A Film Exists. Watching Not Required.

Time for another different kind of movie review this week.  I apologize in advance - this one is going to be pretty scatterbrained, and there's a strong possibility that I might veer off into hardcore Twilight Zone territory at some point.  Don't say I didn't warn you.

There's a philosophy that I have literally just discovered in the past, oh, six months or so that has changed my life.  No joke.  It's made me happier and more productive.  Let's start with this story: I know somebody who, like a lot of people (myself included) thought that the Ghostbusters remake looked absolutely godawful.  Every bit of evidence from the trailers and TV spots seemed to indicate that this was a loud, obnoxious flick rife with bad jokes and that truly irritating self-congratulatory modern movie tone.  But that didn't stop this somebody from being there in the theater on opening night with his girlfriend, which was then followed by him bitching about how bad it was nonstop the following day.

Like...this is a phenomenon that just confounds me.  He knew that he wouldn't like the movie.  He knew this going in.  No, actually, he knew it BEFORE going in.  And yet he still watched it.  Why?  Because it was there. 

Well, allow me to present the Lick Ness Monster Life-Changing Philosophy: Just Because a Movie Was Made Doesn't Mean You Have To Watch It!

To be fair, this has been a long process for yours truly, because I used to be just like my aforementioned friend.  I used to go to just about everything that hit the multiplex, especially the action blockbuster and the 2-3 superhero movies that we would be blessed with every year.  For a long time, I actually ENJOYED these flicks.  John McClane, Indiana Jones, James Bond, Batman, Sam Raimi's amazing first two Spider-Man flicks, it was truly a great time to be alive.  But no good thing can last forever, and gradually, it started happening.  Everything started to get either overblown or "dark."  James Bond turned emo.  Gotham City got plastered with a dark gray color palette and nonsensical plot twists.  Spider-Man and the X-Men both had awful third movies in their franchises...and the former again went emo.  That Superman movie that I anticipated so much in 2006?  Yeah, it sucked. 

And now, many years later, I've pretty much officially given up on blockbuster movies.  I really didn't intend for this post to be so much about superhero flicks, but since these things have essentially replaced action movies as the modern "event" films, they kind of go hand in hand.  Want to know what did it?  Avengers: Age of Ultron.  Now, I haven't seen it since I watched it in theaters, so forgive me if my memory is sketchy, but IIRC this is the movie where Iron Man creates this technological monster - against the wishes of his teammates and pretty much the entire freakin' world - which promptly escapes and causes wonton death and destruction.  140 minutes and $200 million of explosions and CGI later, the good guys destroy the tech terror run amok, but that doesn't exactly change the fact that they MADE the thing in the first place.  So...what?  The public who just suffered all that raping and pillaging just goes "well, yeah, these guys created this thing that murdered the f**k out of us, but hey, they stopped it, and they wear cool costumes, so, EH, it's all good."  Apparently.  Seriously, these guys can't even tell their own damn stories effectively anymore, and when you've got movies where the heroes are responsible for like 90% of the bad stuff that happens in it, you've lost me.  So until these movies calm the f**k down and maybe dial it back with HOW MANY of them are released every year, I'm out.

And I'm not alone.  I know plenty of people who complain about the state of modern blockbuster cinema, who echo my sentiments that these movies are all flash and no substance, emotion, or genuine power.  The only difference is...they still go, instead of hitting these guys in the wallets and making producers realize that story is still important. 

You might be wondering how this relates to horror.  Well, I'm getting to it.  The movie business is a copycat league, and horror is no different.  Anything that succeeds gets a whole bunch of like-styled imitations.  In the 2000s and up, we've had all kinds of mini-waves - Japan-style ghost thrillers, Saw and torture porn, the never-ending barrage of slasher remakes, and now demonic ghost flicks.  That's a pretty wide variety in a pretty short amount of time, all things considered, and it's no accident.  The reason is a simple one: horror fans actually do vote with their wallets.

We're a dedicated, educated, and savvy bunch of film-goers, so feel free to pat yourselves on the back just like I'm doing right now in my masturbatory online outlet.  When something gets old, we let the powers-that-be know it.  Post-Scream intentionally self-aware films wearing thin?  Well, this Ring movie looks pretty kickass.  Saw series burning out?  Eh, we'll pass on the last few sequels...but Paranormal Activity looks like it could be interesting.  Seen too many movies about evil ghosts?  Hey, there's no ghosts in Don't Breathe, let's give this a shot.  As a result, we seem to continually get pretty fresh, inventive stuff every few years.  Well, discounting all the remakes, but pretty much every franchise has already suffered that raping, so we're safe from that until Michael Bay inevitably gets his grubby mitts on the Halloween franchise.  Mark my words, it's going to happen at some point.

The horror community enjoys the benefits of being hardcore, including what we choose to not see.  If only the rest of the world would follow suit.  But they don't.  They just keep going, even if there is data (that doesn't just exist in my own mind, I swear) that show that people by and large aren't really that excited about the slew of megadoom action flicks.  But, again, they still go.

It's not hard.  Don't Watch.  You know that movie that you thought was just okay?  Now there's a sequel?  Don't Watch.  TV show starting to go south on its success rate?  Don't Watch.  Trust me, I know from many painful years of following WWE that it ain't going to get any better.  So just Don't Watch.  You don't owe these guys anything.  You want better?  Plant your eyeballs elsewhere.

Hey, it works for us.