Last weekend, Thor: Ragnarok premiered to massive critical and commercial reception. It’s no secret that the most consistently profitable movies in recent years have come from the Marvel franchise. However, speculation is mounting about what this success means in the context of the U.S. box office’s steady decline. This past summer marked historically lousy box office numbers, featuring a revenue drop over 10% lower than the prior year and the worst Labor Day in seventeen years (Wilkinson). Commercially, the frontrunners of the summer were Wonder Woman, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, and Spider-Man: Homecoming, each released by Marvel. The financial success Marvel has achieved is both a catalyst and a byproduct of enormous popularity with moviegoers, in general, the majority of America. Many who fit into this category believe these films are saving cinema. However, many also think these films are responsible for its demise. I have noticed that as Marvel becomes increasingly prominent, the separation between its supporters and opponents grows to the point where the discussion surpasses Marvel films and spills into an argument about the presence of what I will call “commerce films” in contemporary American cinema. When I use this term, I mean it in the sense that these films prioritize pleasing the viewer temporarily over artistic expression in an attempt to sell more tickets. In “Art of the Contact Zone,” Mary Louise Pratt describes a contact zone as “a term referring to social spaces where cultures meet, clash, and grapple with each other, often in contexts of highly asymmetrical relations of power” (34). A contact zone, as Pratt describes above, has formed between those who support “commerce movies” and those who don’t, arguably resulting in a lack of communication essential to the medium’s survival itself about the direction America wants movies steered in.
To explore the contact zone between commerce and arthouse films in America, we must delve into the arguments made on both sides of the conflict to understand better how they have created a hostile environment that is restrictive to open discussion. Although it may seem as if the arguments against commerce films are more prolific, in reality, those who oppose commerce films have been more active in their efforts to attempt to snare the attention of their supporters and show them why they believe it is destroying cinema as an artistic medium and, more importantly, why they should care about this.
While movies and money have always been associated, there’s never been a period in American cinema when films have been so profit-driven. Film business eclipsing film art is a key pillar in the arguments of those who oppose commerce films. The general decline of arthouse productions and the rise in popularity of commerce films exemplify this priority shift, as does the requirement of exterior advertising for new movies. David Denby addresses this in the following quote from his essay, “Has Hollywood Murdered the Movies?”.
“By 2010, rattling around stores and malls all over the world, there were also Iron Man video games, soundtrack albums, toys, bobblehead dolls, construction sets, dishware, pillows, pajamas, helmets, t-shirts, and lounge pants. There was a hamburger available at Burger King named after Mickey Rourke, a supporting player in Iron Man 2. Companies such as Audi, LG Mobile, 7-Eleven, Dr. Pepper, Oracle, Royal Purple motor oil, and Symantec’s Norton software signed on as “promotional partners,” issuing products with the Iron Man logo imprinted somewhere on the product or in its advertising. In effect, all of American commerce was selling the franchise. All of American commerce sells every franchise” (Denby).
Denby perfectly exemplifies the exploitation of advertising as an economic tactic in mediums outside the film itself with the tactics used by the Iron Man franchise. To make money, the film, or more appropriately, franchise, expanded its consumer base by advertising in areas stretching beyond television and movie advertising. By this, I mean instead of just showing commercials or putting up posters, movies or their characters occupy space outside of their imagined world, such as a bag of Doritos or a can of Pepsi. This technique has become exceedingly commonplace in American cinema with the rise of the Marvel universe and their effective deployment of the vertical integration approach.
This dominance of franchises across the spectrum of advertising mediums puts artistic films at an enormous financial disadvantage. Because many of these advertising schemes intentionally target young audiences, an artistic film with mature subject matter has no power in such an economic ploy. For example, kids love going to McDonald’s because they can get an Iron Man toy with their Happy Meal, subconsciously coupling a love for McDonald’s with the Iron Man franchise simultaneously. However, it would be impossible for a movie like Manchester by the Sea, whose emotional complexity significantly outweighs Iron Man, to advertise in the McDonald’s medium since it deals with depressing themes both too complex for children and too morbid for a “Happy Meal.” Of course, not all advertising outside the film sphere is geared toward kids, but promoting something fantastic to the general public is far easier than the less entertaining option, regardless of the product’s explicitness. Despite the newfound popularity of this vertical integration approach, it’s been present for quite some time and has remained, for the most part, cinematically unalienating during that span. What truly endangers cinema’s future is that movies are now manufactured according to the financial potential they present outside of the movies themselves. Quality films are being contorted into franchises if they present ample potential for exterior advertisement or multiple series installments through sequels, prequels, remakes, or reboots. Movies used to dictate their marketing. Now, the marketing dictates the movies. I can think of no assertion that more accurately exemplifies the film business’ invasion of artistic filmmaking.
Because of this structural industrialization in film, artistic projects (most of which usually make minimal profit, if any) have become financial risks too significant for studios to take. Though not unheard of, artistic films rarely become financially significant with audiences after their release. Studios know that for arthouse pictures to achieve residual financial prosperity, incredible work and care must be put into each project, as their success depends on the execution of the film and the talent of the artistic departments making it. However, because studios cannot measure talent qualitatively, their persistent presence onset often becomes counterintuitively overbearing to the point that it suffocates the artist’s ability to perform optimally. Many know this kind of scrutiny discourages artistic realization because it manufactures an environment restricting the freedom necessary to produce uncorrupted art.
The few good artistic films that have squeaked out of the machine recently are either made independently of it or get funded by a studio able to finance on account of recent blockbuster profit. A significant number of directors considered artists working today have already established themselves and can convince producers to fund future projects from the creative and monetary strength demonstrated in previously successful work. For example, though now regarded as the blockbuster king, Christopher Nolan broke into the industry off the strength of his independently financed crime thriller Memento. Nolan leveraged Memento’s success into his production company, Syncopy Inc., where he could control and fund his own creative projects. That said, breaking through with the indie approach like Nolan did is much easier said than done, especially nowadays. The mere opportunity to direct an indie project often involves an enormous risk taken by the studio, and in the rare event that it happens, turning a profit is a historic feat. One such example came in 2016 when Barry Jenkins wrote and directed the Oscar winning Moonlight. Despite the film winning Best Picture, it took Jenkins nearly ten years to get it financed. After doing so, he had to work to his budget’s restrictions, which historically ended up being the smallest budget of any best picture-winning film ever.
Even though Moonlight’s award season run was prestigious, it made what would be considered scraps at the box office relative to any Marvel movie released in the last ten years (Brueggeman). Denby says, “It is impossible now to tell the films of one studio from another. All the studios are ruled by what I would call conglomerate aesthetics.” With the exception of one studio that’s garnered significant Oscar nominations recently, Denby’s assessment is entirely accurate. In 2015, A24 Films released The Lobster, Ex Machina, and The Witch. In 2016, they released Moonlight, and this year, The Killing of a Sacred Deer, A Ghost Story, The Disaster Artist, Lady Bird, Good Time and The Florida Project. Each film just mentioned garnered a strong critical reception and a range of accolades, including Academy Award nominations and victories (Baron). A24’s success and commitment to independent storytelling represent a glimmer of hope for opponents of the rapidly popularizing commerce films. That said, A24 is one of a kind. Its presence as a studio promoting artistic films is the exception in a business-oriented industry churning out mostly popcorn flicks, not the conventional studio championing cinema as the creative medium it once was.
Advocates for the artistry of filmmaking continue to voice serious concern about the mind-numbing repetitiveness of commerce films. Because these movies are engineered to fill seats instead of exploring artistic expression, possibilities for new material are limited. As a result, many of today’s movies are derivative, not original. David Denby addressed this sameness when he stated that The Avengers, a mega-hit featuring a story with an entire team of superheroes, “would quickly be effaced by an even bigger movie of the same type.” Denby’s prediction was nearly spot on, as out of the eleven films Marvel studios has released since The Avengers, seven of those films have featured at least one superhero alongside the title character. Even two of the four films not included in this category were Guardians of the Galaxy movies featuring ensemble casts. Marvel’s transparency about their intent to unite the Guardians with the Avengers in their upcoming film, Avengers: Infinity War, is neither surprising nor condemning; many terrific films of substance feature star-studded ensemble casts to sensational effect. That said, it’s long been standard practice for studios to attach big names to projects solely to fill seats because of star-value attraction, and while this approach can enhance a film’s substance, a growing trend is emerging in blockbuster cinema by which studios inject public interest into increasingly unoriginal narratives by superficially cramming as many stars into one cast as possible. I believe Marvel is guilty of encouraging this trend. Not every new Marvel movie is repetitive, but this process of prioritizing star value regresses the predominant importance of the story in the movie business and lazily normalizes conceptual complacency. In other words: new stars, old tricks.
There is also a growing fear amongst the opponents of this commerce trend that the increasing prevalence of the fantastic is becoming dangerously unrealistic. Movie lovers have long turned to stories to attempt to escape the hardships of their own reality. Given that every story offers a portal into another world, every movie is an escape, whether financially or artistically motivated. However, stories grounded in reality simultaneously offer viewers distance from and exploration of their problems depending on the narrative’s relevance to the viewer. This sort of informative fantasy can be incredibly beneficial to the viewer’s reality. There is, however, a very American tendency to intentionally avoid reality altogether in the consumption of this fantasy that commercial film creators are exploiting. “...subordinate peoples do not usually control what emanates from the dominant culture… Transculturation, like autoethnography, is a phenomenon of the contact zone” (Pratt 36). While many arthouse advocates would like to see their children and future filmmakers raised on art, they are powerless to control or censor the media consumption of any individual due to the sheer enormity of content available nowadays. The fear growing in this camp pertains to the endangerment of cinematic substance. Since future generations of moviegoers and moviemakers will be subject to a lopsided ratio of the soon-to-be default commercial cinema, there is concern future art will suffer accordingly.
The truth is that most moviegoers today are indifferent to the future survival of cinematic art. They are consumers, not creators. Whether or not they’re aware that they are hammering nails into the coffin of film art by financially supporting commercial entertainment, they will continue to reinforce the anti-cinematic commerce trend passively. The entire conversation, or contact zone, between the supporters of commerce and artistic films is paradoxically stagnant because both parties are fed up with the other for seemingly misunderstanding their position. Unhinged arthouse supporters project bitterly onto commercial consumers for their responsibility in the murder of cinematic substance while these consumers refuse to engage the other side they see as being overly dramatic and pretentiously invested in an entertainment form that’s intended to be simple. As a result, both sides are contributing to the stagnation and, as a result, the growing lack of art in cinema. “Our job in the Americas course remains to figure out how to make that crossroads the best site for learning that it can be. This includes laying ground rules for communication across lines of difference and hierarchy that go beyond politeness but maintain mutual respect; a systematic approach to the all-important concept of cultural mediation” (Pratt 40). Pratt’s observation speaks to the severe importance of maintaining the American cinematic contact zone. Because of the inability to discuss the topic in depth due to the differing values, neither party has any clarification on what the future of American cinema should be. But despite how fragmented things seem, that future doesn’t have to be binary. We need not abandon art films due to their inferior profits, just like we need not abandon commercial productions to revive art in cinema. The beauty of America, and art in general, lies in its complexity. There is space for both parties to transcend coexistence into prosperity. Not all commercially motivated entertainment is substantially hollow. Not all cinematic art is financially burdensome. And it’s not a crime to prefer one, the other, or both. If we determine the future of American cinema through silence, then there will be no way of mending the division between the two parties with opposing views on commercial films. However, we have a chance to manifest a symbiotic production-consumption infrastructure that enables funding for pioneering artistic studios like A24 in the shadow of growing corporate behemoths like Marvel if we seek it out in open discussion. There may be nails in the coffin of cinematic art, but ultimately, it’s up to us to decide whether the last nail has already been hammered.
Baron, Zach. How A24 is Disrupting Hollywood. GQ Style, Condé Nast, 2017, https://www.gq.com/story/a24-studio-oral-history. Accessed 20 November 2017.
Brueggeman, Tom. ‘Moonlight’ is the Most Frugal Best Picture Ever: See Analysis of the 10 Lowest-Budget Winners of all Time. IndieWire, 2017, http://www.indiewire.com/2017/03/moonlight-wins-top-10-lowest-budget-best-picture-winners-oscar-history-1201788405/. Accessed 20 November 2017.
Denby, David. Has Hollywood Murdered the Movies? New Republic, 2012. https://newrepublic.com/article/145813/cause-consequences-retail-apocalypse. Accessed 20 November 2017.
Hipes, Patrick. Oscar Nominations: Noms By The Number. Deadline Hollywood, 2016, http://deadline.com/2016/01/oscar-nominations-2016-lists-films-studios-1201682825/. Accessed 20 November 2017.
Pratt, Mary Louise. Arts of the Contact Zone. JSTOR, Profession, Modern Language Association, 1991, www.jstor.org/stable/25595469. Accessed 20 November 2017.
Wilkinson, Alissa. The Terrific and Terrible Summer 2017 Movie Season, Explained. Vox, https://www.vox.com/summer-movies/2017/8/29/16184610/summer-movies-wrapup-box-office-critics. Accessed 20 November 2017.