“The Message”
Choking out creativity in Hollywood
Over the past decade, we have seen a rapid deterioration when it comes to story telling in cinema. Hollywood was once an unreachable dream for aspiring writers who pushed themselves in the art of complex characters and intricate narratives that challenged the audiences, but today it is a hollow vessel to deliver “the message”, whatever politically motivated hot topic may be popular to espouse at any given time. I’m sure the average person loves didactic visual stimuli produced by the most detached and wealthiest of the nation.
Unfortunately, the cinematic landscape now suffers from the oppressive and commanding “message”. Hollywood is a mere propaganda machine, narcissistic in its obsession to impose ideology on the average population, just as The First Order sought galactic control without question. The very essence of movies- story telling, plot telling, and character development, all sacrificed in the name of easily toppled beliefs that crumble when an iota of logic is brought in. Gone are the days of story telling with the pleasure of engaging the audience and challenging them to think deeply about complex emotions and stories. Consume. Don’t question.
The vapid recycling of established franchises, reboots, and prequel/sequels is but the mere surface of the creative-bankruptcy iceberg. Driven by the need to please shareholders and big daddy BlackRock, creativity is out and playing it safe by recycling characters is all that is allowed. Innovation and experimentation is replaced by tired formulas of pretty colors and nostalgia tickles, with predictable outcomes and empty meanings. Shoveling the self righteous message down the throat holes of the viewer has choked out any excitement the average movie goer has left, and is replaced with “well there’s nothing else going on, might go drown out the noise with this I guess.”
Characters were once complex tapestries of the push and pull of morals, they had nuance and goals. Now they’ve been reduced to check lists catering to the ideology, lacking depth and meaning making it hard to empathize with even on the most basic level as all they are written to care about is “the message”. There is no room for intellectual stimulation or critical thinking, and they strip away exploration of the multifaceted human experience in the name of political correctness. None of this constitutes good writing.
Shareholders don’t care about the experience, they just care about money being spent and the views they can rack up. Those little numbers dont share emotion, mimicking the lackluster films released over the last decade, but so long as those numbers go up, some rich guy gets to get richer.
The only way forward it seems is through the power of crowd funding and investing time in creating new studios who can release smaller scale IPs on sites like YouTube or personal websites. Twitter offers promise with long format videos now allowed. This however doesn’t help the selection at theaters immediately, but perhaps one day.
Until then, you might think the only choice is to “consume, don’t question”. But there is another.
Resist. Don’t become a drone, a number. Be free with those around you.
