Death of Hollywood?
--------------------------------------------------
Oh no! Not again! Didn't Hollywood die in the '50s after TV killed it? Then, didn't it die again in the '80s, when VHS drove a wooden stake through its heart? Okay. So should I be worried that DVD is about to kill Hollywood for the third time?
This week, Slate magazine reports yet another and somewhat compelling argument that DVD could deal a fatal blow, at least insofar as Box Office receipts are concerned. But check out the numbers. There's no doubt that, percentage wise, box office is way off the 100% mark that it held when a theater was the only place you could see a movie. Also true, DVD sales and rentals are on a huge upswing -- they've definitely all but killed off VHS (rest in peace), but, did box office do any worse than last year? Short answer: No!
I never know quite how to take these stories. The focus of this week's episode of Hollywood's Death Spiral is that the window of time from when a movie is first released to the theaters and when it shows up on Cable and DVD keeps shrinking. That means that DVD distributors can/will be getting more attention from Hollywood than will the owners of theater chains. Is that really bad?
Call me ignorant, but the way I look at it, Hollywood is still very much behind the wheel of the content, whether that content debuts at local theaters or goes straight to DVD-only release. I don't see the problem. For theaters, maybe, but not for Hollywood. Granted, I don't want my local theaters to close down -- here in Carbon Harbor, but it's been years since I could depend on them to bring me the full smorgasbord of what's out there, anyway. But, thanks to the Internet, I can expand my scope, read the New York Times, etc., find out what's new and, even if I know it's never coming to a theater in my town, it still shows up in the DVD store. Yeh! Even here in Carbon Harbor! So, the way I see it, there's still way more out there to see than ever before, Hollyood is still behind it, at least distribution-wise, even if not production-wise. So, where's the problem?
I spent some extended time in San Francisco and New York last year. True, the options for seeing something a little (or a lot) off the commercially beaten path are far better, but it is still limited to a handful of theaters. By far, most of the theaters are multi-plexes, just like here in Carbon Harbor, and they show the same current releases I can see at home. For those I can't see in the theater, I wait until they come out on DVD. If the wait becomes shorter, hey, I'm happy. Even if my local DVD store doesn't order a release on their own, I can usually convince them to order it. Not for me, only, but for rental purposes. You know, a copy or two. I'll rent it, other folks in town will rent it, and even a few farmers in the boonies will rent it and then they can sell it used. They've got better odds on selling those few copies than they do selling all 200 copies of The Minority Report that they ordered for the "Guaranteed In Stock!" promotion. They make their money, Hollywood makes theirs, and, in the end, more people have seen it than would have back in 1950 when the movie never would have made it to the Bijou in the first place. Where's the problem? The way I see it, Hollywood is still creating the content and, thanks to DVDs, more of us are seeing it. Who's losing? The theatres that didn't bring it to town in the first place?
And that only goes for recent releases. I remember in the '70s, going to film school in Chicago, those were terribly frustrating times. I'd sit in classes hearing/reading about the films of Chaplin, Griffith, Murnau or we'd discuss movies like Giant, Wild Bunch or Le Jetty. Yeah, right, the professor had seen it, but we had to take his word for it that it was great, because it wasn't ever going to play again anywhere we'd be seeing it so we were just shit out of luck. Sure, we might catch it as a late, late, late movie, with a gazillion carpet commercials, where any movie would begin to seem like a long, bore-to-death epic, in which all sense of pacing is lost.
Then, after I got scared that I'd never make a living doing what I wanted to and then got myself a nice day job as a COBOL programmer, I finally was able to rent some of these things and see them again or for the first time, on VHS. It's only gotten better with DVD.
When I first told my 70 year old father about my screenplay for Carbon Harbor, he looked at me and said, "That reminds me of an old Spencer Tracy movie, "Bad Day at Black Rock." I searched hopelessly for it, but, it wasn't released on DVD until May of this year. But it was released and now I own it and somebody (in Hollywood) made some money on it, probably for the first time in 40 years. How can that be bad? It's not bad for Hollywood and I'm sure my local Cineplex wasn't planning on a revival of the movie anytime soon.
So, thanks to DVD, there are now more opportunities than ever before to see Hollywood content, regardless of when it was made. Where's the problem? Theaters aren't showing that stuff anyway, but people do still like to get out of their homes to see a new movie made for a big screen. Box office is also still the best marketing medium for debuting and gauging what material might make for a good "renter" or "keeper" at home.
So where's the problem?
Well, today Hollywood also agreed on a standard for Digital Delivery of movies. Okay, so maybe 35 MM film is on it's way out as a delivery medium, but is that bad? You can still shoot it and transfer to digital. It may take years for theaters to convert, coast to coast, but you know they will, eventually. Even the Cineplex here in Carbon Harbor. They will. They're not closing. Not until people stop going out on dates or never want to just get the hell out of the house, now and then.
Comically, the Wall Street Journal looked at the lagging sales of Shrek 2 DVDs and interpreted that to mean a slowdown in DVD sales in general. WTF? Can they really be that stupid?
Box office is not going away. Changing? Yes, for certain, but not going away. DVDs can offer any movie to anyone, regardless of when the movie was first released. Where do movies come from? Hollywood. So, is Hollywood dying?
I don't think so.
This week, Slate magazine reports yet another and somewhat compelling argument that DVD could deal a fatal blow, at least insofar as Box Office receipts are concerned. But check out the numbers. There's no doubt that, percentage wise, box office is way off the 100% mark that it held when a theater was the only place you could see a movie. Also true, DVD sales and rentals are on a huge upswing -- they've definitely all but killed off VHS (rest in peace), but, did box office do any worse than last year? Short answer: No!
I never know quite how to take these stories. The focus of this week's episode of Hollywood's Death Spiral is that the window of time from when a movie is first released to the theaters and when it shows up on Cable and DVD keeps shrinking. That means that DVD distributors can/will be getting more attention from Hollywood than will the owners of theater chains. Is that really bad?
Call me ignorant, but the way I look at it, Hollywood is still very much behind the wheel of the content, whether that content debuts at local theaters or goes straight to DVD-only release. I don't see the problem. For theaters, maybe, but not for Hollywood. Granted, I don't want my local theaters to close down -- here in Carbon Harbor, but it's been years since I could depend on them to bring me the full smorgasbord of what's out there, anyway. But, thanks to the Internet, I can expand my scope, read the New York Times, etc., find out what's new and, even if I know it's never coming to a theater in my town, it still shows up in the DVD store. Yeh! Even here in Carbon Harbor! So, the way I see it, there's still way more out there to see than ever before, Hollyood is still behind it, at least distribution-wise, even if not production-wise. So, where's the problem?
I spent some extended time in San Francisco and New York last year. True, the options for seeing something a little (or a lot) off the commercially beaten path are far better, but it is still limited to a handful of theaters. By far, most of the theaters are multi-plexes, just like here in Carbon Harbor, and they show the same current releases I can see at home. For those I can't see in the theater, I wait until they come out on DVD. If the wait becomes shorter, hey, I'm happy. Even if my local DVD store doesn't order a release on their own, I can usually convince them to order it. Not for me, only, but for rental purposes. You know, a copy or two. I'll rent it, other folks in town will rent it, and even a few farmers in the boonies will rent it and then they can sell it used. They've got better odds on selling those few copies than they do selling all 200 copies of The Minority Report that they ordered for the "Guaranteed In Stock!" promotion. They make their money, Hollywood makes theirs, and, in the end, more people have seen it than would have back in 1950 when the movie never would have made it to the Bijou in the first place. Where's the problem? The way I see it, Hollywood is still creating the content and, thanks to DVDs, more of us are seeing it. Who's losing? The theatres that didn't bring it to town in the first place?
And that only goes for recent releases. I remember in the '70s, going to film school in Chicago, those were terribly frustrating times. I'd sit in classes hearing/reading about the films of Chaplin, Griffith, Murnau or we'd discuss movies like Giant, Wild Bunch or Le Jetty. Yeah, right, the professor had seen it, but we had to take his word for it that it was great, because it wasn't ever going to play again anywhere we'd be seeing it so we were just shit out of luck. Sure, we might catch it as a late, late, late movie, with a gazillion carpet commercials, where any movie would begin to seem like a long, bore-to-death epic, in which all sense of pacing is lost.
Then, after I got scared that I'd never make a living doing what I wanted to and then got myself a nice day job as a COBOL programmer, I finally was able to rent some of these things and see them again or for the first time, on VHS. It's only gotten better with DVD.
When I first told my 70 year old father about my screenplay for Carbon Harbor, he looked at me and said, "That reminds me of an old Spencer Tracy movie, "Bad Day at Black Rock." I searched hopelessly for it, but, it wasn't released on DVD until May of this year. But it was released and now I own it and somebody (in Hollywood) made some money on it, probably for the first time in 40 years. How can that be bad? It's not bad for Hollywood and I'm sure my local Cineplex wasn't planning on a revival of the movie anytime soon.
So, thanks to DVD, there are now more opportunities than ever before to see Hollywood content, regardless of when it was made. Where's the problem? Theaters aren't showing that stuff anyway, but people do still like to get out of their homes to see a new movie made for a big screen. Box office is also still the best marketing medium for debuting and gauging what material might make for a good "renter" or "keeper" at home.
So where's the problem?
Well, today Hollywood also agreed on a standard for Digital Delivery of movies. Okay, so maybe 35 MM film is on it's way out as a delivery medium, but is that bad? You can still shoot it and transfer to digital. It may take years for theaters to convert, coast to coast, but you know they will, eventually. Even the Cineplex here in Carbon Harbor. They will. They're not closing. Not until people stop going out on dates or never want to just get the hell out of the house, now and then.
Comically, the Wall Street Journal looked at the lagging sales of Shrek 2 DVDs and interpreted that to mean a slowdown in DVD sales in general. WTF? Can they really be that stupid?
Box office is not going away. Changing? Yes, for certain, but not going away. DVDs can offer any movie to anyone, regardless of when the movie was first released. Where do movies come from? Hollywood. So, is Hollywood dying?
I don't think so.
posted by Bryrock at 6:29 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
Links to this post:
Create a Link
<< Home