In no particular order, here are some suggestions for the film industry …
Please fill in your own below.
- Pair up Paul Rudd and Elizabeth Banks in a smart rom-com. The duo played lovers in “Role Models,” but it was a very small segment of a larger R-rated romp. Let these two charmers have an entire movie to themselves and prove the romantic comedy isn’t past its prime. Hasn’t Katherine Heigl gotten enough chances to fill the fabled Meg Ryan slot as America’s Sweetheart?
- Here’s a documentary sequel we actually need – “I.O.U. 2: The Obama Deficit.” Just don’t hold your breath for it.
- ’80s overload: Enough with recreating the Me Decade. We’re in nostalgia overload, and it’s not pretty.
- No more franchises for Robert Downey, Jr: The comeback kid might be the most electric actor working today. But he’s saddled with “Iron Man” and “Sherlock Holmes” sequels, plus the upcoming “Avengers” film. Let him work on some original material … please?
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{ 13 comments… read them below or add one }
1. I would like to see a good Viking flick — a 300 type. Not some anti-Christian claptrap and not some awful Polar Express meets Leif Erickson animated crap.
2. I would like to see a good big budget American Revolution film… Similar to the Patriot, but on George Washington. David Morse did a great job on John Adams — this could be good for him and us.
3. Lone Survivor (book by Marcus Luttrell the film… I think there’s one in pre-production, but the story has it all.
4. I’d like to see James Bond head to Afghanistan/Pakistan and track down a high-roller who backs bin Laden types. He can still play poker with hot wimmins — but underneath he is a jihadist true believer.
5. I’d like to see a good big screen biopic of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, but I know WW2 has been done to death.
I would like less re-boots and re-makes and would like to see more original screenplays or adapted from books (that aren’t comics).
“Y: The Last Man” is a great graphic novel, with lots of powerful apocalyptic imagery and sneaky social commentary, along with well-defined characters and a compelling storyline to boot. With comic book movies being all the rage at the moment, I’d love to see a visionary director like Zack Snyder or Chris Nolan tackle it.
If “The Expendables” is half as good as it looks, then I’d like to see Stallone make a franchise out of it.
And a biopic of Ayaan Hirsi Ali desperately needs to be made, but I doubt anyone in Hollywood will ever touch that one with a 20-foot-pole.
I would love to see heroic stories about our soldiers in Iraq or Afghanistan. There have got to be so many acts of bravery that we haven’t even heard about, and there’s source material from Michael Yon, David Bellavia, etc. They don’t have to paint the soldiers as saints – human flaws and complexity are OK – but at least start with the premise that these are genuinely smart and capable men and women who are called to serve out of love for their country. And please resist the urge to make the US government or Western companies the villain.
Old-school Hollywood was deft at creating movies on small budgets using a plethora of stories and ideas. As years have gone by, we get less and less movies each year, which means hedging bets on fewer and fewer movies, which means more of the same, less innovation and less quality. That means funding is funneled straight to guaranteed hits such as re-makes, sequels or star-studded small budget fare such as Matt McC rom-coms and Will Ferrell man-boy comedies.
Technology, by now, should make things cheaper not more expensive. Focus on that, not on making every hair on the Panda look perfect.
Go back, watch every Western from 1935 to 1967, repeat.
1. Let there be an end to shaky cam movies. It’s a rotten gimmick that has overstayed its welcome.
2. I miss Whit Stillman and would love to see some studio give him enough cash to make movies again.
3. Please, Hollywood, don’t screw up the film version of World War Z.
There is a book out called “War As They Knew It” about the 10 year war between Woody Hayes and Bo Shembelcher. It is non-fiction but reads like a novel. It’s written by a writer from the Detroit Free Press, though off the top of my head I can’t remember who. I would SOO love to see this book made into one of those epic HBO mini-series. Not a feature but a mini-series simply because there is just too much material there.
I would concur with Floyd Turbo about the American Revolution. The last good series on that came out in the 80’s starring Barry Boswick as Washington. I would love to see David Morse fill that role.
I don’t mind remakes as long as they’re good, or at least make you have a good time. But agreed that there needs to be more orignal material.
I’ll give cudos to Chris Nolan for Inception. Saw it this past weekend and it was one of the best films of the year (my take). To give some context, we saw it in a theater with many teens who would normally spend a film talking or texting. Not a one of them made any noise during the entire film. It was amazing.
More fare like this would be welcome.
Great stuff, all …
Some thoughts:
Yes, why in the world haven’t we seen one movie featuring heroic U.S. soldiers in Iraq or Afghanistan? Just try it, Hollywood. If it tanks, move on to the next anti-war project.
Whit Stilman … man, I love “Metropolitan.” It was one of a handful of movies I watched over and again when I worked at a mom ‘n pop vid store years ago.
I am a little tired of event movies. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy watching them, but I wouldn’t mind some movies that weren’t crammed down my throat marketing-wise.
I watched the movie Sneakers the other day. It was pretty fantastic to see Robert Redford in a movie that was fun and not real preachy. I wouldn’t mind if the political message movie went away for a century or two.
I enjoy Redford, even his directing. Definitely an actor who is much more enjoyable when he isn’t behind a pulpit.
1. How about a movie about americans battling terrorists? Without the moral equivalence hoo-haa. I think Executive Decision was the last one of this type.
2. How about a movie about a traditional family that struggles and thrives in a dysfunctional society–instead of the other way around?
3. More real stunts, less green screen. We can still tell the difference.
4. A family comedy where the kids are silly and the parents are wise–instead of the other way around…..
I must be gettin’ crotchety…..
I loved the 80s, every last cheesy part of it, but please quit remaking the movies of the 80s, Hollywood. You suck at it. I would like to see more quirky Coen Bros flicks, a la Fargo, a whole new spate of 90s style Tarantino films, and maybe even some romcoms that don’t star women my age, (40s), trying to be dewy ingenues. Where are the fresh, quirky girls that can take over for Meg, Julia, Jennifer, and Cameron? I love a good shoot-em-up, full on explosion heavy movie. Where are the fun movies like Die Hard, that just are fun? No social commentary, no angst? And speaking of angst, that’s what we have now. Why can’t characters go back to being 1 dimensional? Having all this back story can kill a straight forward movie. Everyone doesn’t have to be depressed, have some tortured past. Let’s just have fun, AKA why real 80s movies were great.
1. This isn’t going to happen until it becomes public domain, but I’d love to see J. R. R. Tolkien’s “Hobbit” and “Lord of the Rings” done as he wrote them, exactly as he wrote them, and very light on the magic (read ’special effects’) unless it was needed, and then very intense indeed, but brief, with the lectures on the dangers of magic left intact in the script. These works are so much more than just a swords-and-sorcery deal, and audiences will love them, just as they have loved the books.
2. Coverage of the Soviet era as it really was in Europe, the USSR, and its real activities in and effects on the rest of the world. Going along with this would be realistic coverage of the Cold War — there must be a lot of material in there that, objectively handled, would make good drama.
3. Redo the story of John Adams (or a fresh story of one of the other central people then) and tell it as it really was, as he really was, not so much inaccuracy and PC fiction: and this time, please, do include the American Revolution. I just tried watching this for the first time and so could easily get going on a rant, but will limit myself to:
a) Don’t tell us things: show them. If you have the members of the Second Continental Congress fretting that there are British warships coming up the river, then by all means, show at least a little bit of the British actually taking Philadelphia and Adams escaping, rather than just a one-liner later on from Abigail in the next series part as the couple stroll through the back yard at home one calm winter day back in Massachusetts saying she was afraid she had lost him when Philadelphia fell.
b) If you must show Benedict Arnold on horseback in front of his troops and in full hero mode in Philadelphia while the Declaration is being read — and congratulations on getting an actor who so closely resembled Arnold that I suspected you of cloning — then bring him into the rest of the show at some point. I thought there was going to be a subplot with Washington and him, the part about Arnold’s wife buying time for her husband to escape by pretending to be hysterical when General Washington came to West Point–nice parallel with Washington’s meeting with Abigail there. I was put off by there just being a verbal reference later in the series by some character over in England about ‘Arnold’s treachery.’
c) Allegory will only get you so far and then it will lose your audience. Specifically, I rather liked the fear of new things shown as the Congress debated independence tied in with Abigail having herself and the kids vaccinated, but it would have been nice to know what John thought of her actions. Later on, though, I did not appreciate the allegorical balloon lift-off in France; I would have preferred seeing some of the nitty and the gritty of that new republic getting off to a start, especially with the show focused on the historical character who negotiated the treaty with Britain and fought for and got important fishing rights, etc. in it. But I feel a rant coming on, so will just sum up: if you’re going to do a movie or series about a historical person, then follow the history, don’t reinvent the whole thing. It’s nowhere near as satisfying.
4. Life of Gotama Buddha as told in the Theravadan canon…the full De Mille treatment, please (although in this case, the drama and high-budget stuff would come first, while he was a Prince, and then the story would simplify…at least until the gods started visiting the Buddha, etc.) I am a Theravadan Buddhist and would really enjoy something like that.