Hollywood Needs a Wake up Call

Superheroes flying stoping baddies continuously in the same manner, vampires twinkling in the sunlight and pirates sailing over and over till the whole ship is fill with holes of disappointment that finally needs to sink in the deep waters of hungry vile critics forever. What is happening to Hollywood movies today you would wonder no wonder the romantics comedy department in Hollywood looks like it is faring better than any other department in the industry.

In the past five years, the movies in Hollywood seem to be taking a hard knock in the head with movies such as X-men: Wolverine, Fantastic Four, the horrible Aliens versus Predator franchise, the overuse idea of the movie Taken, and trying to get every dollar from audience with big budget sequels after sequels such as the fourth and hopefully final entry of Pirates of the Caribbean. Of course there has been a few exceptional movies such as the brilliant inception which had such originality and the dark No Country of Old Men which felt like an exact representation of the book (Javier Bardem just felt and act totally like Anton Chigurh that just sent chills to the bone). Growing up with movies such as Die Hard, Lethal Weapon and the original Walking Tall, I was looking forward to great movies which had original idea and if they were adaptations to games or comics hopefully stayed true to its origins. Although there were some pretty good adaptations with original ideas the dark knight, the lord of the ring series, watchmen to name a few many of the Hollywood movies seem to have loss the spark it had during the nineties and in the beginning of 2000.

My opinion, Hollywood needs a wake up call not more sequels with huge explosion and more babe exposure such as the sequel to Transformers Revenge of the Fallen which was the most confusing movie that I have seen. The revenge theme Taken was a crowd pleaser but somehow it still lack originality and it did not had that what many Malaysians would call oomph or power to maybe 2004 Man on fire which stared Denzel Washington. On the other hand, Hollywood should pay attention and takes some notes of original story ideas from movies of the east and from other forms of media as well such gaming and television. South Korea has released some jaw dropping ideas when it comes down to movies such as My Bittersweet life and the acclaimed Old Boy that told of a tale man locked up for 15 years for no apparent reason and frame for his wife murder. A revenge movie that felt like a combination of orange clockwork and crime noir that seem to go into the depth and soul of revenge.

US television and the gaming industry on the other hand have also excelled in terms of story ideas. Justified, the Wire and the walking dead are great adaptions and original idea that has managed to capture many of the audience feelings and emotions. On the gaming industry department, Mass Effect, The Witcher, Heavy Rain and Dead Space are good examples of how great story telling can be told by experiencing it. The fear and distrust of one personal journey to face their inner demons in Dead Space 2 has never been captured so well or the emotion of losing a loved one in Heavy Rain. Hollywood directors, producer and scriptwriter need a wake up call and stop making a quick buck out of the big sequels or ridiculous adaptations such as Resident Evil.

With that being said there are some good signs that Hollywood are learning their lesson with X: Men First Class and the Source Code. We shall see whether Hollywood will bring back its glory days in the years to come.