Kaszycki: Modern Hollywood nothing but high-grossing redundancy

Being center-right, I feel a bit strange making this statement: Movie studios have become, well,… Being center-right, I feel a bit strange making this statement: Movie studios have become, well, too conservative.

No, I don’t mean in terms of subject matter. Studios are still inclined to put out the same type of anti-war films that have been around since Vietnam, and they’ll still present requisite other “message” films.

But when it settles down and the studios are setting their vision for the year, far too many have come to rely on tired formulas. This tactic fosters a blithe public that doesn’t discern cinematic quality and instead goes into a movie theater as if it were a McDonald’s: “Here’s my $5, give me a Happy Meal. It’ll be the exact same thing I got last week.”

How else to explain the myriad romantic comedies’ lack of quality romance and comedy? Take for example: “Love Happens,” “All About Steve,” “Leap Year” and “The Ugly Truth.” Or just check out virtually every Matthew McConaughey movie in the last five years.

These movies continue to get made because they continue to make money. On the non-romantic comedy front, one of the worst offenders in recent memory was “Wild Hogs,” which received mostly negative reviews. It made $168 million at the domestic box office, and director Walt Becker followed it up with “Old Dogs,” a movie remarkable for obtaining even worse reviews than its predecessor — Stephen Holden of The New York Times called it an “imbecilic, mean-spirited farce, which sneers at adults.” Astonishingly, it has been substantially less successful, grossing only $48 million as of Feb. 7 and lending hope to the belief that Hollywood has perhaps finally scraped the moldy bottom of the cinematic barrel.

Comedies are hardly the lone offender. The torture-porn sub-genre of horror films has mercifully gone out of style, but each year new, stupid slashers appear. They’re cinematic meth: low budget, easy to make and possessing a niche audience that will always eat up more. Remakes have been the craze as of late, with critically lambasted retellings of “Halloween” and “Friday the 13th,” among others.

Action films, including what passes as sci-fi, such as “Transformers,” have also deluged the screen in wanton acts of stupidity — the “National Treasure” movies, the “Fast & Furious” series, etc. Notice the trend: sequels. It’s not enough to have Nicolas Cage uncover inane conspiracies in one film. No, we need to repeat the same plot with inconsequential details altered. It’s the same phenomenon that grips some textbook manufacturers — the realization that going out and crafting a new product is hard to do. Instead, it seems better, or at least easier, to change a few illustrations and the table of contents. Eureka — ninth edition, new and improved!

Directors who try to do something different have a rough time of it. “Moon,” a 2009 film made on a paltry $5 million budget, received generally favorable reviews. Roger Ebert praised it as “a superior example of that threatened genre, hard science-fiction.” “The Hurt Locker,” a taut, non-preachy war film, made less than $13 million in its first domestic theatrical run. “Serenity,” an ambitious futuristic space-western with bits of Mandarin, became profitable through its release on DVD but despite generally positive reviews, didn’t make much at the box office.

“Serenity’s” large cult fan-base clamors for a sequel, and a follow-up should certainly be profitable — just not profitable enough for many studios who have embraced a mindset of searching out $100 million investments that will gross $200 million. And the studio hopes to make much of that profit margin in the first weekend. A $40-50 million investment that will earn roughly that much or more at theaters and make significant profit on DVD? Nope, not interested.

Having assailed sequels, you might wonder why I include a “Serenity” sequel as an artistically defensible project. It is because, like “The Godfather Part II,” a “Serenity” sequel would represent the expanding of an epic story — not the stale rehashing of familiar plot elements with disregard to character development.

Interestingly enough, the modern race to the bottom seems to be the opposite of the “Hays Code” era of Hollywood — a time when Hollywood enforced a morally strident set of guidelines upon directors. These guidelines restricted the manner in which narcotics, firearms, “white slavery” and other questionable material could be portrayed in films. This era produced groundbreaking films as “Citizen Kane” and “Sunset Boulevard.” Within the confines of a sometimes draconian system — i.e. interracial romances were frowned upon — artistic ventures flourished. Sure, there was plenty of fluff. Elvis spent his career making rubbish that rivals “From Justin to Kelly” for the award for “most unintelligent effort.”

But there were also the visionary efforts. Until I see a “Serenity” sequel, I’ll remain forlorn about the state of contemporary cinema.

E-mail Steve at sdk13@pitt.edu.