Quote:
Originally Posted by Leslie Anne
Personally, I see a lot more cr@p being produced for television than film. I watch very little television anymore because of that.
Taualumna, could you be more specific about some of the films? I think that would make for an interesting discussion.
*Note: the comparison made about the levels of education among the artists isn't meant to suggest that the more educated ones necessarily produce better work. IMO
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I do agree with you that there's much more cr@p on TV (e.g. many of the new game shows that rely more on chance than on the brain), but I've found that lately, there's just so much more "guy comedies" that are a complete turn-off. Mr. Tau rented
Superbad a few months ago, and I absolutely COULD NOT watch it. Too offensive for me.
Other movies:
Disney's
The Little Mermaid and
The Hunchback of Notre Dame. OK. I have to admit that I was a little kid when
Little Mermaid came out and loved the movie a lot. But at that time, I had not read the original Hans Christian Andersen version and didn't realize that Ariel actually died. Did Disney really have to change it? Why can't kids accept that things don't always end happily ever after? Same thing with
Hunchback. Actually, I don't think Disney should have done Hunchback to begin with. Victor Hugo's writing isn't exactly kid-friendly. Making it kid-friendly was a bad, bad thing.
Let's take a look at
Shall We Dance. The original Japanese movie apparently had two versions. The original version is over two hours long, while the version released in the US (this IS NOT the 2004 Richard Gere/J.Lo movie) was some 20 minutes shorter. According to something I found online, one of the scenes with the main character's wife was altered to suit how Americans/the west see the typical Japanese wife. I wouldn't know, since I've never seen the 2 hour+ version of the film. Never mind that the Richard Gere/J.Lo version wasn't nearly as good.
(I have also heard that the original Korean version of The Lake House had a completely different, sadder ending than the Keanu/Sandra Bullock movie that was more Hollywoodized.)
As I said in the video, I originally made the video to discuss the altering of the main characters' ethnicities in the upcoming movie
21 (the movie is based on a true story of students from MIT. These students were of Asian descent). I wouldn't have had much of a problem with it if some people said that they did the change to keep the original people anonymous or whatever, but according to several things I read online, the change was made because they wanted the movie to make money (not sure if they really should have said that, IMHO). So yeah, Hollywood is dumbing down to parts of our society who have trouble seeing characters who aren't of their ethnicity in mainstream roles. If this movie were "artsier" the cast would likely have been more reflective of the original story.
Mainstream Hollywood is unlikely to make the following types of movies because mainstream society wouldn't watch it:
- Story of hate crimes against Catholics (you have to admit that even in 2008, some parts of the US are hugely anti-Catholic. Especially in some parts of the Bible Belt. BTW, when was the last time a television show had a main character that was openly Catholic that wasn't a priest, nun or from a culture that is historically RC? I can only think of Donna Martin from 90210, and the show went off the air 8 years ago.)
- A gay character that is just "one of the guys/girls" but happens to date someone of his/her own sex
- Story about immigrants/children of immigrants who are not poor (I read somewhere that an Eva Longoria movie was called off because people felt that a story about a wealthy Latina wouldn't sell... not sure if this is true, since she plays this type of character on Housewives..maybe what's okay for TV isn't okay for movies? But also, we don't know long the Solises and Gabi's families have been in the US.)
- Difference between Evangelical Christians and mainline Christians. Maybe even issues that these groups have. I think it could make a good Romeo and Juliet type of story.
I want to know this: Why won't people buy tickets for these movies? Is the general public really that out-of-touch? Is the general public really as stupid as Miss Teen South Carolina, who thought Europe was a country?
ETA: Re Harry Potter - Yeah..what's wrong with "philosopher"? Kids really aren't that dumb, are they? They didn't change the title in Canada (and usually we get the US title on everything) and the entire series did well. I heard that
Harry Potter and the PHILOSOPHER'S Stone wasn't exactly a best seller when it first came out in the UK, anyway.
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