Thursday, June 14, 2007

The absence of originality

During a break from studying, I watched "The Island" starring Ewan McGregor and Scarlett Johansson. I had bad preconceptions for this film, since it didn't do very well at the box office. However I was pleasantly surprised, with Michael Bay making a decent thriller which engages you to wonder what would happen. Naturally the lead characters would survive but in the essence of romantic comedies, it's not the end result but how you get there that counts.

I think why the movie failed at the box office is that it had no fanbase. The concept was totally original. Nowadays most of the summer blockbusters you see are either sequels or have some fanbase. Spider-Man 3, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, Shrek the Third, The Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, Die Hard 4.0 and Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix are all sequels. Throw into the mix Transformers (I really want to see that) and the Simpsons Movie there is no big movie that has any originality. This is the state that Hollywood has degenerated to, that they are banking on reliable but unoriginal films without risk anything on new ideas. I wish that Hollywood stopped thinking less about the money and more about the creativity.

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