching. And in a digital age you can find this content if only someone points you in the right direction.

Would I like Hollywood to go back to doing less of what you mentioned? Yes I really would. But there’s a lot of things I want them to start doing first. One of those is get rid of this ludicrous notion that being Harry Potter is more important than being the head of state for any country or a teacher. There’s nothing that anyone does in Hollywood worth over 7 figures. I’m sorry but it’s true and it’s killing the consumer and the industry alike.

Actually if you solve this problem right here, you get a lot more original content. Everything seems like less of a gamble when you don’t need to clear $200M domestic to break even.

But back to Thor. I really think you should go see it. It may be an adaptation of a Marvel property which is itself based on Norse mythology which is itself rumored to have roots in Egyptian mythology, but this is something altogether new at the same time. A comic book universe actually forming and crystallizing on screen. A soap actor’s first try as a lead is on display here. And a guy known mainly for films that are so far from this kind of thing that you wondered why they even hired him to make it. There’s so much going on here that writing it off as just another comic adaptation is doing it a great disservice. It’s even being called the best Marvel movie so far by some.

I can’t wait to see it next week. Even if a part of me is most excited for how they pull off Bifrost without copping out or making people laugh.

I really do think there should be a restructuring of the industry from the top on down. It’s ridiculous. People hate hearing me say this because they feel that these folks provided us a service and took massive amount of time out of their lives through their devotion and dedication just to entertain us. And that’s all true. But that still doesn’t explain to me why Daniel Radcliffe deserves 50 million dollars for just pretending to be an important guy while being actually being an important guy like Barack Obama is worth somewhere on the order of 140K. And there are people who say that he’s being paid too much!

Even if we wanted to stay within the industry and not draw comparisons where they really can’t be drawn. Why is Chris Evans worth less than Robert Downey, Jr if they both will share the same amount of screen time playing equally important characters? Why is the cameraman who makes it so people aren’t just putting on theatre on soundstages not paid anything close to the people who wouldn’t be seen otherwise?

It’s ridiculous. And it’s why we have 100 million dollar budgets, shortened DVD windows, 3D and IMAX on films that don’t need or require them for anything but upcharges, huge marketing pushes that often annoy the consumer, and consumers who don’t even feel bothered because of all of these things. Not to mention that Hollywood is now so afraid that a new property might bomb because it could cost so much they’ve all but decided not to make them except once in a blue moon. And when they do sink money into it it often bites them on the rear. For every District 9 there are several Sucker Punches. For every Avatar there are a ton of Cutthroat Islands.

Even safe bets aren’t safe bets. 400 million on going back and forth on a Superman movie for a decade only succeeded in torpedoing the entire franchise a second time in as many decades. And it’s likely to happen again next Christmas too.

Something has to be done. Industry wide salary caps of 1 million, and that is being incredibly generous, is a great start. Possibly the greatest.