Casey Comerford0:00 So kind of wanted to take a second to talk real quick about the current state of movies and cinema, um movie theaters, and especially um kind of what's going on with how people think and view the box office.0:13 Um we've seen earlier this year there's been movies that people loved.0:17 Um I take, for example, um Sinners that made I think 350 million in the box office worldwide, and then Superman, which made about 650 million worldwide.0:27 Um and those were widely regarded as very good movies.0:29 Most people enjoyed them, yet people are still quick to go and say, Oh, this was a box office flop.0:34 This was a fail because Superman had a higher budget superhero movie, they're thinking a billion dollars, and then you know, sinners, anything under 500 million can be, you know, just everything's so skewed nowadays to where people view have a different viewpoint of the box office.0:49 And I've seen um some big actors, DiCaprio, Brad Pitt, um, especially when Brad Pitt was interviewing his new F1 movie, um, kind of starting to talk about this, and I think obviously when you see like less people going to the movies, people say are quick to say that it's due to streaming.1:07 But I think people are so, you know, there was a run of about 10 years where we were just seeing billion dollar after billion dollar movie between the new Star Wars movies, the Marvel movies, um, and then some of the Disney movies.1:21 And I take example live action Lion King.1:24 Um, and I think though that run of about five years has completely just skewed with how we view the box office as a community.1:32 Um I think it is dangerous to view it in that way because it's it's it's it's very harmful to be quick to judge and say, oh, this is a major flop of the movie, um, because it didn't make X amount of money.1:43 Um, and even say, oh, well, it barely broke even or whatnot.1:48 But I think that's dangerous not only for how the the movie's reputation in general, but also for you know, the future of movie theaters.1:58 Like why would if everyone's quick to say this box office flop and it's just getting bad rate reputation after bad reputation, why would the producer companies want to take on these projects, say a m DC the next DC movie like Superman, if they know the only way for it to be considered a success is to make a billion dollars.2:14 That's a lot of pressure, it's a big risk to take on.2:17 Um and I don't think this is completely because of streaming services.2:22 Maybe there's a few less people going to the movies.2:25 Um but at the end of the day, I think it's it's dangerous to start calling a movie that made six hundred and fifty million dollars a flop.
Gaines Gunn0:00 Casey, this is a really interesting topic.0:02 Um I really wanted to touch on this because I did take film for two years in high school, and so I really do appreciate the art of film, cinematography, camera angles, all that, all that jazz.0:11 And so I will say I kind of agree with that, um, with the statement about how movies are now kind of fading away from the art of of filmmaking and more into simply just money making.0:22 And I think that's kind of a bad direction to go, kinda like you said.0:25 It's it's sad because I watched um in my film class and we analyzed these films as well.0:30 I watched some very interesting films like American Psycho and Um Chicago, and these are like and City of God.0:37 All these films are not like these crazy films that everyone knows about, but they are absolutely stunning and beautiful and complete works of art.0:44 And so I think we should shift our focus with films and movies away from how much money they can simply make and more into the creative aspect of it and how to um actually like further the art of filmmaking.0:59 And I think it's really sad because I did I I agree, not many people are going to the movie theaters anymore, but I went to the movie theaters and I saw the Fantastic Four movie, and it was just sad.1:08 It was just a sad piece of s of film.1:13 It was just the story was boring.1:16 It was the same thing that we've been forced down our throat over and over again, and it's just it's not this great thing.1:23 It's it's just to make money, and that's what's sad about film nowadays.1:27 Um but that is the reality of the United States and the film industry, is it is a capitalistic um environment, and so the goal is at the end of the day to make a profit.1:36 But I think it's sad.1:37 I think there would there are more creative ways to go about making money than it would be to just repeat the exact same story over and over and over again.