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Knew this was Critical Drinker before I clicked on it. Mate introduced me to it and he is absolutely spot on for the most part.

Modern movies (and TV for that matter) have become so commercialized and expensive that the series they are now rehashing (Star Wars for instance) wouldn't be possible to create today. George Lucas definitely didn't have the name or history necessary when Alan Ladd gave the go ahead to make Star Wars that you would need these days for a comparably ambitious film.

It's weird because I feel like some other forms of media, namely games and music have gone in the opposite direction because of the availability and power of tools for independent production. However movies just need so much more resources the same indie competition hasn't been able to come in and shake things up sadly.

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> George Lucas definitely didn't have the name or history necessary when Alan Ladd gave the go ahead to make Star Wars that you would need these days for a comparably ambitious film.

I don't know if that's entirely true. George Lucas had come off the back of American Graffiti, which was an incredible commercial success. It had made 50x its budget, and in 1977 was the 13th highest grossing film of all time.

The question was really whether Lucas could turn his hand to a completely different genre. It's down to American Graffiti's success that Lucas was able to re-negotiate a deal for Star Wars that gave him merchandising rights.

True, American Graffiti was pivotal in him getting the shot he did. What I am saying is I don't think that plays out the same way today given movie budgets, you can't just have one person like one film you made and force through the production budget of a AAA film anymore.

Was "Star Wars" a AAA film though? I don't know what typical budgets were for films from that studio at that time were but in so many other regards it feels like it was a B-movie that over-achieved.

I mean just one aging star (sorry, Alec) in the film's credits.... That doesn't sound like a AAA studio effort.

Wait, what does AAA mean here? For beef, AAA is top of the line. For baseball, its the 'not quite good enough' level.

My recollection of the history of The Star Wars though was that Lucas had begun to shop it around before Graffiti's success. Also "American Graffiti" was not an instant success but had more of a slow-burn upon its release.

Of course then "American Graffiti" caught fire and I suspect that (and the urgings of Francis Ford Coppola) is when Ladd gave the green light.

> Knew this was Critical Drinker before I clicked on it.

Absolutely. He seems to be consistently spot-on with his analysis of TV and Movies and the wider industry. I also enjoy Red Letter Media:

https://www.youtube.com/user/RedLetterMedia

Both channels use a humours approach to their reviews and analysis.

The biggest problem with movies is none of the labor has been automated much.

You still need an entire film and sound crew. You still need a cast of actors and a director and a screenwriter and a composer. You still need to raise money, producers, etc.

Sure, video & sound editing have had a lot of automation improvements via software - but that's pretty much it.

One person can make a game with a bunch of cheap pre-made assets and make something really interesting and cool.

You just can't do that with film.

There are many examples of making a film on a budget of almost nothing. Clerks, Evil Dead, the Sweding movement, most all of Tik Tok…

You can make a compelling story via flip book.

ahem PRIMER

I came here to say that too. If ever there was a quintessential HN movie...

"Almost nothing" in movie terms means "the cost of a house". Not "almost nothing" on a normal human scale.

I would actually say, "almost nothing" in movie terms means, "human scale almost nothing" all the way to perhaps, "cost of a house". We all have phones, video editing software is free, there's plenty of distribution channels. If you want to make a movie for "almost nothing", you can do so.

Doesn't mean it's going to be good, or that anyone wants to see it.

Is this a peculiar concept? We all work OSS every day, right?

True, to the extent that any 90 minutes of smartphone footage uploaded to youtube is technically "a movie". In order to be "a movie" in the sense that Evil Dead or Primer are movies, I would say you need a bit more than that.

I really wouldn't consider, "a budget larger than, 'x'" one of the defining traits of what, "a movie" is. That's gatekeeping.

I would also vigorously oppose such a view.

For anything with a niche target audience - sure.

You're not going to have multiple locations, good actors, good writing, good composition, quality cinematography, etc - unless you're incredibly talented and not counting how much your time is actually worth.

Films for a wide audience these days basically require - at a minimum - 6 specialists working for a month of shooting. Plus 5+ actors.

The absolute minimum that costs in labor - if you actually counted the value of your time - is ~$200k+.

A good script itself is worth well over $100k...

Realistically - it's almost impossible to make something with wide appeal for less than $2m in the US - or $1m internationally.

I feel like CGI has increased productivity a lot. Not so much in big, effects driven movies, but in everyday type shots where they can change backgrounds or remove things so they don't need to make big elaborate sets or control environments quite so much. That's my guess at least. Film was also a huge cost of production and especially distribution that's essentially gone now. I think Hollywood unions also add a lot of jobs - look up the job of focus puller sometime.

On the other hand to all the expensive stuff - you can just not do those. I'd take Primer as an example. I believe it was shot for the cost of a Toyota Corolla and became a fairly significant film. I've also seen "low budget" movies (meaning $3-5 million or so) in the last decade or so that probably would not have been possible 20 years or more ago, so I feel like there has been some progress.

> I feel like CGI has increased productivity a lot.

Yeah, but take a look at the massive number of VFX people listed in the end-credits of CGI-heavy films. Often several different companies (e.g. DNEG) each with its own array of artists, modellers, riggers, tech, pipeline engineers, asset developers, IT support, etc etc.

Yep, that's what I mean when I say not so much in big, effects driven films - I suspect those will always consume as much budget as you throw at them because there's always a cutting edge to push. But in smaller and less effect driven films/TV shows, the tech seems to be a net win for productivity.

I don't think this argument holds for TV. Unlike movies which have a large sunk cost, require a coordinated rollout and expensive marketing, television can make a short proof of concept pilot season and doesn't require a marketing blitz. Television also doesn't have the expectation of budget breaking CGI/effects. As a result, TV can take chances and do things the suits would never approve for movies. If a show fails, it fails small, but if it succeeds it can do just as well as any movie (e.g. friends).

So true.

I feared the Hollywoodization of the game industry.

But it never happened in the mindless extend of movies and music.

Indie games are still going strong.

I think all media you mentioned have similar effects and all have both Hollywood and indie areas.

I mean, some sports games are definitely hollywoodized with "let's just swap some colours, change 2021 to 2022 and charge another $70". On the other hand Bill Wurtz still releases new tunes on YouTube and Ben Levin continues doing... Ben stuff. In movies you can still get quality indie productions like Joel Haver's full movies. My random selection of course, but the point is, there's definitely indie stuff available if you want it.

There are some jewels in the category of the short movies. For example, some films, even mini-series from the DUST channel on YouTube.

I mean there’s indie games that are works of art just like there are indie movies for the lack of a better term. Similarly there are plenty of popcorn games with big budgets and shallow content.

This might be true. But to me it seems like Indie games make real money. Mosty because making a good game requires less personel than making a good movie.

most indie games have shallow content as well... you are probably just cherry picking the top of the iceberg.

Plenty of indie games have stunning visuals and lame cookie cutter gameplay.

I agree with the box office movie theater experience, and yet movies as a whole still allow the offshoots. You cant find them in theaters, but you can fine them on streaming services.

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