(Guest post by Dagnabbitt, longtime acquaintance of WWTW and an occasional freelance script writer)
At the Movies … is not what it used to be.
The marketing buildup for James Cameron’s “Avatar” causes me to consider that his dozen-year-old “Titanic” remains one of the very few films of the past decade and one-half that truly were designed for the cinema (I, of course, put the “Lord of the Rings” trilogy in this category).
So many other releases either quickly migrate to DVD or are released directly to DVD that I fear the Industry is undermining its own existence.
DVDs just are not the ideal vehicle for film enjoyment, and their diminishing sales underscore this. Consumers just are not enchanted by DVDs – even with the value-add of the Blu-ray format.
In light of the ever-growing number of online video consumption, it appears that consumers are settling for products that are far less in quality than the usual Hollywood productions. Further, release window shifts and “buzz” are not appreciably changing this metric.
Consumers who did not come out for $10 cinematic releases are not likely to spend $20 to own them – save for the few blockbusters. The amount of available content and the inverse amount of actual viewing time conspire against the investing in a DVD requiring repeated viewing to justify the initial purchase.
DVD collections thus diminish, save for core essentials.
The Industry just must recognize that it need no longer create a glut of supply in order to survive at the cost of diminished quality. Movies, and movie-going, used to mean something – the industry must make its product once again mean something, dagnabbitt!
(Photo: James Cameron’s “Titanic” gave audiences a story worthy of the big screen.)
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I'm an award-winning journalist and film critic with more than a decade of experience in newspapers, magazines and the Web. I'm a member of both the Washington, DC Area Film Critics Association and the Denver Film Critics Society.
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
Personally, I prefer DVD’s. In a theater, the sound is often way too loud and the visuals on a huge screen are so overwhelming, they border on migraine inducing (I’m looking at you, Star Trek).
By the way, it’s “disillusioned” not “disallusioned”.
Hey, Star Trek is the last film in a long time I really enjoyed that much. It was encumbered by people whining about the environment or the droning sadness of contemporary politics.
I loved Star Trek!