Why Modern Cinema and Hollywood Movies Suck

My thoughts on why modern movies seem to suck compared to the past. Keep in mind your biases affect your memory, but movies have gotten worse primarily due to marketing and profit concerns.

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[ghs-]

Movies now seem to focus less on plot, and more on pandering to the lowest common denominator.

[RobertShyanNorwalt]

Could we go back to plots, acting, and talent?

[wado]

Modern movies are cut so fast and there's so much CG crap in every frame that I can't tell what's happening half the time. I get bored because it's just a bunch of visual noise. In the mean time, there's almost no story, no reason for me to care about what's happening, because it's so full of action. Maybe I'm in the minority, but I don't understand how that increases crowd appeal.

[scanspeak]

I use the food analogy - modern blockbusters are like a McDonalds big mac, filling your stomach but ultimately leaving you unsatisfied and unnourished. I haven't had a big mac in many, many years.

[edwardgleeson]

The problem is they've taken reality and human relationships and subordinated them to special effects. Very rarely do you see a film that has anything important to say. Even bland TV shows of the 60s felt they had to have some moral or teaching aspect. Viewers are being dumbed down big time.

[simplythebestk]

I think the B movies have become big budget movies. Ironically some movies that would be considered B movies are starting to become better because they focus on narrative and or story rather than flash.

[entropyw]

Before watching this, as a screenplay writer, the problem is lack of character development. If you don't care about the characters in the film, you don't care about the film.

[OrtegaSeason]

Since the late 90s there's definitely been a shift towards having much more comedy in big budget films especially those aimed partially or primarily at younger people.  The first film I saw at the cinema was The Land Before Time.  That's a kids film but there's barely any comedy in it if any.  There's  "cutesy" characters but no actual jokes or gags.  By contrast if you look at American animated films today, they're all 50% comedic.  To me at least this privileging of comedy over drama makes them much less memorable, but I suppose from a marketing perspective it makes sense.  Almost everyone likes comedy but not everyone likes dramatic stories.

[pigboykool]

Simple, bad story/plot, too much on special effect, and sex special effect.

[daboys]

Plots that make no sense. Terrible actors. Gratuitous nudity. Explicit sex scenes which do nothing to enhance the movie. No intelligent stories. Vulgar language. All of that means me staying home and not bothering with the theaters at all.

[r.blakehole]

Basically, it appears that modern screenwriters are ignorant of the three thousand years of Western Storytelling. If you are ignorant of the past you cannot draw upon that unknown knowledge to craft the future. We live in an age which completely denigrates and disparages the past. But, as the aphorism describes, if you do not learn from the past you are doomed to repeat it. Thus, modern storytelling is shallow and repeats mindlessly the dogma of the present politically correct regime. But, from a storytelling reality that regime has only a dept of twenty years, whereas the western story telling history has a depth of 3000 years. Think about it.

[TentaclePentacle]

There is the reason why the current tv series are better than movies now, because actually have the time to tell a full story.

[mengutimur]

Say it with me, people. I HATE THE FORCE AWAKENS!

[Jared_Wignall]

I love all sorts of films, but superhero films and Disney's Star Wars are too much at this point. There's a new one every year, and it just gets too much. Directors like David Fincher, Christopher Nolan, Wes Anderson and Paul Thomas Anderson make their films one at a time, and don't just rush into a film because they want to make money. People go to see their films because they make something that the director's interested in and really devote a lot of their time into the development and go about making the best film they can. If only big studios could understand this, than maybe people would be more excited for the type of films they're putting out.

[storyiseverything]

Two of my favourite films are Ghostbusters and Back to the Future. Both are high concept/sci fi/ fantasy films however neither rely on their special effects. In fact both have very little special effects in them. It was all about story and character.

[marcushedstrom]

In many cases, if you make a movie for everyone, you are making it for no one.

[chrisl]

Too much CGI!!! Everything is created through some computer and its so jumbled on-screen that i cannot even tell what's happening. If movies scale back on the graphics then movies will improve. Also, stop with all the dang propaganda in so many movies. I don't want to watch a movie to be indoctrinated.

[anthonyanderson]

One point that i'm not sure is mentioned in this video as I haven't watched the whole thing yet is that all the top writers in Hollywood all write for TV shows now more so than film. The last 15 years or so we've seen a New Golden Age in Television with the amount of quality TV shows that have been run. Everything from the Sopranos, The Wire, Mad Men, The Shield, Sons of Anarchy, Breaking Bad, Game of Thrones, Homeland, Dexter, etc... all are the results of excellent writing, something mainstream movies are now lacking.

[mar]

Leftest PC propaganda is why I cant watch anymore.
Every 5th person is gay, or trans.
The average woman is always automatically the strongest, fastest, and smartest now no matter the situation.. Its getting very boring.

[Kissamiess]

Similar to my experience with video game especially in 00s. As the budgets got big, everything was dumbed down for the lowest common denominator to maximise the audience. Looks like the crowdfunding has reversed the trend by showing that there is still audience for the more complex games and diverse genres, though.