Why Movies Are So Expensive (And How To Fix It)

if Godzilla minus one taught us anything it's the Eastern filmmakers are probably going to end up doing to movies what manga is currently doing to the US comic book industry the kind of things that make even my most demanding sessions with Tatiana look like a playful cuddle and an early night in comparison partly this is because they haven't yet been infected by the postmodern nihilistic malaise that slowly kill in Hollywood but mostly it's because they're able to produce big bombastic movies on par with anything we can make over here only for a fraction of the price and it got me to thinking why why are movies so damn expensive now what is it about our style of film making that results in ludicrous budgets of Two Three or even $400 million well with this video I want to shed some light on the issue I'm going to delve a little deeper into the reasons behind the problem and maybe even make a few suggestions for how it might be corrected in future so hold on to your wallets as I take you through the five reasons why modern movies are so expensive ensive one actors there's no getting around this actors are paid way too much these days and I'm not talking about the day players and The jobbers Who live paycheck to paycheck and have to struggle just to get by I'm talking about the top level Talent the a-listers the cream of the crop the men and women who command such ridiculously overblown salaries that they actually push movie budgets to the point of failure often with little or no justification as it turns out take for example Jennifer Lawrence the first female action star first woman to discover fire and the first intelligent life form on planet Earth who was famously paid $20 million about 15% of the film's total production budget for a role in the movie Passengers even though there was almost nothing to suggest that she was actually a box office draw and no I'm not going to count the Hunger Games in this because that was her breakout role so she had no star power to exploit at the time she was famous for sure but she wasn't a box office draw and that my friend is a very important distinction when you're writing Pat checks and it's not like this is a rare occurrence in Hollywood Arnold Schwarzenegger got paid $30 million for his role in Terminator 3 even though he was clearly past his prime as an action start and hadn't had a major hit in almost 10 years in short he was no longer a bankable box office draw and yet he was still getting paid like one it's even worse in the present day because as other people have rightly pointed out we don't even have movie stars now in the traditional sense yeah we've still got plenty of famous actors with all their brand deals and magazine articles but the days of Hollywood starss who could sell out movie theaters on their name alone are long gone I mean let's be real here when was the last time you went to see a movie purely because of who was in it and yet even as the commercial power of actors declines their salaries just keep increasing mid tier comedy actors like Adam Sandler and Will Ferrell who churn out low effort dog [ __ ] movies and haven't been commercially relevant in years somehow still command $20 million paychecks even Daisy Ridley who's done precisely [ __ ] all since in Star Wars and practically vanished Into Obscurity is being paid $12 million to reprise her role as Ray yeah money well spent there Lads nice one and then there's the rock everyone's favorite lovable Boulder who makes insane amounts of money for being in films that nobody can ever remember who's apparently getting paid 50 million for his role in the upcoming movie red one son of B [ __ ] that is [ __ ] absurd you could literally make an entire mid-budget movie from his salary alone there is no way that any actor can possibly be worth that much to a project and the thing is it's not just the actors themselves it's everything that comes along with them the biggest stars will usually bring along a whole retinue of stylists personal trainers personal assistants personal chefs life coaches publicists and various other hangers on all of which have to be fed housed and paid usually out of the production budget all of this stuff adds up to one simple fact most actors are grossly overpaid for what they actually bring to a project and their bloated salaries contribute to the spiraling cost of most big budget Hollywood films the only way you could realistically fix this is either put a cap on salaries or a massive reduction in upfront payments in favor of backend deals both of which would require a massive overhaul of the entire Hollywood System number two production bloat if you've ever worked at a big company for any length of time you'll probably have noticed how much waste and inefficiency there is bizarre and nonsensical processes that do nothing but create log jams pointless job titles that are no longer needed people that have been around for so long that nobody really understands what they even do anymore it's the kind of stuff that happens in a large and complex organization and it's much the same with Hollywood movies like how many times have you seen a film with a list of producers executive producers and special Consultants a m long and thought to yourself what the [ __ ] did all these people actually do the answer most of the time is absolutely nothing the thing is big movie projects are a kind of mutually parasitic relationship people generally want to be attached to them because it brings Prestige and attention and allows them to pad out their resume to make it look like they've done way more stuff than they actually have on the flip side having the right name attached to your project can give it the clout it needs to get extra funding better marketing and bigger actors attached either way all of these people command salaries regardless of how much work they actually do and a lot of them can be pretty [ __ ] expensive and that's not even counting all the pointless madeup positions that have cropped up in recent years I wonder how many movies have been improved by the presence of intimacy coordinators sensitivity readers on-site therapists or diversity and inclusion Consultants but there they are anyway and they all cost money lots of money it's too much [ __ ] too many layers of management too many pointless people doing nothing useful and it all adds up to a shocking waste of time money and resources three too much CGI again you don't need me to tell you that modern movies have begun to rely on visual spectacle over character and story and that usually means CGI a lot of it and the reality is that CGI is expensive as [ __ ] these days especially cuz most effect houses are in high demand so they can basically charge whatever they want a good example of this would be the Indiana Jones series Raiders of the Lost Arc was filled with action adventure and spectical and it definitely resorted to visual effects when it had to but for the most part it used models pyrot Technic stunt men and real locations for its filming the result it came in at a budget of just $20 million that's about 67 million in today's money dial of Destiny on the other hand made extensive use of CGI just like everything else these days and combined with all the other factors we've already mentioned plus a few more we haven't the production budget ballooned to well over 300 million that's almost five times larger than Raiders even adjusted for inflation and did it result in a movie that's five times as good I'll let you you decides number four bad writing as to find people at film threat have done an excellent job of exposing in recent weeks the current thinking in Hollywood circles is that old pale and male is stale especially in the writers room and the only way to fix the problem is to force them out and replace them with a new crop of younger and more diverse writers which is great as far as I'm concerned because I like nothing more than seeing a whole group of people have opportunities and resources arbitrarily taken away from them and given to a completely different group that someone somewhere decided were far more deserving it does create a bit of a problem though because no matter how many boxes these new writers take the one that they keep missing out on is experience for example it's easy enough to write a big elaborate fight and Chase sequence through a crowded City but an experienced screenwriter would understand that something like that is going to be hugely expensive and timec consuming to actually shoot they tailor their scripts based on years of experience of what can actually be done with the production budget available new writers don't have that kind of experience though and so they tend to write stuff that's far beyond the scope of what can actually be delivered the other big issue with people like that is that well a lot of the time they're just not very good at what they do they don't know how to put together smart complex logically consistent stories populated by compelling characters interesting dialogue and meaningful arcs this lowquality writing has the KnockOn effect of poor test screenings which in turn gives rise to number five re-shoot re-shoot are the [ __ ] bane of modern film making yeah I know it's always been a thing to some extent and I know movies like Superman 2 and Back to the Future had pretty major re-shoot but they were very much the exception to the rule back then nowadays major re-shoot are practically expected because when there's hundreds of millions of dollars on the line who wants to take a chance on releasing a movie that tested badly with audiences Justice League Suicide Squad dial of Destiny The Flash and the Marvels all had massive re-shoot mostly because of appalling test screenings and panicking Studios and the real problem here is that re-shoot basically replicate all of the other problems that are already stacking up because now you're going to have to hire even more shitty writers to try and fix the problems created by the previous shitty writers and all that new work is going to have to be checked over by sensitivity readers and the diversity and inclusion Consultants to make sure it adheres to the message then you have to recall all those expensive actors with their expensive assistance and work with the intimacy coordinators and the on-site therapists to make sure nobody getss too stressed by the whole thing then you have to bring back overworked and expensive visual effects companies to do more CGI to try to cover up the massive cracks in your screen play and you have to answer to all the extra producers and the executive producers and the creative Consultants who all want to know why you're not returning their calls anymore add all of these different factors together and it's no [ __ ] wonder that movies are so expensive and difficult to make now the whole industry's become so bloated and inefficient so over stuffed with expensive and unqualified people so dependent on spectacle and superficiality that they've basically priced themselves right out of their own Market a 3 or 400 million doll movie needs the best part of a billion dollars just to break even and as last year showed us fewer and fewer movies are capable of reaching that Milestone so what's the solution you might ask don't just complain about the problem Drinker my good man show us a way out of it how can Hollywood Studios dig their way out of the financial hole that they've created for themselves well the first thing they need to do is start trimming the fat cut down on the number of pointless job roles on set the intimacy coordinators and the sensitivity readers the unnecessary producers and overseers who do nothing but clug up production stop relying so much on overblown CGI to carry a weak script and bring back practical effects in location shooting recognize that actors no longer sell movie tickets simply by existing and pay them accordingly because if everyone does it then they've got no choice but to accept it sorry Dwayne you're going to have to put that third private jet on on hold for now also bring back solid quality mid-budget movies that can be made for less than $100 million because you can make three of them for every bloated wannabe Mega Blockbuster that's churned out that means three times as many chances to have a Smash Hit which in turn means less risk with individual projects which results in less Studio interference and more opportunities for creativity and Innovation it also allows you to avoid the dreaded Pitfall of the safe generic Omni film that has to try to appeal to absolutely everyone because it's the only hope of making back its ridiculous budget but in reality ends up satisfying no one with cheaper films you can afford to Target a specific audience and actually appeal to them and for [ __ ] sake start hiring competent and experienced writers again who can actually deliver good scripts instead of relying on a bunch of meaningless check boxes that have been promoted into positions they're totally not qualified for who are going to deliver substandard work that will require a ton of expensive reshoots to fix do these things and you might just find that making movies can easier more cost effective and more profitable than you imagined or on the other hand feel free to ignore me and carry on [ __ ] out $300 million turds that nobody watches until the money eventually runs out and your whole industry falls apart around you the choice as they say is yours anyway that's all I've got for today go away now

Channel: The Critical Drinker

Views: 988,146

Keywords: critical drinker, review, funny, best, star wars, disney, feminism, feminist, captain marvel, the marvels, indiana jones, kathleen kennedy, bob iger, hollywood, movies, budgets, lucasfilm, rachel zegler, brie larson, sharmeen obaid chinoy, rey, daisy ridley

Id: kn6rGRPUMbk

Length: 12min 21sec (741 seconds)

Published: Sat Feb 10 2024