When Will Hollywood Figure It Out?

Accusing Hollywood of being a filmic crap factory is nothing new. They’ve been churning out garbage for decades. But in most cases, their failures aren’t due to a complete ignorance of what the people want, they fail due to a lack of execution. Hollywood, for the most part, dictates what’s cool, or at the very least, has their finger on the pulse of America and make money by making movies that speak to it.

But it makes me wonder how an industry that has been so successful in knowing what America wants can be so blind when it comes to movies about the war on terror? Is it that they are stubborn? Is it that they are simply stupid? Is it that Hollywood’s ego has finally expanded beyond the smog in the LA basin and now they firmly believe that they can tell us what to watch, and are no longer held accountable by the wants of the movie-going community?

In the latest example of incomprehensible arrogance, Hollywood has brought us the newest stylized MTVish hackjob about the war in Iraq, and just as the previous 5 films of the same topic did, it too failed miserably.

Consider, if you will, the following names:

Robert Redford, Ryan Phillipe, Susan Sarandon, Jake Gyllenhall, Reese Witherspoon, Tommy Lee Jones, Brian DePalma, Charlize Theron, Josh Brolin, Samuel L Jackson, Jessica Biel, Tom Cruise, Meryl Streep, Christina Ricci

Now, if I were to tell you that these people headlined a cast of 6 films, would you say that they were box office successes or failures?

These are the stars/directors behind the following six films that Hollywood has decided to try shoving down the throat of a greatly unappreciative audience; In the Valley of Elah, Home of the Brave, Redacted, Rendition, Lions for Lambs and the latest, Stop-Loss.

Now, not all of these films were complete, abysmal, horrendous, embarrassing failures. Rendition did open with a $4 million weekend, which while not the worst opening ever, was still bad enough to make a couple of movie execs not want to face their boss on Monday. Of course, it didn't get any better and limped out of theatres a few weeks later compiling a paltry $9 million. Ouch. People liked the big stars, Reese and Jake, and saw the movie. They then found out what it was about and told everyone else not to go see it.

Then, there was Lions For Lambs, a flick with a cast that would spell instant success had it not been about what it was about. It brought in $6.7 million in its first weekend. Not good. Then, it too suffered a few more really really bad weeks before giving the world a respite and just going home, taking in a whole $14.9 million. Now, sure, 14.9 million bucks ain’t bad for little old me, but considering the budget was over $35 million, that one hurt. And hurt bad.

Now let’s talk about the bad. And I mean, the really really bad. About a year ago, Samuel L Jackson, the uber-hot Jessica Biel, Christina Ricci and everyone’s homeboy 50 Cent got together for their “Iraq war vets come home damaged” film “Home Of The Brave.” With a cast like that, how could it fail?! Well, no surprise here, it did just that. After negative responses from test market crowds, it earned a tiny release and left theatres after two weeks, raking in a total of…drumroll…wait for it…drums still rolling…$40,830! With an estimated budget of $12 million, I’m thinking that wasn’t the wisest of choices, Hollywood.

Maybe that sort of thing should set off an alarm in the head of some of these people. Maybe a film with a great cast that should’ve carried it to even modest success that instead failed miserably should’ve made the people in charge think twice about making releasing more films in the same vein? Maybe not.

Redacted, Brian De Palma’s war film released later in the year raked in $65k! And then there was Valley of Elah, from Oscar winning writer/director Paul Haggis (Crash), starring Tommy Lee Jones, Charlize Theron and (surprise) Susan Sarandon. It flopped its way in and out of theatres collecting a massive $6 million!

So what do we learn from all this? You and I, as sane and clear-thinking people, see this as an indication that the American people have NO interest in movies that shine a negative light on our soldiers or the war that they are fighting. But alas, we are not Hollywood. We are not so egotistic to assume that the people are too stupid to know what they want. We are not such assholes that we think our narrow views of the world are something that the rest of the country wants to spend money to see.

There are people out there who are still on board with the war, and there are quite a few who are tired of it. There are many people who never liked it, and there are a bunch who just hope we lose and come home. Hollywood, apparently, falls in to that last group. What Hollywood doesn’t understand is that AMERICA doesn’t agree. They simply can’t figure that out. They really aren’t stupid, they simply live in a bubble. When you live in this bubble, you realize that everyone around you says the same bullshit and everyone else simply agrees. So when everyone you work with all believes the same crap (and when those who don’t just shut up because they fear losing their jobs), you start to believe that everyone believes said crap. What they don’t realize in Hollywood is that there is a whole nation out there that continues on east of Silverlake, and that nation actually has a different opinion – as incomprehensible as that may seem.

Perhaps this latest crapbomb, Stop-Loss will help them realize that despite the actors, despite the directors, despite the marketing blitz, the people sign your paychecks and the people are sick of you badmouthing the effort and the sacrifice that our military makes. Sure, they’ll say “These are movies FOR the soldiers! We just hate their superiors!” Great, keep that idiotic argument going, keep green-lighting box office failures, and we’ll wave to you as we drive by Urth Caffé in the middle of the day as your unemployed ass pretends to be busy on your iBook with all the other unemployed douchebags in town.

Here’s to you making more crap and America not seeing it…


**** I guess Hollywood isn’t completely filled with idiots; I did see today that they are hard at work adapting Atlas Shrugged for the big screen, starring Angelina Jolie as Dagny Taggart and Brad Pitt possibly as John Galt. Angelina's dad, Jon Voight is a staunch conservative...maybe he and his daughter have something in common, afterall?