Booty Shake part two

So what DOES POTC3 mean for Boise Filmmaking, anyway?

Damn fine question, glad I asked it.

When any monster budget franchise such as Pirates of the Caribbean or Lord of the Rings or even Back to the Future (remember that one, and how much part two REALLY sucked?) come out, the people with nice offices in Hollywood do a couple of things:

1) sign everyone on to multiple sequels, "just in case".
2) wait for opening weekend to arrive, hoping everyone else has done their job.
3a) if opening weekend tanks, fire assistants and move on to next project.
3b) if opening weekend doesn't tank, celebrate while someone else's assistants are being fired, then plot to make bukoo bucks on next two pictures in franchise.
4) realize that if franchise flops, you'll be looking for a new assistant.

Having checked out the world B.O. lists over at www.boxofficemojo.com, I've noticed a few things: fantasy/sci-fi films really rake in the bucks if they're done right. And by, "done right" I don't mean, "having a great script." Here's the top ten worldwide money makers:

1) Titanic
2) The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
3) Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest
4) Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone
5) The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
6) Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace
7) Shrek 2
8) Jurassic Park
9) Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
10) Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

Hmm. Not exactly David Mamet quality dialogue ripping off the pages of these movies, y'know? BUT... these are all very sexy looking popcorn films with big, epic cinematography/sfx and big, epic soundtracks by people we never hear on the radio. And these are the movies that people talk about when they talk about how much fun they had at the movie theater, whether we like it or not.

AT THE WORST... POTC: AT WORLD'S END is going to continue to foster in the common Mr. Moviegoer's mind that, for a movie to be REALLY GOOD, it's gotta emulate one of the above 10 movies - none of which would ever come close to cracking my personal top ten list. As lower-budget filmmakers in Boise, we haven't a chance at making these movies; Jurassic Park's production budget came in at $63 million alone (add another $20 mil for advertising, etc.,), and I'm pretty sure I don't know Michael Crichton or Steven "Big Daddy" Spielberg.

So what do we do?

Well... AT THE BEST... these movies perpetuate themselves in Hollywood; it seems that everyone in la-la land is trying to make the next Two Billion Dollar franchise. Hey, I don't blame 'em. BUT... it does allow for a whole world of errors that the consumer ends up paying for. For every Lord of the Rings movie, there are twenty Pitch Black sequels that all seem to suffer from the same thing: crappy scripts.

Anyone rush right out to buy Caddyshack 2 on DVD lately? Me neither.

Ultimately, this massive amount of effluence and dreck makes Hollywood look bad, and that's when the doors open for the indie filmmaker. BUT: the indie filmmaker can't be a lazy bastard, oh no he and she cannot! They have to hustle and work their networking craft all over the place, and even that's not going to get them very far unless they have one of three things:

a) the treasure of the Sierra Madre.
b) whatever's in the briefcase Jules is delivering to Marcellus Wallace.
c) the best script possible.

Desire, heart, talent - all these things account for tons in the everyday world, but let's remember something: making movies isn't about living in the everyday world. It's about living in a fantasy land where we get to pay (hopefully) people to hop around according to our whims while cameras roll.

So. I say let Hollywood have their blockbusters. When it comes time for movies with good scripts - and it will again - the doors will be that much more open for the likes of me. Err... us. Uhm... whatever.

-Will

Real Filmmakers. No Tourists.

Shake your booty.

Johnny Depp & Co. are here to take even more of your money back to Disneyland.

Went to the early Friday AM 12:35 showing of Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, mostly because:

a) I wanted to see it to get the bad taste of PTC2 out of my mouth.

b) Shrek the Third left bad taste in my mouth too, so I had to get SOMETHING done about it...

c) All the previous showings (from 8 pm on) were sold out.

d) Fewer teenaged bastards in a super-late night showing.

e) I figured I'd be up anyway.

f) All of the above.

If you answered "f", that'd be the correct answer. First off, lemme say I'm a fan of the PTC franchise, if not so much the films themselves. Damnit, these movies are so insanely huge undertakings, the only thing bigger seems to be the stories they try to tell and the way they tell them. My biggest problem with PTC2 was that, when watching it in the theater for the second time, I realized as the FISH HEADED FREAKS came out of the water that I was watching a really expensive and elaborate Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers movie, and that kind of thinking really sucked the entertainment out of the picture for me. Needless to say, PTC was bloated, under-acted, under-written, and over-long; but still a solid "B" movie due to the sheer spectacle of it all.

PTC3, however, is a different story. Not as tight as Numero Uno, and still a good 30 minutes too long, PTC3 takes spectacle to a whole 'nother level, with CGI shots that would win best animated picture Oscars for everyone - if only we could tell where the animation ended and the reality began (or vice-versa). Add to that a script that is so ludicrous that it only makes sense if you don't think about it too much, and we're talking one of the first movies I've seen that doesn't give a flying rat's ass if you WANT to willingly suspend your disbelief; it grabs you by the knickers and shouts, "DEAL WITH IT!" at the top of it's lungs.

Curiously enough, it seemed to work. And, amid all of this chaos and confusion there were moments of surreal beauty and (gasp!) script depth.

Script depth? Yeah, I wrote that. And, yeah, I wrote it in conjunction with PTC3. Why? Because the movie does a curious thing nearing the end: it takes what would normally be an opportunity for sugar and honey - staples of a Disney flick - and gave us an honest moment that came off as neither contrived nor a cop-out. Is PTC3 an overwhelming clunker of a movie with truck-sized logic holes, too many characters, too much counter-Esperanto, too much everything? Yep. And it's still damn entertaining (with the exception of a 20 minute lull that ends the second Keith Richards shows on the screen to steal the show for awhile), with one big difference between it and its predecessor: the crazy in PTC3 is honest here, while in PTC2 the crazy was a thinly veiled lie.

So what's this got to do with Boise Filmmaking? Hunh. Well, that's the subject of my next blog...

... but right now I need sleepy.

-Will

Real Filmmakers. No Tourists.