It is a major problem for Disney. Disney’s main business strategy is to make/buy things to be nostalgic for and then sell that nostalgia at a premium.
Star Wars should have been a slam dunk for Disney. They had experience with the brand and the resources to develop it in ways George Lucas couldn’t. Yet, Disney can’t get the same cultural resonance for Star Wars that Lucas was able to give it and it shows. Hell, people shat on the prequel trilogy for its issues, but the movies were still able to resonate with society enough to get memed and talked about.
As commercial as Star Wars ever was, there was a message of “scrappy scruffy rebels triumphing over the Evil Empire” that was at the heart of its popularity.
IMHO, of course.
They used that to sell endless toys and crass merchandise, and made tons of money.
But along the way, Lucas, and doubly so for Disney, put their heads up their asses and believed it was all the exotic designs, and spaceships, and special effects, and fights, and and and and that was what made Star Wars Special, instead of a simple inspiring message that good can triumph over oppressive evil.
Modern Hollywood doesn’t know how to make a good movie anymore.
It’s not Hollywood just “doesn’t know”, it can’t, period.
When modern Hollywood movies are financed, by banks, there is a risk assessment: The stars, director, script summary, etc are put into an algorithm to minimize the risk that the movie will bomb and that bank loan will be repaid.
The result is that only the movies that are approved for production loans are those that roughly match all the hit movies that came before it.
The result is a system that can only make the same fucking movies, with the same fucking old man stars, directed by the same octegenarian directors, because they’re designed to please the financial algorithms as much as…, you know, audiences.
It’s like a roundabout way to get AI slop: Hey this movie approved by the algorithm made money, so let’s make copies of that, instead of new ideas, or something that’s in tune with the times for which there is no precedent.
Tl;dr we were better off when the Mafia was in charge of financing movies because at least a real human with good taste could decide which movies got financing, instead of an algorithm.
So on topic of the original article:
Can anybody else who read the article explain to me what “the problem” is? Because I don’t see it.
To me it seems more like a light at the end of the tunnel - that maybe we’ll get out of the nostalgia fad (and probably straight into the next fad).
It is a major problem for Disney. Disney’s main business strategy is to make/buy things to be nostalgic for and then sell that nostalgia at a premium.
Star Wars should have been a slam dunk for Disney. They had experience with the brand and the resources to develop it in ways George Lucas couldn’t. Yet, Disney can’t get the same cultural resonance for Star Wars that Lucas was able to give it and it shows. Hell, people shat on the prequel trilogy for its issues, but the movies were still able to resonate with society enough to get memed and talked about.
I don’t want to poop on your well phrased comment, because I do agree.
But all I can think is “Oh nooooo! Poor Disney! Someone should give the multi billion dollar company a hug!”
As commercial as Star Wars ever was, there was a message of “scrappy scruffy rebels triumphing over the Evil Empire” that was at the heart of its popularity.
IMHO, of course.
They used that to sell endless toys and crass merchandise, and made tons of money.
But along the way, Lucas, and doubly so for Disney, put their heads up their asses and believed it was all the exotic designs, and spaceships, and special effects, and fights, and and and and that was what made Star Wars Special, instead of a simple inspiring message that good can triumph over oppressive evil.
Modern Hollywood doesn’t know how to make a good movie anymore.
It’s not Hollywood just “doesn’t know”, it can’t, period.
When modern Hollywood movies are financed, by banks, there is a risk assessment: The stars, director, script summary, etc are put into an algorithm to minimize the risk that the movie will bomb and that bank loan will be repaid.
The result is that only the movies that are approved for production loans are those that roughly match all the hit movies that came before it.
The result is a system that can only make the same fucking movies, with the same fucking old man stars, directed by the same octegenarian directors, because they’re designed to please the financial algorithms as much as…, you know, audiences.
It’s like a roundabout way to get AI slop: Hey this movie approved by the algorithm made money, so let’s make copies of that, instead of new ideas, or something that’s in tune with the times for which there is no precedent.
Incidentally, this type of algorithm is also used by popular music producers to find hit songs, which is why all modern pop music sounds the same.
Tl;dr we were better off when the Mafia was in charge of financing movies because at least a real human with good taste could decide which movies got financing, instead of an algorithm.