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It's a bit funny that an industry so dedicated to pumping franchises for money insisting on deconstructing their properties for no apparent reason at all, especially when the deconstructions aren't even good or creative.
Why not just give the audience what it wants? Ie. Another adventure man, rom com, war hero, horror, whatever.
I'm not saying that deconstruction can't be a good idea but why does every franchise have to be deconstructed? Why does almost every movie have to be about deconstruction of narrative tropes or the movie making process?
Always chasing the upcoming generation of new consumers who haven't been locked in yet. See Bud Light. They take the existing market share for granted (you're always going to go see the next Star Jones Drink Beer movie, you're always going to drink their brand of soapy water because it's what you started drinking when you were eighteen) but they need to keep drawing in new audiences and new customers, and if in their view Gen Z or whatever we're up to now want DEI and black Elves and trans beer, that's what they'll give them.
Then they piss off the existing customers and don't get the new kids who are never going to be satisfied ("that trans queer furry non-binary character was not played by a trans queer furry non-binary actor, this is appropriation and we're gonna boycott the studio!") , so they end up with the worst of both worlds.
That's the excuse, but peel that back and you find they -- as in those making the decisions, not those holding the stock -- don't want to cater to the existing audience because they're gross.
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Hercules is a fairly straightforward coming-of-age story where the hero rescues a damsel in distress, but Meg is a little sassy and more of a femme fatale than a damsel. The Swan Princess is more of a pure damsel in distress movie, and bombed in 1994, which might explain why people shied away from this genre.
Earlier than that, The Princess Bride (1987) is notable for having a dumb, beautiful protagonist who is clearly a damsel n distress, though it is not animated. Star Wars in 1977 felt the need to make Leia a strong independent woman who did not need to be rescued, so The Princess Bride was quite brave. Whoopi Goldberg was considered for the role of Buttercup, which would have been different.
My son's favorite character was Gaston, and he believes the movie is a tragedy and should end with Gaston falling from the roof. From his point of view, Gaston did nothing wrong. His crush was captured and imprisoned by a beast, so he roused the village to rescue her. Stockholm syndrome is to be expected, so we can't take Belle's word for things, as "No denying she's a funny girl that Belle."
Based son, he already understands the concept of war brides and Stockholm syndrome being a female-coded phenomenon. We'll watch his career with great interest.
Your son's hardly alone. Gaston and his dark triad personality has many teenage and adult women swooning, hence fanart such as this.
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Didn’t Leia need to be rescued? She was set to be executed. Yes, she wasn’t helpless and was competent. But it is clear throughout the movies that Leia was the moral center but not the physical one.
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Gaston is by any measure the hero of the movie. He's a paragon, the absolute image, of his people, and they adore him. He is the bringer of benefit, the one who is capable of moving them to action as a body.
Gaston’s problem in the end was that he wasn’t masculine enough for Belle.
To channel my inner Sloot, I thought it was that his house wasn't big enough.
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I think this is a great point.
Edit: though, upon reflection, Tangled played this pretty straight.
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One Piece: Film Red, 2022
Of course, since that isn't American, it just proves your point.
Also, Fate/stay night: Heaven's Feel III.
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I suspect it's a skills mismatch. Years ago I watched a video essay in which the author outlined the concept of "chaos cinema". It's that style of action cinema you're all familiar with because it was all the rage in the 2000s and 2010s (maybe even today, I don't think I've seen any action films which came out in the last five years): omnipresent shaky handheld camera, cuts every half a second, lens flares up the wazoo, post-production blurring, dirt on the lens. It's a style of action cinema more prone to inspire disorientation than excitement, nausea than an adrenaline rush. Think Paul Greengrass (Bourne, Captain Phillips), Marc Forster (Quantum of Solace, World War Z), just about every Christopher Nolan action film, Hunger Games.
A later article (which I can't find now) noted that this trend coincided with a spike in Hollywood hiring directors who didn't cut their teeth making action films to direct action films, in hopes of lending them a little cachet and respectability. Before he was tapped for Batman, Christopher Nolan made understated psychological thrillers; before Bond, Marc Forster made intimate dramas and quirky comedy-dramas. The skilful directing of an action film, contrary to what Hollywood producers might believe, is not an easy thing to do, and one shouldn't assume that the ability to direct an intimate character drama necessarily translates to the ability to direct an action film which is exciting and engaging. So these directors, with colossal budgets at their disposal but essentially no experience in how to stage and shoot an action sequence effectively, took the easy way out. Let's just get fucktons of coverage from every angle and shake our cameras like we're having an epileptic fit, we'll figure it out in post.
Note that this approach can technically "work" in producing an action film which is true to the franchise in question, provided the director (and, more importantly, the screenwriter(s)) actually have some respect for it and understand why it appeals to people. The Dark Knight is widely considered a faithful adaptation of the Batman comics despite containing some of the most incoherent action sequences ever put to film, and the received wisdom was that the Nolan brothers and David S. Goyer had really done their homework in understanding the comics.
I think there's something similar going on here. We're making a new Indy movie, yay! Who's going to write it? We could hire a screenwriter who has an established track record in writing screenplays in the action-adventure genre, but that's not enough - we don't just want our Indy movie to make bank, we want it to have prestige. Everyone who's anyone is talking about that Fleabag girl, who's got her phone number?
The trouble is that, while Phoebe Waller-Bridge may be a talented playwright and screenwriter in her comfort zone (my girlfriend made me watch the first episode of Killing Eve the other day and I barely laughed, but everyone who's seen it tells me Fleabag lives up to the hype), she may not really understand what makes Indiana Jones appeal to people. She may, in fact, have nothing but contempt for the people who enjoy Indiana Jones. So when a Hollywood producer gives her a fat paycheque and tells her to "put her own spin" on the franchise - well, she's going to deconstruct the shit out of it, isn't she? It's not bloody Shakespeare.
That genre has been dead for 20+ years. There aren't any ...
Tom Cruise disagrees.
Tom Cruise Mummy was utter shit.
Yeah but that was development by committee to the extreme, Universal pictures were desperate to create a narrative universe they could use to remake all the classic monster movies in their vault. The Mission Impossible movies are all produced by Cruise, who I suspect is responsible for maintaining the formula and quality of them (which isn't the best of the best, but is consistently better than average.)
I think Tom Cruise Mummy was the moment when Hollywood started its true decline.
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People genuinely have liked Christopher Nolan films, generally, not just The Dark Knight. People raved about Inception when it came out.
Then he made TENET, though.
I will always admire Tenet for what it is - millions of dollars spent bringing to life the scattered thoughts of a guy who has smoked way too much weed. I don't have any proof Nolan is a stoner aside from Tenet, but Tenet is pretty solid proof on its own.
I'm generally not a fan of Nolan (I've seen several of his films and still think he's yet to top Memento) so I wasn't really that pushed about seeing Tenet. But I read a review somewhere in which the critic said it was the most impenetrable film they'd seen since Primer, which did pique my curiosity a bit. I love Primer, but it was made by one guy in his garage for two months' salary. The idea of someone expending a nine-figure budget to create something comparably bizarre and incomprehensible is intriguing, if nothing else.
Still haven't gotten around to watching it but my girlfriend wants us to watch it soon.
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My god was Tenet bad, it's Christopher Nolan huffing his own farts, the movie.
And I say this as someone who likes his movies, I loved Interstellar and Inception.
Am I the only one that thought the male lead was really bad? I thought the praise for him was so bizarre, he doesn't have half the charisma of his father.
Is he good in something else?
Whatever it was, I think the main problem was that he made the life of an international superspy pulling off insane heists (three in one film!) seem like it was boring? Like he (the character, not the actor) just didn't want to be there?
Compare/contrast to James Bond who generally seems to enjoy killing baddies, infiltrating bases, and seducing women. For the protagonist it just seemed rote.
No possible way to forgive the audio mixing though.
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I first watched Tenet during COVID with a now-ex-friend who had gone full progressive pod person; this fucking guy pretended to be "queer" because he just had to complete the trifecta of being a gay black communist (to be maximally appealing to college-educated white women).
He claimed to love TENET because (direct quote) "It had a black protagonist and internationalism themes." He will forever be my model organism of empty-inside clout-chasing scum.
What the fuck does that even mean?
Globo-homo. United States Bad, United Nations Good. Only by giving up sovereignty to unelected transnational officials can we hope to survive the crisis of [climate change].
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Put him at the head of the queue when you live up to your username.
You're welcome to use my skull too if you'd like, I feel like it's a lot emptier after watching Tenet, and hasn't fleshed out all the way since.
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I know, despite his obvious deficiencies in directing action sequences he has directed one critical and commercial smash after another.
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Because artists want to do what is cool among their peers.
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