That's right -- today's post coming to you from the land of St. Andrew's, kilts, thistles and William Wallace. I got here yesterday, flying from London to Edinburgh, and am currently in Mary's family's house, Monteviot, just minutes from this town called Jedburgh (which is of no interest to any of you, other than people who live in Scotland, have visited Scotland, have an odd, unyielding interest in superficial Scottish geography, or any potential stalkers presently breaking a sweat trying to find me, kill me, and use my guts as Christmas decorations).
I've always had ambiguous feelings about flying commercial planes. I love the actual flying bit -- nothing quite like it, really -- but it's everything surrounding it that's always a little dodgy. Commercial airline transport is the only business I know that can be extremely inconvenient, be consistently late, forbid you to have a bottle of water on you, have an unknown stranger in a uniform pat your armpits and privates, lose or break your luggage... -- and make you pay for a fortune for the privilege, too -- and no one complains. Everyone's grateful for these bastards, their disgusting pre-chewed microwave meals, and their tiny gay little bag of peanuts -- hell, even I am. Because we need them. Have you ever noticed that every business, or every type of business, you absolutely need and have no alternative option for, tends to be the most fucked-up, laziest, oddest working business?
Take the postal service. You get your crap late, broken, occasionally at the wrong address -- sometimes you don't even get it at all. What're you gonna do? It's not like you're going to start up an alternative postal service.
Take the police -- I had my cell phone stolen from my car a couple months ago, and we had police come to the scene, and filed a complaint, and all the shabang. A girl who lived on the street saw the guys who took the phone, knew one of them, and went down to the police station to ID some mugshots and lineups. To make a long story short, something went wrong with Virgin Mobile blocking my number and phone, and whoever stole the phone kept it -- working -- for over two weeks -- and both me, my girlfriend and some of the people I was working with (at the time on the Other Boleyn Girl camera tests and preshoots) all spoke to the son of a bitch on the phone, repeatedly. He tried lying to all of us, giving us different names, different stories, but he was stupid enough to tell us a bunch of information -- his voice alone let us know that he was male, in his midteens to mid20s, and had a Putney accent --, and even set up a meeting with me to try and sell the phone back to me. On the basis of that information, we called the police, figuring, fuck it, we got this bastard nailed. You know what the police did? Absolutely nothing. It took three days to even get anyone on the phone, and when we did, they asked us to leave a message, and that they'd call us back. That was three months ago, and since then I've spoken to the police about as many times as I've spoken to God -- zero. But they can afford to do it -- it's not like Batman is hiding in a tree somewhere, waiting to correct their fuck-ups. It's not like you can go to Alternative Police Service, who offer better rates, quicker turnaround and higher customer satisfaction. You're stuck with the regular police -- meaning they can sit on their juicy asses all day, fine you a fortune for going 36 mph on a two-lane carrageway instead of 30, and never ever actually catch the real criminals. And there's nothing you can do about it that's going to hurt their business.
It's also not a coincidence that these past two services (and national health -- with which, if you live in the UK, you get the fantastic privilege of walking in with appendicitis and walking out HIV-contaminated; or if you live in the US, you get to walk in with a minor infection, wait for about 5 or 6 hours in the same room as a self-stabbed coke addict, and walk out $2,000 in debt) are also public, ie government-run, services, either. But that's a whole other subject.
What this subject brings me to is my business of choice -- the film business. A lot has been said lately (and, to be honest, since the day after motion pictures were invented) about how the film business is at its worst, in the very basic sense that no one goes to theaters anymore. It isn't completely true (after all, Dead Man's Chest did have the highest US opening weekend gross ever, and went on to gross over a billion worlwide; all 5 highest opening-weekend box-office records were set by post-2000 movies, including two movies from 2006; the highest grossing movies of the winter, fall, summer and spring ever are all post-2000 movies also; and so on so forth), but I think there is something to say about the way the film business treats its patrons -- something that, I believe, plays a huge part in the overall declining theater attendance.
Imagine, if you will, that you live in the 30s or 40s. There is no television yet, no Internet, no home entertainment other than radio, no DVDs, no VHS. Movie studios controlled the movie theaters, there were relatively no independent film producers either, and a maximum of one or two movies opened every week. Ie -- movie studios had an absolute, total monopoly on audio-video entertainment (theater or vaudeville being live performance arts, in a sense different from cinema). They could do pretty much anything they wanted -- slap a crappy B-movie on your double ticket, seat you in a huge auditorium where you couldn't see or hear anything, make you go see the same film over and over again, and so on -- because, to be honest, there wasn't really any other alternatives for you. Cinema was a great thing, exciting, and the only entertainment of its kind available -- and, back in that day, a higher percentage of movies was actually good. So you stayed and came back over and over again and watched movies every week.
Nowadays, film theaters have an incredible number of competitors -- TV, cable TV, DVDs, VHS, on-demand, Internet, piracy, BluRay... -- and so do film studios -- alternative theaters, independent producers. The problem is -- they still both behave as if they had a monopoly on their specific type of entertainment, which they don't anymore. Watch an episode of Lost on a massive widescreen HD TV (for free), and you'll experience more cinematic thrills than you will going to the cinema to see any of the Harry Potter films or any of the Star Wars prequels (for 10 bucks per person, plus transport to and from the theater and concessions). Watch a low-budget independent comedy like Little Miss Sunshine (produced for $8 million), and you'll laugh more than if you go see a big-budget comedy vehicle like The Pacifier (produced for $56 million).
But still -- movie theaters still allow themselves to make you pay 10 bucks plus concessions for a film, slap over 20 minutes of trailers and ads before the film itself, and occasionally offer you crappy sound and a broken screen; and film studios still allow themselves to produce big, high-budget "event" pictures, with recycled plots, typecast actors playing stereotypical parts, and dull, predictable themes. As if there was no competition to take any business away from them -- as if, in a way, they were the postal service, or commercial airlines, or the police.
I'm not quite sure if there's anything in this -- I'll be honest, I started out just wanting to talk about my plane being delayed, and this whole rant just came to me on the spot -- but I do think that if there's any way cinemas are going to bring asses into their seats, it's by re-defining the cinema experience. It's going to be hard making movies of a consistently higher quality than TV shows in the day of Lost, 24, Scrubs, The Office, Curb Your Enthusiasm, The Sopranos, Huff, Family Guy, Grey's Anatomy, and a countless number of other quality shows (that's not even including one-offs or miniseries such as The Life And Death Of Peter Sellers or Elizabeth). And cinemas just can't compete on the convenience aspect of the deal -- even if your local Loews is right at the corner, that's still an elevator ride and a block's walk more inconvenient than just turning on your TV or computer and checking something out on there.
There used to be a day where, despite all the flaws of motion pictures, you can still get a double-ticket and a tub of popcorn for just a few bucks. And more often than not, like I said, the movies would be good -- studios needed them to be good.
The motion picture business today has more money, more cutting-edge technology, bigger, better screens, and more amazing sound than TV or the Internet. It also has a myth to preserve -- the smell of the popcorn, the taste of the watered-down sodas, the darkness of the screening room -- and it has the advantage of being a social event: you go with friends, with family, with fellow AA members.
Cutting down ticket prices is one thing (I mean, c'mon, 10 bucks? Gimme a break. I also think US theaters should have the same scheme UGC - Cineworld has in France and the UK, where for just about 20-25 dollars a month, you get a pass to an unlimited number of movies in any of that chain's cinemas. Huge businessmaker). I also think less trailers and less ads is essential -- no one wants to sit in front of 25mn of commercials when now they can even fast forward through TV ads. But the experience, man. The experience is what makes it all worth it -- which is why sports arenas still fill up (you can see them on TV, but it's not like seeing them live with 20,000 other people), and which is why Broadway shows still fill up (you can see the film adaptation in five years, probably on bootleg DVD instead of the theater, but it's still an experience to see live -- it's a night out).
That's why I'm a big fan of these new theaters, like the Electric in Notting Hill here in London, or all these cinemas in Thailand and Australia, trying new ideas, giving you more comfortable seats, better service, maybe a couple perks -- actually making cinema a night (or an afternoon) out again. Some of the ideas might be pretty fucked-up (I mean, who wants a massage before the movie?), but the simple act of trying is a step in the right direction.
If I were Loews, or AMC, or Regal, that's what I'd do. And I'd hire really, really good branch managers -- ones who wouldn't run cinemas like a Subway franchise, but like a local business. Who would train their employees to be polite and upscale, who would keep the employees in-house for as long as possible, get them to remember regulars' names, make people feel special. (And one last thing: fucking fix your screens and your sound too, man. If I pay to see a movie, I don't want to see it on a screen with a huge fucking scratch right in the center of it, or listen to it under a barrage of speaker hissing. I'm serious.)
And as for film studios -- instead of putting money into stars' salaries (and by stars, I don't mean people like Tom Cruise, like Will Smith, like Harrison Ford, like Johnny Depp, people you can only see in films -- I mean don't pay Kiefer Sutherland 10mil, don't pay Eva Longoria 5mil, and so on. It's just ridiculous.), put money into what is going to make your movie different from anything that can be seen on a TV this year -- or next year, for that matter. Pay directors with a vision (Martin Scorsese, Tim Burton, Steven Spielberg), pay for high-concept (Johnny Depp as a crazy pirate), pay for R&D -- George Lucas didn't change cinema by making A New Hope. He changed cinema by funding the people who pretty much invented CGI (yes, that's both ILM and Pixar), by funding the people who invented THX sound, by taking a risk on digital projection (which, in the next 25 years, is how we're going to watch films at the cinema -- period). Save money on film -- HD's pretty much gotten to the point where it's just as good, and it's gonna get even closer in the next few years (Superman Returns, shot on a Genesis, proved that much). Pair people together -- people wanted to see The Departed because it was Martin Scorse-meets-Jack Nicholson. Saving Private Ryan because it was Steven Spielberg-meets-Tom Hanks, Raiders Of The Lost Ark because it was Steven Spielberg-meets-George Lucas, The Godfather because it was Marlon Brando-meets-Al Pacino and Robert Duvall and James Caan, Charlie & The Chocolate Factory because it was Tim Burton-meets-Roald Dahl, and so on. Even if it's only part of why people want to see a film. Not only does it make a great poster, but if you've got not one great artist but two interested in a piece of material, odds are it's good -- good enough to be a hit if you can market it even half right.
And then finance stuff like Half-Nelson or Little Miss Sunshine. Stuff that's a little edgier, that might be a little more like TV, but you know what? Is gonna be an experience just because you're going to the cinema, with friends, to see something that intelligent and that challenging on a big screen, with great sound, played by great actors rewarded by all the prestige great actors should receive from cinema. Pay good scouts -- start making stars again, instead of just taking them from TV. I love going to a cinema and seeing Ryan Gosling much more than I do seeing Zach Braff. Partly because Gosling is a better actor, partly because you know what? I can already see Zach Braff on my TiVo and DVD whenever I want. What's the big deal? He's no huge star -- no Tom Cruise -- and he's no discovery -- I've got him at home already! Whaddya trying to pull here?
One last, final thought on that one -- please, please, please stop making pointless 2-and-a-half hour plus movies. If I want to watch a mini-series, I'll turn on HBO and catch an hour of it every week for a couple weeks, but in the cinema? With that large-size Coke razor-blading its way through my bladder and my skin's natural need to get back to sunlight before it cracks and falls off? No way. If you've got Lawrence Of Arabia or The Godfather, cool, do what you gotta do. But I don't need Dead Man's Chest to be two-and-a-half hours long. I don't need The Good Shepherd to be three hours long. Hell, you could even shave a half-an-hour to 45min off War Of The Worlds (losing Tim Robbins's performance in the mix too, please) and make it an even better movie. Making a movie long, long, LONG is just a self-indulgent way to mascarade it as an event. And it's annoying. And it forces you to have fewer screenings a day and make even LESS money.
Also? Lobby for the US government to bring down legal drinking age to 17, then allow a maximum of one beer per customer for all movies rated R or over, for all customers who can show ID. Trust me. People like social events better when there's alcohol there -- and don't tell me it makes people disruptive -- I've never heard a heckler on Broadway, and you can get a fucking shot at intermission.
People are always going to say that what movies need is better quality. I don't think that really helps -- everyone, from studio heads to smaller production companies, knows consistent quality is a great sell. But quality isn't an easily definable term (I think The Departed is crap, most people love it; I think Half-Nelson is a great film, watch it make no money), and it's harder to get consistent quality with movies than with, say, television, since movies, to come back profitable, have to either be very cheap, or play to such a wide audience that you have to try and hang on to a certain formula (which sometimes works -- The Santa Clause, to me, plays to every rule in the book, and it's still an amazing, wonderful Christmas movie -- shame on me for admitting it -- and, surprise surprise, generated plenty of cash flow).
Take Titanic. Highest-grossing film of all time. Was it a great quality movie? No, it was too long, predictable, and so cheesy it deserved to be spread on a thin crust, covered in tomato sauce and called a pizza. But it was an event. It made stars out of two actors (Leonardo DiCaprio, Kate Winslet) who had been until then discovered in movies, and NOT TV; it had state-of-the-art digital effects, both visual and audio; it dealt with a landmark, high-concept, instantly recognizable idea (not only Titanic in itself -- but the idea of two people finally finding love on Titanic. They FINALLY find love -- on a boat that we all, except them, know is gonna sink before the movie is over. Fuck the Greeks, THAT's tragedy.); it had the kind of romance TV never has, and probably very rarely ever will, offered; and it was directed by a unique, stunning directorial mind (James Cameron, until then of T2 and True Lies fame). And it fucking brought down the HOUSE.
Anyway. A lot of this might not make any logical sense under scrutiny, but it just dripped out of my fingers as I went, so here it is. It kept me from getting to everything I actually wanted to talk about -- the Sundance Film Festival, the NBA All-Star Game, the build-up to Christmas, global warming, a new goal I've set myself for next year, or even how, according to my Blogger profile, I was apparently born a year of the Tiger (thank you God) -- so I'll hopefully get to all of that tomorrow.
Until then, the day's question: am I the only one who seriously think that, despite (or actually even thanks to the curiosity engendered by) how many people were disappointed by Dead Man's Chest, sequel World's End might just make even MORE money? Hit me back with your two cents.
Cheers.
PS: Sorry about the format in this post (italics, etc.) being a little dodgy -- due to screwy Internet, this one post got to you via lots of cutting-and-pasting through three different softwares. So -- apologies.
