A Rant...
Now don’t get me wrong; I understand that the majority of Americans are idiots. I also understand that, being a higher-up network executive with important decisions to make which more or less result in the continuation (or lack thereof) of your job, you have to take into account the fact that your target audience is comprised of a vast array of said idiots. However, I do not feel that the combined IQ of your demographic being less than the total population of the country in which they reside is just cause to pump out round after round of “straight-to-DVD” bullshit.
As I write this, there is another Police Academy movie in pre-production. It will be the 8th film in the Police Academy series, excluding any side projects. Scary Movie 4 is in post-production, and will star celebrities so apathetic to trying to keep their careers alive and unmoved by attention as Leslie Neilsen, Carmen Electra, André Benjamin (André 3000 from Outkast) and even famed rapper Chingy. Hell, even American Pie 4: American Pie Presents Band Camp, is ready for you to grab off the shelf of your local rental store.
Fuck, there’s even a new version of Pride and Prejudice, for Christ’s sake. According to imdb.com, including TV mini-series, there are 9 versions of this horribly boring story, and let’s not forget about Bride & Prejudice, the Bollywood version, to make 10.
As you can clearly see, with more and more remakes, sequels and “adapted froms” coming out, Hollywood is suffering no shortage of creativity. Whether it’s the Wayans brothers reminding you that they can still make incredibly unfunny jokes simply by incorporating any of George Carlin’s “7 words you can’t say on TV” (shit, piss, fuck, cunt, cocksucker, motherfucker, and tits) as the theme of the joke, or Peter Jackson dazzling you with 3 hours of CG and a few cameos from humans here and there, movies are inarguably in a downward spiral.
Original screenplays seem to be a thing of the past, and people argue it’s because humankind has already told every story there is to be told. This is bullshit. With time moving forward there are only more new things from which to create original ideas. Hell, it’s been proven that movies can even be without a noticeable plot and still kick the shit out of half the stuff with more rising and falling action than Ron Jeremy’s penis between takes (i.e. Garden State).
So why, then, is there nothing but a hard-on for terrible movies stemmed from lesser-terrible movies? I refuse to believe that Hollywood is suffering from a lack of originality, but rather an over-abundance of laziness. Just think of how many great TV shows we’ve seen (Firefly, Dead Like Me, etc.) that have been cancelled because somebody somewhere didn’t “get it”, and have been replaced by something surely everybody can enjoy, such as Skating with Celebrities (Yes, now they’ll learn how to skate, too), or Stacked, starring the delightful Pam Whateverhersurnameisnow with her great sense of humour, impeccable sense of timing, and eternally reliable tits. Her shitty, pissy, fucking, cunt-seeping, cocksucking, motherfucking tits.
Coming up with new, good stories can be hard work, and getting paid millions of dollars is hardly worth that in a busy city like LA. But hey, that crazy VW Bug from the 60’s has already been done… let’s do it again! And with the future of this industry lying in great role-models like Lindsay Lohan, this world need not fear a depletion of talent or quality any time soon. If only Hollywood could reduce the size of her stature the same way they did her breasts in that film.
I know a lot of incredibly talented actors and film-makers, who I’m sure, given the chance, could blow the lid off a crowd down at Grauman’s Chinese Theatre. Pursuing acting myself, I hope to be able to be a part of it when it happens, as there is a lot of work needing to be done, and a lot of changes to be made for the better. Cleaning house would be a good start, and I can think of more than several names to kick it off.
But it can look bleak and pointless at times, striving to get into something with so many aspects you despise. All I can say is that, as a society who’s let our standards be considerably lowered, we should start raising the bar again. The best high-jumpers are those who pushed the bar to a risky level, Fosbury-Flopping over something they hadn’t done before, whereas those who stuck with their comfort zone had to settle for second or third.
Like Fosbury, we should begin revolutionizing this industry set on pushing the opiate of the masses, and take it in a new direction. Unfortunate though it is - that these films are made to appeal to a dumbed-down audience that only seems to get exponentially dumber - perhaps there’s a reason for this cycle somewhere out there.
And it could be right in front of our faces.