'Only Those Who Are Prepared To Fall Greatly Can Ever Succeed Greatly' - Hollywood VS Art House

Do you remember a time when you watched something at the cinema that wasn't an adaptation, remake, prequel or sequel? Failing that just have a quick look at your DVD shelf. You do, you say? Made you think though didn't it?
I was staggered to be told during a screenwriting seminar that 'adaptation' in its entirety makes up for around 84% for contemporary cinema. I remember a dissertation I wrote some time ago regarding the emerging roles of women since the 1930's, I called it, 'From Scream Queen To Action Hero.' It started from 'King Kong' in 1933 to other examples such as 'Tomb Raider' to 2001 and beyond.
I don't care too much for academic writing as I do for the practical screenwriting & directing side but this was interesting. Reviewing Hollywood's money making strategy, there's no doubt it works, especially when it comes down to choice of directors & actors / actresses but seriously... it's 2013 now and we're getting 'Die Hard 5', 'Fast & Furious 6', 'Scary Movie 5' another X-Men number not forgetting those that have sneaked in under 3D's outfit like 'Final Destination 6 (3D)', 'Saw 7 (3D)' then of course we all know about the relentless 'Paranormal (shoot yourself in steady cam night vision and pull pieces of string to make things move) Activity', moving to 'Harry Potter one-hundred', 'Twilight one-thousand' & don't even get me started on television... Have I bored you yet?    - Good!

Few channels seem bothered giving us something fresh anymore. On the other hand, there are screenwriters like myself busting their chops to produce, effective "story" - a broad concept which you can measure in many ways. Lecturers, seminars, authors (Robert McKee, Linda Seger, Christopher Vogler etc) teach screenwriters teach us about the importance of rewrites and the creative processes of idea development so that by the end we can satisfy our audiences by delivering an effective understanding of narrative as best we can.

As for ourselves, we are usually intending our scripts for a festival we can submit to so that we can achieve some recognition, wealth or both to further our career and yet one look at most previous winners is what I refer to as 'The Art House Middle Finger.' For example, I watched festival winning horror film this year which had a young girl, with blood on her face, locked or unlocked in a wooden shack in the woods, the walls covered in visceral paint markings, a television glowing with no reception, forcing a door closed whilst a childlike girl creepy voice kept asking random questions whilst a steady-cam POV shot kept rushing towards the shack from outside that was never revealed then ended with a close up of the girl looking scared... This apparently cost £50,000 to make!? Why - is the question to so many things here.


I can barely remember one winner of a film festival 'Cannes', 'Rain/Sundance' etc as well as foreign language winning films, particularly across Russia, Spain, India, Italy etc... Is it just me or is it now mandatory or fashionable to have the most ambiguous story with no resolution or catharsis to have a chance to win? Each and every one of my stories I've ever wrote and / or filmed as well as stories I've worked I've cared about and are judged, assessed, understood by what is commonly known as 'Classical Narrative.'

You can use flashbacks or jump around the story timeline if you like, I won't bother going through examples, I'm confident they're screaming through your head already but classical narrative is a comprehensive story, told in clear visual and / or audio form.

There are a few words a screenwriting teacher of mine said to me I've never forgotten: "We're all here because there's something about the world we'd like to change." So 'Hollywood' you should be confident in yourselves enough by now to know that no competitor comes close to you by miles, when James Cameron first came up with 'Terminator' he pretty much got told, to go and get stuffed by every production company as with Dan O Bannon's script for 'Alien' but bet you wouldn't turn down the opportunity to make a sequel.
These films are only fantastic until their legend is completely torn apart by new directors, directors of photography, actors even we as writers of different generations. Sequels can be great but once they get tarnished by different teams, the fans wish they could pay in tuts and frowns. You wouldn't expect to replace an artefact in the museum would you?
At least art house attempts something new but if we're going to take a utilitarian vote here, I'm sure audiences would increase for seeing more stories being told via classical narrative, clearly due to the above... Now think of how many films that you guys saw at the cinema or DVD's you have on your shelves that were feature length art house films... Thought so.

I'm not a Marxist but a read through of Janet Wasko ideas would be a more academic source to check out on this troubling future for our film world. If we cannot take risks to make new original stories and ideas come to life and define ourselves in the twenty-first century then what's the point? As for now raising creative industry tuition fees, cancel them if we're no longer needed but don't tell me we didn't warn you.