response to 'Missing in action: The Perplexing Decline in film productivity'

sharon waxman's article is nothing really to write home about, or even blog about with the exception of a few things which i'd like to address.

summary - the article lists several 'hot' directors who have made films in the last several years noting darron arronovsky, cameron crowe, and spike jonze and makes an observation that they are simply not making the same amount of films that their counterparts robert altman, hal ashby, martin scorsese from the seventies. [at the outset we see a bit of a generational comparison here]

next - three mexican filmmakers are listed: alejandro gonzález, guillermo del toro, and alfonso cuarón and their productivity is being listed as higher than their (presumably) anglo counterparts. [rather than just being generational we are now talking cultural/national comparison]

i'm a little concerned that ms. waxman just doesn't display much of an understanding of the current hollywood situation though she seems to have contacts so perhaps it's one too many liquid lunch.

the long and the short of it [and i hear my fianceé saying 'make it short, get to the point'] is this: the current studio system is broken. it's kind of on life support when it comes to making a creative environment like there was in the seventies.

we've seen the decline in film productivity ever since the fifties when the u.s. government broke up the studios ability to distribute their own product. from that point on, it became a rather long road uphill where fewer and fewer films were being made yet more money was expected to be made from each piece. the trend has become, especially since sony made such a ridiculous killing with spiderman that the summer blockbuster season generate enough to see the studio through the lean months of the 'oscar' season.

furthermore, with the encrouchment of the dvd release to the studio release we are seeing that the cycle is shortening.

there are some - true who also point to the entire digital thing whether it be iTunes or the like is something that is going to 'kill the studios' but, that's a bit of a handshadow. the truth of the matter is that the studios are probably going to find that while the online distribution model of itunes means less money per capita - it does mean more money coming in. to date, i know of only one family that is willing to substitute a computer monitor for a television and to be fair - it's a fairly big monitor. the whole digital age will probably work out like vhs - the naysayers echoing 21st century versions of valetini's ingorant screed against vhs not withstanding.

all apologies to my love but this isn't going to be too short.

next you have the whole generational thing. trying to compare three current 'hot' directors to the greats like altman, scorses, coppola is a bit asinine. for the simple reason that at the time of comparison all three of those guys were working out of the system. they were all the 70's equivalent of 'independents' and today the independant filmmaker is no artist more than he is a business. the proof of that happens every year in colorado at sundance. so that was a bit of a weak argument.

next you have the cultural thing. i'm not going to speak much on that other than to say that takashi miike and his like in japan makes most of the north american continent look like slackers when it comes to output. for example, takashi got his break in '91 and has directed no less than sixty film/commercial/theatre productions being listed as averaging 14 in 2001 and 2002 alone. obviously this is someone who would agree with whoopi goldberg when she replied to an interviewer asking why she was in so many horrible movies with 'if i wanted to only be in films like color purple i would have to wait a long time. i would rather work'

in closing i'd like to point out that the system currently doesn't allow failures.

i remember in school when one of my arts professors said something that has become more true the older that i've become. he said 'you should try to take as many risks as you can here and now. outside these walls you won't be given very many chances to survive a failure. it's best to do it right here and now and learn from it'

lastly i'd like to say that i think the whole digital thing is still burgenoning. so far, the whole conflux of easy online distribution has only served to make people nervous about their content. when the first film maker comes along to do like cory doctorow did with his first novel 'down and out in the magic kingdom' and intentionally distribute an online version free and sees how profitable that will be for the plastic version i think suddenly everyone will be like 'oh right - i knew it all along - i just didn't have the bandwidth'. [insert eye roll]

there's a lot of great work out there already if you look for it. believe me, i did. for the last four years i have lived sans cable and for two of them with nothing but my 56k dialup for finding legitimate content online. and i have to say that i was quite impressed by what was out there but, certainly none of it has come to the level of any of the films worthy of oscars. but even 'traditional' creators are branching out into new things, take david lynch [the high priest of weird] who's davidlynch.com showcases his experiments and art. there is someone definitely not resting on his laurels.

frankly i wonder about the whole 'oscar worthiness' anyways. i prefer the globes because it's an outside entity. the oscars sometimes come across as a bit tooo self congratulatory.

the fact of the matter is that no one wants to take risks in hollywood anymore. they are spending too much time hanging out with the bean counters who have spreadsheets and pie graphs.

perfect example: the mouse aka the house that walt built - why would they cut production? because they probably figured out somewhere that if they could always make films that are blockbusters, why would they make middle of the road (box office speaking) pictures?

the answer to that is obvious. my response is 'fine let 'em. just don't come crying to me if you make a series of bad pictures and sudenly have a shareholder revolt. film is a marriage of art and business - not just business'