One critic's take on why one of the busiest years the film industry has ever witnessed could prove its most destructive period.Does anyone remember a time when the film industry simply produced a few entries of note in each individual year? That's a period which should feel distant to the vast majority of cinema goers as of 2013, where there are record-breaking sequels, prequels and reboots front, right and centre at all times, the Summer a particularly dense time for studios to bring their big guns out and rack up the dollars and pounds in the box office no matter what the cost. Indeed, with critically acclaimed motion pictures such as Les Miserables and Django Unchained now requiring a great deal of luck, promotion and star appeal to warrant a viewer's cash, the situation is becoming worryingly narrow in terms of the variety of new film offerings presented on an annual basis.
In order to first provide a retrospective on this matter, before we look ahead to 2015 and its potential disturbing implications, let's rewind a decade prior to that year, taking us back to 2005. There, we can see that that particular year's biggest sellers were Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith, The Chronicles of Narnia and War of the Worlds. Each of these blockbuster instalments performed admirably in the box office rankings, yet acquired nowhere near as much financial success as 2013 blockbusters such as Iron Man 3 and Star Trek Into Darkness have in recent months. More interestingly still, those new movies which went down more positively with the critics such as Batman Begins, Sin City and Goblet of Fire were often either in these charts or still performing relatively well in terms of profits and hard cash figures.
Were it to be the case that as of 2013, the same could still be said, with a select number of headline mainstream blockbusters released on an infrequent basis throughout the year and critically acclaimed cinematic pieces also given their time to shine, then there would be nothing to worry about. However, it has become clear in the past few weeks that such an assertion couldn't be less true- whereas innovative, expensive motion pictures such as Baz Luhrmman's stunning The Great Gatsby and Disney Pixar's charming prequel adventure Monsters' University would once have been given the time to warrant acclaim both critical and financial, in a Summer as busy as this they've simply been swept aside around a week after release in favour of new CGI-heavy, emotion-light blockbusters like Man of Steel, Pacific Rim and The Wolverine. Soon enough, at this rate blockbuster studios including Warner Brothers, Paramount and the like are simply going to likely reason that only these high-octane, critically divisive/oft-panned pieces are truly profitable in today's market, leaving us with a harsh final eventuality whereby many potential new classics are swept under the rug due to financial restraints.
It's bearing this in mind that highlights 2015 for me as such a potentially destructive year for the realm of cinema and the film industry as a whole. While fans of various franchises are no doubt ecstatic to hear that The Fantastic Four, Cinderella, The Penguins of Madagascar, Marvel's The Avengers: Age of Ultron, Assassin's Creed, Independence Day 2, The Smurfs 3, Superman Vs. Batman, Terminator 5, Pirates of the Caribbean 5, Ant-Man, Bond 24, The Hunger Games: Mockingjay- Part 2, Alvin & The Chipmunks 4, Kung Fu Panda 3 and Star Wars Episode VII are all set to form a part of their film line-up in just two years' time, to this writer there are plenty of negative connotations that could arise from this development. First and foremost, there's a clear trend of 'sequelitis' developing in this roster, perhaps moreso than any line-up we've seen emerge for previous years in the realms of the film industry.
This has a twofold potential negative impact for this industry- on the one hand, it encourages studios to continue along the lines of a lack of narrative innovation in terms of sticking to tried-and-tested franchises, and on the other hand, it equally forces them to neglect many more subtle indie projects of potentially higher quality as a result of financial constraints. The worldwide economy isn't getting any better these days, no matter what the significantly increasing levels of box office interest suggest, which means that eventually there will come a time when studios will place a focus on the franchises that are producing the most money. We've already seen such an outcome over at Disney, a studio now intent on highlighting their Avengers and Star Wars sagas via bi-annual or annual releases of new films in those particular franchises, as opposed to one Pixar film at best per year. What happened to this studio that was once so intent on preventing stale ideas that it demanded a new world and new characters from its various production teams each year? The allure of a bigger, Mickey Mouse-shaped pay cheque came in, that's what, and the same could happen across our industry.
Of course, I'm not here to suggest that once 2015 does arrive- and boy, will it arrive fast- you should simply neglect to support those film franchises which you hold close to your hearts, and indeed which likely remind you of childhood idealisms just as Marvel and Star Wars films aim to do. Nevertheless, this writer at the very least finds the prospect of a year so jam-packed with new franchise instalments a simultaneously thrilling and disturbing concept, since it begs the question as to whether those indie studios looking to provide quality over quantity will be neglected by the major distributors in favour of those titles certain to provide headlines and box office rankings which break records. If we're already showing signs of rapid neglect and dismissal of charming and innovative blockbusters such as Gatsby and Monsters, not to mention the (generally) plaudit-worthy Oscar shortlist nominees, then it's only natural to worry what state the film industry will be in come 2015, and whether even worthy longstanding franchises will fall into the gutter come that particular year's end.
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