very o/t: Two movies with familar titles, Hollywood hype machines

[robert]

Fanfic memories, prepare to come out because of my mentioning of two upcoming films. The first one is an Iranian film about the horrors of being a woman in Iran, and it's actually called, "The Circle" Well, a film about horrible things happening to women would be a good connection with the other thing called The Circle, except that our Circle wrecks horror on everyone, or tried to. The second film is one just starting production, an action thiller starring Courtney Love and Charlize Theron, called "24 Hours" No points for guessing why I brought that up.
Well, that's part 1 of this post, part 2 is about the decline of Hollywood. Have you ever noticed that almost every single film in recent memory that has enormous hype turns out to be no good at all? I say this because "Pearl Harbor" the film that will certainly make $100 million this weekend, is said to be an almost laughingly bad film, though not even close to "Battlefield:Earth" and "Freddy Got Fingered" territory. It's my opinion that nearly every film recently that has started out with big hype has not been good at all according to critics, exceptions as far as I can remember being "Gladiator" "Toy Story 2" "Traffic" "Cast Away" and "Shrek" And some films with hype have been critically acclamed like "Crouching Tiger: Hidden Dragon" but that didn't have much hype going on until it's release. Also, there are a lot of films people are talking about this summer, like "Tomb Raider" "Final Fantasy" "Planet of the Apes" and "Cats and Dogs" and I don't doubt for a minute that all or almost all of them will not be well liked by the reviewers. Okay, here's what I'm really trying to say. Have you noticed that almost all the movies that have been acclamed by both the public and the reviewers recently has not been hyped up like a "Pearl Harbor" or a "Hannibal" for example? It seems that all the good movies made are the ones we don't notice behind the movies that actually make money but have little artistic merit, that's the point I'm trying to make here, all the really hyped up films have turned out to be terrible. And as usual it took me lots of time to get to that point.

[Anthonynotes]

Part One:
I've heard of "The Circle", and noted its title :-)

Part Two:
It's usually the case that blockbuster films that are clearly cookie-cutter drivel/not all that great usually have much advertising pushing them to ensure as many of the masses see said designed-to-appeal-to-the-masses film as possible, whereas films that aim for a higher quality level/aren't made by big wealthy Hollywood studios (like "Crouching Tiger") don't get as much attention/advertising. Thus, the reason the hyped-up-in-advance films usually aren't all that great. "Pearl Harbor" sounds like it'll just be "Titanic-with-kamikaze pilots" IMO (and the various sequels coming out this summer, including "Jurassic Park 3" a certain fave comedian's "Dr. Doolittle 2") don't sound all that great, either...

-B.
Of course, such hype's been going on for years---remember "Superman III" and "Superman IV"? ;-)

[The Mad Hatter]

I'm glad I'm not the only one who thinks Pearl Harbor is Titanic with bombs.

Anyway, my concern is not necessarily the badness of films (there have always been bad films), but the fact that there are so dang many sequels/remakes lately. Planet of the Apes, Jurassic Park 3, Dr. Doolittle 2, etc. etc. Whatever happened to originality? Something daring, not something something based on a pre existing idea (sequels, remakes) or a marketing trend (any of the teen movies, Freddie Got Fingered). Even if it doesn't quite work, I want something _different_.