Trend 1 - originality will become rarer
This year from the top 10 grossing movies worldwide there was only one movie that was not a reboot, part of franchise or a sequel. That Movie was
interstellar. The question however is where are the rest of the innovative movies? what is ironic is that any time you speak to any critic about the box office they always talk about seeing something original, the problem at the moment is that when it is released audiences seem to be shying away from original movies. We are already 10 movies into the marvel cinematic universe which runs on the same formula and heading to transformers
5 and fast and furios
7, every franchise needs a break. This is a worrying trend as Hollywood needs new good movies to make new franchises like hobbits or hunger games.
Tonys theory- studios are under more pressure than ever to deliver hits. If they put out movies that arent hits they dont just get criticised by the usual suspects (shareholders, management) today you have media and internet fanboys ready to really highlight any shortcomings to put the boot in. So less and less risks will be taken on new movies not within a franchise or sequel. Interstellar only really got made because it had arguably two of the greatest directors alive in cinema behind it in spielberg and Nolan, it might be the case that the only way originality will prevail is if we have talent with clout pushing those movies. But even then i think studios will be more and more in favour of franchises.
Trend 2 - Marketing will grow in significance
you compare movies like the transformers 4 (18% on rotten tomatoes) and edge of tomorrow (90% on rotten tomatoes) yet transformers 4 has grossed a staggering billion dollars and edge of tomorrow grossed 370 mil (not a flop but definitely not making waves from a commercial perspective). Apart from proving my point above about franchises and sequels being the order of the day in hollywood What also really struck me about edge of tomorrow was the sombre and non- existent marketing, while transformers spared no expense in getting the message out
Tonys theory- I genuinely believe that with edge of tomorrow, the studio must have seen the movie and decided that it speaks for itself now this obviously with Hindsight was a mistake. In every industry marketing can make or break the product, it is how you get products that are essentially inferior having the greatest market share in some industries. The morale of the story here is simple if you have a good product dont be lazy, realise nothing sells itself and invest in getting the message out.
Trend 3 - Romantic comedies are for yesteryear
I only decided to add this after speaking to my wife yesterday about an idea for an article
I remember as a youngster heading to the cinema in 2000 and watching what was essentially a really surprisingly funny and good movie called "what women want", which was the 4th highest grossing movie that year in that year as well believe it or not Mission impossible 2 was the only movie in the top 10 that was from a sequel or franchise. The last romantic comedy that i saw in the cinema was hitch and that was a really good watch too. In the top 10 this year there are no romantic comedies and if i believe my wife and her sister, this is not because of a lack of appetite but rather from a lack of choices. all you need really is a leading man like say chris pratt and a leading lady like say jennifer lawrence to get together and do something fun and feel good.
Tonys theory - I believe that studios are increasingly foregoing these types of movies and concentrating on spectacle movies because of the emergence of television. I think those films which are drama pieces or romantic comedies will be made less and less simply because studios want the big ticket movies, they want movies that give the cinematic experience which you wont get from home from HBO. Therefore studios want to invest in differentiation and are looking for movies like the hobbit, or planet of the apes. I dont believe this will change anytime soon. But its a shame as the rom-com sub-genre is essentially dead in cinema.
Trend 4 -Internet fanboys matter
I wish they didnt but they do!!!
I dont want to get too worked up about this but the biggest threat hollywood faces are from the internet fanboys who add nothing but can definitely take stuff away.
Cast your minds back to batman begins, a movie with a similar budget ("$150 mil)and take ($374 mil) to edge of tomorrow. if that movie was made today and that performance was made today think of all the internet trolls that would have been queuing up to call it a failure (to make it sure it fails). In doing so most likely the dark knight wouldnt have been made the dark knight went on to gross over $1bil, and is still the only comic book movie to get over a billion without 3d (no mean feat) but aside from the money it is widely regarded as one of the best films ever made never mind comic book films.
Studios need to find a way to deal with this sect that has emerged and is trying to intersect and gain influence in the industry, this is to the detriment of the industry as these fanboys do not add dollars but the noise they make can be picked up by wider resources and reported as fact or representation of the general populos which it isnt.
A big example was interstellar this year,where disneys trolls basically couldnt wait to attack the movie and paint it a failure the idea being that if you call it a failure then people will think its a failure before they review it and go into it reviewing trying to validate why its a failure as opposed to being objective. this naturally effects some (not all , thankfully) who want to go watch it and could be dissuaded from seeing it. The reverse was done with Guardians of the galaxy and the movie ended up grossing perhaps far more than it should.
this is creating a problem at the domestic box office as more and more people will be put off not realising that alot of reviewers have an agenda. It even got to the point where some idiot was trying to attack the science in batman and interstellar yet decided to completely ignore the ridiculos assumption about a hammer with its own mind and can fly or that of the unkillable green man or the fact that if you had a suit of armour and took the tumbles and knocks that iron man routinely takes you would break every bone in your body (basically the science in those marvel movies are as crap as it gets), thats because its not about the science in the movies as much as it is about simply attacking a different studio and trying to create negativity around their products. This is a problem and honestly one that needs to be looked at now
Tonys theory- Honestly the world is getting more and more digitised and more people than ever are going online it is logical that some studios will try and use the internet to shape peoples perception. The problem is that this is being abused and the worst offender by some margin is disney the way they or their fans attack anything released within 2 weeks of a disney movie is appalling to say the least. I watched the attacks on man of steel last year, i saw it this year with interstellar when it was up against big hero 6. as an fyi at the time of writing this interstellar had grossed 640 million worldwide while big hero 6 (the interstellar killer )had grossed half of that or 320 million. imagine if those numbers where reversed? those internet trolls would be queuing up to shoot interstellar to make sure it never takes off.
Trend 5 - International markets are good for business
this year every single movie in the top 10 grossed more money internationally than in the US. Transformers grossed over 840 million of its billion dollar gross from abroad, and this sort of trend is not going to slow down, in the future you will see more and more films and franchises with international appeal as opposed to smaller ones that can not be sold abroad, the idea is to maximise every dollar. In doing this there will be less and less outright flops at the box office.
Tonys theory- as more and more countries open up to the idea of internationalisation there will be more and more markets that open up revenue streams for the box office, the flip side however is that it will become less and less uncommon to have movies being shot in international locations like china (as we saw in transformers 4) just to appeal. Im all for it. also the international markets are less and less influenced by internet fanboys and because of this their industry will continue to grow, like the US box office did prior to the recent years.
Thats it for now folks , I hope you have enjoyed reading this as much as i have enjoyed writing it. If you do then dont forget to hit the red thumb. Either way i want to wish everyone of our wonderful community a happy new year.