[lbo-talk] why movies suck

[Catherine Driscoll]

Focus groups in the sense we mean, as part of the production process, are a product of the 50s. But studios routinely cut and recut films for various reasons/audiences, and pre MPAA classificaton it was still not uncommon (before Hays Code it was common) for states to cut films based on their audience. Directorial power was limited by a range of interests, and the big studio system in the US was partly based on forcing, as well as responding to, the rise of the movie star. 

However, I will give Brian that now directors are less often originators of film projects than they were at some points in the 20th century. The integrated system, however, where directors, producers and agents were tightly entwined when they weren't the same people is hardly something I expected to see praised here. The famous "paramount decree" that spelled the end of the studio system was an anti-trust decision that only scratches the surface of how tightly certain interests controlled what was made and what wasn't. 

Anyway, on the "new movies suck" front, many directors, like Spielberg, for example, still propel their own projects, as do the Coen Bros  and many examples in between and on either side of the spectrum presumed to run from mass to art.

Catherine

-----Original Message-----
From: lbo-talk-bounces at lbo-talk.org on behalf of Doug Henwood
Sent: Thu 19/11/2009 07:59
To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org
Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] why movies suck

 

On Nov 18, 2009, at 3:51 PM, magcomm wrote:


> That is really the big difference: directors in the studio
> system could amass enough power to make the films they
> wanted to make.  Now directors are brought in as part of a
> package, and the stars are the major attraction.

Thanks for this, Brian.

Question: back in the day, was there anything like the focus grouping  
of a work in progress that you see today?

Doug
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