I’d like to apologize real quick here. I promised to write several editorials over the weekend and laziness, procrastination and life got in the way. I apologize more sincerely than Amy Pascal.
As I’ve said before, this has been HELL for Sony. With recent threats from the Guardians of the Peace(not to be confused with OUR Guardians of the Galaxy!) to blow up theaters nationwide if the movie is released on Christmas day, Sony has cancelled it altogether. Let that sink in. A possible threat has made a worldwide billion dollar organization shut down the release of a film that has a upward budget of 80 million dollars altogether.
Some have called Sony things such as “spineless” and “weak”. The whole situation and giving in, I will agree, is giving into a bully, it really is. As someone who has been bullied, this is Bullying 101. When you have someone in the palm of your hand like this, you truly win. But I’m not here to talk about Sony’s reaction, but rather the effect it will have on the industry.
Now I see many who will blow this off as if it’s nothing. But as I said before, a movie with a budget that exceeds 80 million dollars got shelved because it offended someone who took severe action against it. I think it’s effect can not only stop (somewhat) controversial big budget films from happening, but stifle freedom of expression in the industry, leaving somewhat unknown indie films to do pick up the slack.
Again, I understand, it’s a Seth Rogen/James Franco comedy vehicle shut down, big whoop, right? It is. Now the film and it’s contents itself aren’t the biggest thing ever. There have been films in the past where the main character(s) kill off a leader of a country, anywhere from Eastern Asia to America. I don’t consider this film’s content to necessarily be something revolutionary to the industry. But the reaction, hacking and cancellation can have some huge effects.
Sony has lost so much money just due to the hacking, or as a clever user called it, The Hackening. I’ve read that it’s effect could lose Sony upwards a 100 million dollars. That right there is enough to make other popular studios skin crawl. But add to it that a movie with a controversy in it like that can bring about a hack of that size and immense threats that shake the very foundation of cinema, we got quite the precedent here.
Now, I will say that big studios don’t make films all the time QUITE as controversial as this film. Sure, films like Noah and Django Unchained has garnered some negative attention in various communities, but nothing as severe as this. Part of it might be it’s contents, another might be that North Korea may want an excuse to do something, we may never know.
Films these days have become sometimes a bit of a continuous recycling of ideas. Now, I know that no idea is completely original, but at least sometimes, people are able to use ideas and expand on them and do things revolutionary to the genre. Just look at this year. We had three CBM’s make HUGE jumps for the genre, and really boost up their respective studio’s game. But often we see films like Transformers: Age of Extinction that really are poor filmmaking and recycle a basic Hollywood blockbuster formula. But sometimes we get films that really are outside the box and use classic Hollywood tropes but also do whole new things. But how many more of these can we get if people’s lives could be risk?
Now, some may say, “Well there’s a difference between changing a genre and making a film that is about assassinating a world leader!”... Fair. BUT will studios share this logic? Maybe not. This has been a huge blow to the whole industry, and any and all risks may frighten studios, as the idea of something a fraction of this size happening to a studio is very scary, indeed.
And what of the people who get offended by films and want severe action taken against it? Now not every one of these folks has connections to giant teams of hackers, but hey, some might. Just the idea that one person has the capability to make a company lose stock points, cancel a movie and possibly not recover is something that will make people either scared or eager. The anonymous hackers proved just that.
What of freedom of expression in general? Is there a point where someone prominent can’t say something over a certain line or they themselves will be hacked, threatened and demeaned? The floodgates have been opened, and the consequences could be detrimental.
Now I know many will disagree vehemently. I also know this isn’t necessarily a CBM related article. But I feel like it needs to be shared, and I felt that I should share it here. That wraps it up folks, and remember,