Stuff movies can do without

[ctc]

>it just made anything is possible = nothing is scary anymore

I think part of that is ghost stories have come to rely on the look, so you don't get really creepy stories any more. Ghost stories have become HORRIBLY predictable.

>I would say remakes.

Bravo! I'd love to see something new for a change. Adding to that, I'd love to see something that wasn't a sequel or a remake that wasn't also almost exactly like whatever's currently popular.

Another thing that I can do without: movies today (especially the nerdly ones) have a bad habit of trying to make evry line, every scene, every shot deep, meaningful and with gravitas. So you end up with disjointed shots, and characters who all talk like Obi Wan.

Don C.

[Splitty]

....
These days, it takes five minutes for the movie to actually start.

Numbnuts Pictures presents...
A Barfbag Production...
In association with Doofus Enterprises...
Executive Produced by Megalomaniac Films...

By then, I'm already getting annoyed!!!!!
And they all have really really stupid logos and stuff....

Yes, and on Netflix rentals they sometimes have FORCED PREVIEWS that you can't fast forward through.
I get really irritated, as I usually have a hot plate of food at the start of a movie.
I just want to relax, watch my damn movie and eat (I'm old, it's the simple pleasures).

I've started putting the DVD in before I get the food ready, but DOH! the days when I forget.

[jwyblejr]

Agreed.
I want all movie to have as much in-camera and on-set filming as possible.
Build it.
Wear costumes.

And all that fails, then use CG sparingly.
It's a last-resort thing, NOT your first option!

It really makes you wonder why they rely so heavily on this sort of stuff. What's the point of Face-Off on Syfy if they don't use the people that compete on the show?

[Brazoo]

Another thing that I can do without: movies today (especially the nerdly ones) have a bad habit of trying to make evry line, every scene, every shot deep, meaningful and with gravitas. So you end up with disjointed shots, and characters who all talk like Obi Wan.

Don C.

True. I think it's another symptom of Matrix disease. The absolute WORST recent offender I can think of was that Total Recall remake.

[ctc]

>The absolute WORST recent offender I can think of was that Total Recall remake.

The last round of Batman movies were bad for that. 'Specially the first one. And I don't just mean the secret ninja academy guys; his girlfriend was horrible for it. Almost everything she said was weird forshadowing, or a veiled life lesson.

>I've started putting the DVD in before I get the food ready

HAW! I do that too.

Don C.

[Mikey]

It seems Hollywood has a very small gene-pool of popular actors.

It was the same in the 90's when Kevin Kosner was in EVERYTHING.

Johnny Depp today is LITERALLY in everything

[Brazoo]

It seems Hollywood has a very small gene-pool of popular actors.

It was the same in the 90's when Kevin Kosner was in EVERYTHING.

Johnny Depp today is LITERALLY in everything

I don't know about those guys, they seem to be in one or maybe two movies a year. Nicholas Cage is in TONS now, but I was under the impression it had to do with a financial strategy he's employing.

Samuel L. Jackson was all over the place for a long time, but I think sometimes when older actors get hot they want to ride the wave, like Morgan Freeman in the '90s, or Michael Cain and Gene Hackman in the '80s.

I think in some ways old Hollywood felt like they had a smaller pool, because actors would be contracted to studios on a year to year basis. Like, it sometimes seems Edward Everett Horton was in every comedy from 1932 to 1942.

And then of course there's John Wayne who starred in well over 100 movies...

[Brazoo]

Because I checked out Johnny Depp's IMDb page I just noticed that he's in a new musical that Rob Marshall is making: Stephen Sondheim's "Into The Woods".

Add that one to my list: musicals with crazy all-star casts who aren't professional singer/dancers. I understand these movies can't get funded if they don't get big stars, but I also don't think each one of these things needs a cast of ALL A-List movie actors. There are one or two fantastically talented people on Broadway right now who won't shatter the lens of a camera if you give them an occasional speaking roll.

[Mikey]

Speaking of Stephen Sondheim and Depp, I do admit Depp was fantastic in Sweeney Todd

[ctc]

>Add that one to my list: musicals with crazy all-star casts who aren't professional singer/dancers.

Saw "les Mis" did you?

>It seems Hollywood has a very small gene-pool of popular actors.

I think that'll get a LOT worse before it gets better. It's about playing it safe, so the casting director and producer can say "I dunno what happened. We got the BEST people...." if the film tanks. As the budgets soar and the margin of profit thins the decision makers are gonna want to play it as safe as possible.

>I think in some ways old Hollywood felt like they had a smaller pool, because actors would be contracted to studios on a year to year basis.

It was the same idea, but sideways. The studios liked to own the hottest stars and put them in as many things as possible. Nowadays the principle still stands, but the stars are more like free agents; able to move between studios at will. But on our end of the process, it amounts to the same. Familiar faces in often baffling roles. ("I'm king of the Monguls pilgrim, and I'll lick any man who says otherwise.")

Don C.

[Bionicfanboy66]

Superhero flicks that take themselves too seriously. I wanna see a modern day campy Batman movie!

[jwyblejr]

^Been there,done that.

[Brazoo]

I caught this brilliant low-budget comedy called "iSteve" on Netfilx recently - it reminded me of this thread.

It stars Justin "I'm a Mac" Long as Steve Jobs, and the movie does pretty thorough work of committing every biopic cliche in the book. It might be as ridiculous as the movie "Jobs", but at least "iSteve" was being funny on purpose.