This clip with Roger Ebert about modern moviegoers is sad yet true



4 comments:

  1. That was from 20 years ago and holy shit, it is so smacked on about the world of cinema now. And here's an unfortunate thing that I went through last year. There were plenty of movies such as The Neon Demon and some of these movies that aren't mainstream. Unfortunately, I didn't have the time to see them and they're gone after a week replaced by something else. There was a near 6-month period where I didn't go to the theaters and missed a lot.

    I'm glad there's a movie like Wonder Woman that is doing well and manage to have some substance but I'm more interested in seeing The Beguiled or anything new from Lynne Ramsay, Yorgos Lanthimos, or any filmmaker that is putting out interesting work. Yet, audiences these days have become fickle as they would want this and that and this and that. It is a sad state of affairs.

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    1. @thevoid99: Thanks for your thoughts. Yes, Roger Ebert’s opinion in that old clip rings true today. Original screenplays are still getting made (to a lesser extent) and released at festivals and in art house cinemas, but the blockbusters are rarely original anymore.
      I heard both Naomi Watts and Mel Gibson talk about drama films are difficult to get made these days, so a number of big name actors work on TV shows instead. Studios put their dollars in what will sell, like franchises and reboots of already proven material.
      Same with albums, there’s no money in it now, Stevie Nicks didn’t want to make another Fleetwood Mac album and would rather go on the road.
      If dramas and albums are dying, then it’s a sad time for fans of both. Blame it on the internet.

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  2. "I don't even know if people know they like movies."

    Wow, that is so damn relevant it's scary. It is sad that because smaller movies can't afford more publicity, fewer people see them, so fewer of those movies are made. It's an awful cycle that keeps spawning more crap.

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    1. @Alex Withrow: The art in movies is definitely a hard sell to a fastfood-loving world who want to chill after a busy week. An awful cycle indeed with so much attention on the mediocre. There are still the Refns' and Lanthimos' of this world making films, so there is that. David Lynch summmed up in a recent interview the state of US arthouse cinema: "not dying, dead". At least the type of films he wants to make. Still, he got to make S3 of Twin Peaks.

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