The New Mutants – Review

Few movies have had the kind of roller coaster like roll out that The New Mutants has had.  After years of delays, cancellations, and speculation as to if it ever was going to be seen at all, Mutants has finally made it into theaters and on PVOD this weekend.  So, why did it take so long?  A lot of factors have led us here.  The movie is based on a spin-off comic from the X-Men franchise, created by comic writers Chris Claremont and Bob McLeod.  It was green-lit in 2015 by 20th Century Fox studios, with Josh Boone (The Fault in Our Stars) attached to write and direct.  The production was intended to branch off from the main X-Men movie franchise, taking a decidedly darker and more horror like tone, which is in line with the comic itself.  The production wrapped filming in 2017, with an intended release date set for Summer 2018.  And then something happened that I’m sure no one involved with the film probably ever expected.  Fox was suddenly put up for sale, which caused a major disruption in the release calendar for the studio.   And when Disney emerged as the victor in the bidding war for the legendary studio, this made it extra awkward for The New Mutants, because it’s very existence conflicts with the ongoing Marvel Cinematic Universe plans.  Fox had been holding onto the rights to their Marvel properties throughout the 2010’s and were attempting to compete with Marvel Studios with their own franchise plans with the characters they had.  With Fox and Disney now part of the same company, Fox’s haphazard attempt at franchise building now seemed superfluous and pointless.  The X-Men franchise as we knew it was pretty much over, and whatever movies were left in the pipeline were basically just going to be epilogues to a now dead series, waiting for it’s inevitable re-imagining under Marvel’s guidance.

But, with The New Mutants already complete and ready to launch, some held out hope that it might still be given a chance to stand out on it’s own, separate from it’s place within Fox’s X-Men franchise.  Unfortunately for it, the last X-Men film, Dark Phoenix (2019), crashed and burned at the box office and was blasted by critics.  This came at a point where New Mutants was already pushed back by last minute re-shoots, presumably to film a new ending for the movie.  After Dark Phoenix‘s problems emerged, Mutants was pushed back again, going from a Summer 2019 to Spring of 2020, a full two years after the movie was originally supposed to be released.  Some were even speculating that Disney may have ended up deciding to dump the movie off on demand or on Disney+, instead of letting it play in theaters.  But, for a while earlier this year, it actually looked like the movie would finally see the light of day.  And then the pandemic happened.  New Mutants, like so many other films this year (big and small), was scuttled off of it’s April release date and was at one point not even on the calendar at all.  Without a set release date, many believed that this was indeed the final nail in the coffin for this horribly unlucky film.  But, to everyone’s surprise, Disney still committed to a theatrical release of the film.  Who know’s why, especially after deciding to put Mulan (2020) on Disney+.  Maybe it was a strange clause left in as part of the Fox merger, but there’s no definitive answer.  Despite many pockets of the pandemic still raging on in parts of the country, movie theaters are beginning to slowly re-open with strict social distancing protocols.  And to everyone’s surprise, The New Mutants is going to be one of the first movies to mark the return to theaters, with the potential of being the first box office hit of the reopening era.  The only question is, was it worth all the wait and trouble to get here?

The story begins with a young Native American girl named Danielle Moonstar (Blu Hunt) finding her reservation community under attack by a monster of unknown origin.  She looses her father (Adam Beach) in the attack and later is knocked unconscious.  When she wakes up, she finds herself in a gloomy looking hospital, where she meets Dr. Reyes (Alice Braga).  Dr. Reyes informs Dani that she has been brought to this hospital because when she was discovered after the attack, it was shown that she possessed mutant powers, similar to the X-Men.  However, Dani is told that her powers are far too powerful and dangerous at the moment, and that she’s been brought to the hospital for safety reasons and also to help her learn how to control it.  At first Dani is skeptical of her new home, but once she begins to interact with the other teenage mutants on the compound, she feels less afraid.  The other “new mutants” include Raine Sinclair (Maisie Williams) who can transform herself into a wolf; Sam Guthrie (Charlie Heaton), who is able to launch his body like a rocket, but hasn’t learned how to land; Illyana Rasputin (Anya Taylor-Joy), who can teleport and also summon weapons from her own body; and also Roberto da Costa (Henry Zaga) who can set his whole body on fire.  Each of them has had a traumatic experience involving their powers just like Dani, which has brought them to this facility in the hopes of improving or even “curing” their powers.  However, the forces behind Dr. Reyes’ research may have other plans for the new mutants, and it be far more sinister that previously thought.  And pretty soon, the silent tranquility of the compound is broken by the arrival of the same mysterious beast that attacked Dani’s reservation; a massive Demon Bear.

So, how is this movie going to fare during a pandemic?  It depends on where it’s playing.  It will almost certainly not perform as well as it normally would under normal circumstances, but at the same time, the movie has garnered attention for it’s troubled history, which may drive curiosity up for it that it otherwise would’ve not had.  The movie is playing on screens in theaters in as many as 44 states that have since lifted their shut downs and allowed theaters to reopen.  However, I unfortunately live in a state (California) that is still on lock-down and has yet to allow theater re-openings.  It’s still a situation that I can support, because health of the customer must come first and foremost, but also disappointing because I do miss going to a movie theater and enjoying movies the way they were meant to be seen, especially when other places are already making that possible.  Disney has made The New Mutants available on VOD rental services, but I felt that I still needed to watch it on a big screen in order to really judge it properly.  Thankfully, there was one screen in the whole of the Los Angeles metro area that had New Mutants playing on it; at the Mission Tiki Drive-In in Montclair, CA, which I previously spotlighted here.   Drive-In theaters have been a godsend for me during this pandemic, as they have allowed me to still enjoy a big screen experience without having to suffer the health risks.  The choices of films have been slim, but when one I’m interested in comes available at these facilities, I will gladly choose it over video on demand any day.  I will say, watching the movie there was a great choice because there is something magical about watching a movie under the moon and stars.  The only question is, was the movie itself worth it.  Sad to say, not really.  My feelings overall about The New Mutants are a mixed bag, but the worst thing I can say about it is that it’s just generic and mediocre.

Overall, I would say that The New Mutants is not the worst thing I have seen from a super hero movie, and definitely no where near the worst that I’ve seen from the now defunct Fox X-Men franchise.  Dark Phoenix was just an embarrassment for the once proud franchise, and a terrible note to go out on.  The best thing that New Mutants does is that it closes the door on this version of the X-Men series with a less sour finale.  But apart from that, there isn’t much else to say that’s positive.  It’s more competently made than Dark Phoenix, but still unfocused when it comes to tone and character.  For a movie that was trying to put a horror spin on the X-Men universe, it’s not a particularly scary movie.  It’s clear that something went wrong during the production of the movie, whether it was studio interference or just a lack of vision on the director’s part.  Josh Boone emerged as a filmmaker with a surprise hit in the doomed romance movie that was The Fault in Our Stars.  For him to go from that to the pseudo-horror of New Mutants seemed like a bit of a stretch, and it turns out that ended up being the case.  Boone just borrows wholesale from other claustrophobic horror movies and just ends up making it feel cliche as a result.  I’ve seen many of these same tropes work better in other movies like A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984), IT (2017), and even One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975) which this movie also borrows heavily from.  And it becomes very clear that the last minute re-shoots were done in part to dilute the horror elements and make the movie more like a standard Marvel action movie, particularly in it’s final act.  You’ll be spending most of the time watching this movie thinking about better films of it’s genre, and that’s never something you want a movie to be doing while you watch it.  That being said, it’s blandness in some ways shields it from being anything worse.  Like I said, Dark Phoenix not only failed, it failed on an almost legendarily bad way.  New Mutants doesn’t warrant the same kind of notorious reputation.  It’s just good enough to be passable and just bad enough to be forgettable.

One of the things that really defines the mixed results of the movie can definitely be found in it’s cast.  One thing that I do appreciate about the movie is that it keeps things very simple.  The cast in this movie is actually quite small for a franchise film, and it allows the movie to better use it’s time to establish each character without losing them within the shuffle.  The only problem is, the lack of direction on these actors is very apparent.  There is a ton of overacting clashing with under-acting between each performance, and it leads to a fairly uneven ensemble throughout the movie.  I’ll say that one of the bright spots of the movie is newcomer Blu Hunt in the role of Dani Moonstar.  She manages to keep the character engaging enough as the protagonist to keep us interested in her story.  I also like the performance of Alice Braga as Dr. Reyes, who manages to fill the antagonistic role well enough without taking it over the top.  The best performance overall I would say comes from Stranger Things’ Charlie Heaton, who manages to perfect a believable Kentucky fried accent in his performance as Sam Guthrie, giving you no indication of his real British accent underneath.  The same can’t be said about the other Brits in the cast.  I believe that Maisie Williams is attempting to do a Scottish accent as Raine Sinclair, but it slips constantly throughout the film.  And Anya Taylor-Joy’s attempt at a Russian accent is just laughable.  And it’s a shame, because I’ve seen these two actresses do so much better in other roles; especially with Maisie Williams whose understated performance here is such a far cry from her beloved work on Game of Thrones.  For the most part, these distracting attempts at different accents take away from the potential character development that these actors might have been able to pull off.  And the movie doesn’t do them any favors either with some poorly edited scenes that are meant to build the characters’ relationships together.

The movie also is visually rather bland.  I’ll give the movie credit for keeping things simple, with a single location used for most of the movie.  But, when it gets to the point where the movie needs to bring out some visual effects, it becomes clear just how neglected this movie was overall.  The visual effects in this movie are pretty bad, and definitely not up to the standard that you’d expect from a movie of this genre.  Every creature that manifests in the movie looks like it jumped out of a video game, and doesn’t feel natural at all.  At other points, like when Sam Guthrie attempts to practice his rocket launching powers, the movie literally makes it look like a cartoon; like he’s spinning around like Wile E. Coyote on one of his failed contraptions.  The best effects are the ones that are kept either at a minimum or hidden in the shadows.  The Demon Bear works effectively when you see less of it, but once we finally see him in his full monstrous glory, oh boy does it deflate the tension fast.  The only thing that I think that Josh Boone and his team get close to right is the atmosphere of the film.  The movie is shot in a way that does convey an unsettling mood, even if it doesn’t entirely make it feel creepy.  There is some creativity in the way that the movie executes the feeling of a repressive atmosphere in which these characters live in, like the blank stone walls of each of their cell rooms, and the ever present cameras that stare down on the characters from above.  Indeed, the movie actually does an effective job in it’s first act of not revealing too much right away and allowing the atmosphere to convey to the audience the feeling of oppression and menace into the story.  Unfortunately, the movie doesn’t live up to that potential, and the longer it goes on the less you feel the movie’s atmosphere working the way it should.

As poorly as the final product has turned out, there’s still a part of me that kind of admires what the movie has accomplished.  It reminds me of those times when you see a track runner either pull a muscle or break an ankle halfway through their race, and yet they pull themselves up and hobble their way to the finish line regardless, just so that they could say they finished it.  It’s those kinds of moments, adversity in a moment of complete disaster, that carry their own kind of inspiration with them.  The New Mutants was a movie that was probably always going to never live up to expectations and was going to be forgotten like so many other disappointments.  And yet, there is something inspiring in how it managed to defy the odds and still get a theatrical release.  The story about this movie’s troubled road to the big screen may far go down as far more legendary than the movie itself.  Despite being caught in the turbulent shuffle of a corporate merger and then once again placed back on the shelf due to a historic pandemic, The New Mutants still managed to make it to the big screen, and that in some way makes it a triumph of perseverance that we can all feel inspired by.  Unfortunately, the movie itself is a mess, and not really warranting of the hype that has surrounded it’s release.  But at the same time, it’s not an embarrassment either.  For a movie that is just a stray remnant of a now defunct franchise, it does work as a better final bow than Dark Phoenix.  Who knows, in time the movie may find a second life as a stand alone oddity, but I think that the movie is a little uneven to warrant that.  As it stands, I’m happy that the movie managed to escape it’s notoriously troubled shelf life and actually make it to the big screen.  A mediocre movie, that surprisingly carved out it’s own inspirational journey that’s far more intriguing than the movie itself.  Will it be the movie that saves movie-going overall?  I doubt it, since there is still a raging pandemic right now, and this is definitely not a movie to spark repeat viewing.  But, the fact that it’s made it to the big screen at all given all the circumstances makes me hopeful that the industry itself is still looking at the theatrical experience as an integral part of the business going forward.  If New Mutants can make it to the finish line, any movie can.

Rating: 6/10

The Movies of Fall 2020 (Hopefully)

When I published my last movie season preview here in April, I knew that it was on the optimistic side and would’ve likely changed over the course of the summer.  Sadly, the worst case scenario played out.  2020 will be a historic year for the film industry, because for the first time in who knows how long, there was no Summer movie season.  Movie theaters remained shuttered for the entirety of what used to be the most profitable period of the year, and only now are some of them (not all) beginning to reopen for business here in America.  Some of my last summer movie preview covered movies that I was hopeful would make it to the big screen on time, and almost all of them failed to meet their original release date, with only Bill & Ted Face the Music (of all movies) actually sticking the landing.  For a movie fan like me who greatly prefers the big screen experience, it’s been a rough couple of months.  Not only am I seeing so many movies I’ve been excited for be pushed back months or even a year away from it’s original date, but some of the studios have just given up and dropped their movies off on streaming services.  I’ve already covered the boom of streaming content plenty during this pandemic, but I will add that my hope is that all these measures taken is just to get us through the crises of the moment, and that things will turn around soon, giving us a chance to return back to normal soon.  I feel bad for the people behind movies like Mulan and Tenet, as they are seeing their films roll-out in a less than desired way.  My hope is that within the months ahead, it will be safe to once again watch movies on the big screen, and that the movies of Fall 2020 don’t see the same disruptions in their roll-out that their Summer cousins endured.  Like my last preview, I am foregoing my usual categories, and instead just spotlighting the most notable movies coming out in the Fall season; hopefully with all of them managing to avoid any postponement.  Anything could change between now and New Years, but hopefully for these movies, we’ll still be enjoying them this Fall season.

DUNE (DECEMBER 18, 2020)

What was already one of the year’s most anticipated new films from the start still remains the most anticipated movie of this holiday season.  Based on Frank Herbert’s seminal sci-fi novel of the same name, Dune is a grand scale epic that people are hoping will be the movie that brings people back to the big screen in a major way.  Director Denis Villeneuve (Arrival, Sicario, Blade Runner 2049) will undoubtedly bring a bold artistic style to this film, and with major studio backing from Warner Brothers, this movie will almost assuredly demand a big screen presentation just to capture the immensity of it all.  This movie could very well be for science fiction what Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings trilogy was for fantasy.  The movie also boasts an impressive all-star cast that includes Timothee Chalamet, Oscar Isaac, Rebecca Ferguson, Jason Mamoa, Josh Brolin, Javier Bardem, Zendaya, and Dave Bautista just to name a few.  For many fans of the book, this movie will also satisfy a long held desire for a faithful adaptation that feels truer to Herbert’s vision, after David Lynch’s failed 1984 version left much to be desired.  It’s going to be interesting if Warner Brothers can pull this off, but you get the sense already that they are hedging their bets.  Nearly 3 months out from the scheduled release date, and we still don’t have a trailer.  That’s unusual for a big movie of this kind, and it makes people wonder if this will be yet another big tent-pole pushed back to 2021.  Hopefully, the pandemic will have died down by Christmas and studios will feel confident in putting this and others like it on a big screen again.  But, without a viable vaccine available in time, and a threat of a second wave, it’s possible that we may have to wait a bit longer for Dune to make it’s big screen debut, if it indeed gets one.  All I can say is if the industry needed a big movie to help boost the theatrical market once again, this would indeed be the movie to do it.

BLACK WIDOW (NOVEMBER 6, 2020)

Marvel’s newest blockbuster was supposed to herald the beginning of the Summer 2020 movie season, as Marvel has done over the last decade on the first week of May.  However, plans changed quickly, and Marvel had to postpone like everyone else; missing out on that traditional slot that has always served them well.  However, unlike most other studios this year, Marvel was actually well positioned to adapt to the delay.  Because they plant their flags so far in advance in anticipation for their upcoming releases, all Marvel had to do was have each of their movies take one step backward to the next available slot.  As a result, Black Widow, which was supposed to come out May 1 is now coming out on November 6 instead, taking over the release date of their next film, The Eternals, which was pushed back to Marvel’s next available date, February 12.  At this point the Marvel brand is so strong that they can make moves like this without hurting their chances at the box office.  Black Panther already showed that they can perform just as well in February as any other time of year, so Eternals is still in a good position.  What also benefits Marvel is that they delay has allowed audiences to build up more of an appetite for a new Marvel movie, with last July’s Spider-Man: Far From Home coming a full year and a half before Black Widow.  That’s good for this new movie, which marks the starting off point for Marvel’s Phase 4 plans.  It will be interesting to see where Agent Natasha Romanoff’s long awaited solo film fits within the ongoing MCU storyline, given what we know of her fate from Avengers: Endgame (2019).   The movie also looks like a fresh departure from past Marvel movies, taking on a more grounded Jason Bourne-esque style and plot.  The inclusion of Black Widow’s “family” of fellow assassins, played by Florence Pugh, Rachel Weisz and David Harbour also looks to make this a fun action movie as well.  Can Marvel keep the ball rolling into Phase 4?  Hopefully, we’ll get the chance to see this November.

SOUL (NOVEMBER 20, 2020)

You can always count on Pixar to get movie goers excited about what they have coming up next.  Unfortunately for the studio, they suffered a bad hit right at the start of this pandemic when they’re highly anticipated Spring 2020 release Onward suffered at the box office during it’s brief two week run before theaters started closing.  It failed to cross the $100 million mark, a first for Pixar, and was rushed quickly onto Disney+ in the hopes that it might help the new streamer gain more subscribers.  With the pandemic raging on through the summer, it became clear that Pixar’s second original film of the year, Soul, would not meet it’s June release date and a delay was quickly enacted.  Taking the release date from Disney Animation’s Raya and the Last Dragon (now set for Spring 2021), Soul is hoping to get a chance to bring Pixar back strong at the box office.  This new film comes from Pixar chief Pete Doctor, who has one of the best track records as a director so far at the studio, having made the likes of Monsters Inc. (2001), Up (2009) and Inside Out (2015).  With his fourth film, Doctor is delving into another high concept, which is what makes up a person’s soul.  Here, the story revolves around a jazz musician and music teacher (voiced by Jamie Foxx) who suddenly finds himself in an ethereal realm after an accident, stuck between the afterlife and the place where souls begin before life.  There he meets a soul named 22 (voiced by Tina Fey), who refuses to join the realm of the living.  It’s the kind of ambitious, multi-layered film that Pixar has built it’s brand around, and my hope is that we will get to see this movie presented beautifully on a big, wide screen.  The trailer gives the indication that this movie will be gorgeous to look at, and hopefully those high Pixar standards bear fruit.  Let’s just hope that the theatrical experience will be able to give us that chance to witness all that beauty in the best way possible.

NO TIME TO DIE (NOVEMBER 20, 2020)

The very first casualty of the 2020 pandemic, this newest entry of the long running James Bond franchise gave us the first real indication of the severity that this pandemic was going to have on Hollywood’s plans for the year.  The movie, marking Daniel Craig’s fifth and final turn as 007, was originally going to be released in April, an unusual time slot for the franchise.  With the delay, it has now moved in a traditional Fall release, which has always been what the Bond franchise has done before, so it seemed a natural move given the circumstances.  But it is interesting that when MGM and Sony moved their massive tent-pole to the Fall, the world had not really fully grasped how bad this pandemic was going to get.  Sure, we already saw China suffer through the outbreak during the winter, but here in North America, it still seemed remote.  The decision to move this film came as a shock, given how close to the release it was.  Tickets had already gone on sale (I bought mine, in fact) and were soon refunded.  But, as we now know, it was only the first domino to fall.  In hindsight, the Bond team did the right thing by postponing the film.  Hopefully, they won’t have to do it again.  This is another movie that definitely demands a big screen presentation, as most Bond movies are.  Considering that Craig is hanging it up as the iconic character after this makes the new movie all the more monumental, and it will help to generate excitement once it’s finally released.  Seeing old faces return, as well as new ones coming in for the first time, like Oscar winner Rami Malek’s enigmatic new villain, will be pleasing to many fans of the franchise.  Let’s hope that the long wait will be worth it, and that Craig’s Bond goes out with a big bang on the big screen.

WONDER WOMAN 1984 (OCTOBER 2, 2020)

You’ve got to hand it to Warner Brothers; they are committed to the theatrical experience for their big tent-pole films.  In addition to Christopher Nolan’s Tenet, they stated that Wonder Woman 1984 would be screened in theaters and they have stuck with that.  Whether or not theaters are going to be ready is another question.  Tenet is already getting a staggered release in markets across the world, with some theaters in North America getting it for the Labor Day weekend, while others in hot spot areas (which sadly includes California, where I live) will have to wait.  Hopefully, when Warner’s next big tent-pole comes out, more theaters will be open to present it.  But, October is readily approaching and it’s hard to say if we are going to be ready.  Having already passed on two Summer release dates, people are hopeful that Wonder Woman 1984 will be able to stick the landing this fall.  The highly anticipated sequel brings back Gal Gadot as the super heroine and the movie looks to deliver on the same blend of high octane action and charming character dynamics that the original 2017 film gave us.  Given the double threat of Pedro Pascal’s Max Lord and Kristen Wiig’s Cheetah, two of Wonder Woman’s biggest foes from the comics, this looks to be a movie that not only builds on the original, but also takes it to new heights.  Hopefully, Warner Brothers and DC’s high expectations are justified with their optimistic release date.  I enjoyed the last film very much, and I too have high hopes for the movie.  This could indeed be the movie that helps to bring movie theaters back to booming business, but given the dangers involved with the ongoing pandemic, it could prove to be a huge risk as well, and it’s asking a lot of the audience to put their health on the line in order to watch this in a theater.  Hopefully, the curve finally flattens before this movie makes it’s debut, but we’ll have to wait and see.

MANK (TBA FALL 2020)

With all this talk of the big tent-pole movies pushed back from the Summer and Spring, we can’t overlook the awards season films that also normally make their way to the silver screen.  The only question is, will they make it to the screen this year.  The entire rest of the 2020 movie calendar could still be in flux, and a lot of the movies put up for Oscar season might not even make it as scheduled.  Given that Academy Awards already decided to push back their deadline for consideration into February, there is less pressure to get these kinds of movies out onto screens before December 31.  Most of the Oscar season movies may now be coming out in January or February at the latest.  There are, however, a few movies vying for Awards consideration that will be released this year, and they are mostly the ones being made by streamers like Netflix.  In fact, Netflix has a few highly anticipated new movies from the likes of Charlie Kaufman, Ron Howard, Aaron Sorkin and maybe even the Coen Brothers if we’re lucky.  But, for me, the one that I’m looking most forward to is David Fincher’s new biopic called Mank.  The movie tells the story of screenwriter Herman Mankiewicz, who co-wrote the film Citizen Kane (1941).  The plot will detail the tumultuous history of that legendary film’s making from the point of view of Mankiewicz (played by Gary Oldman) and show how the pressures put on him from threats by the Hearst Corporation as well Orson Welles (Tom Burke) taking most of the credit, led to a short lived career for the now celebrated writer.  For movie lovers like me, this story is one that will make for a great cinematic experience, especially in Fincher’s hands.  We don’t much about the movie other than it’s cast and that it will be in black and white (a first for Fincher).  I hope that Netflix does screen this somewhere here in LA like they did for last year’s The Irishman (2019).  At least with Netflix behind this one, we know that it will be released without delay.  The only question now is when, and hopefully we get that answer soon and with an exciting trailer to go with it.

It will be interesting to see if these release dates do indeed pan out over the next few months.  I’m hopeful that we’ve gone through the worst of this pandemic and that movie theaters will be able to screen new releases in a safe manner.  That being said, it’s going to be a while before the business will be able to return back to normal.  With the digital only releases of Trolls World Tour, Scoob! and now Mulan, a precedent has been set for how studios can circumvent the movie theater industry with a premium On Demand model for release.  One hopes that it is temporary for the circumstances, but as of right now, the movie theaters need the studios support more than the other way around.  Now of course not every movie is going to benefit from streaming.  Disney suffered a loss by dumping the $140 million Artemis Fowl onto Disney+ instead of delaying it for theaters, but let’s face it, that movie was always doomed to fail, even with theaters open.  But, movie theaters are still in a desperate place, and a lot of hopes are riding on the movies set for this Fall.  Time will only tell what impact the deals the theater industry cut with the major studios, like the controversial one between AMC and Universal, will have on the future of the business.  If anything, this Fall season may be the one that makes or breaks the theatrical market forever.  Hopefully, the movies that I spotlighted here are big enough of a draw to help people return the movies.  I am cautiously optimistic, though I do understand that it will still be a tall order.  One thing that does give me hope is that I hear a lot of people lament about missing being in a theater during this time of year.  Being stuck in a home has run it’s course for many people, and they are eager to get back outside whenever they can.  I can see this whenever I’ve gone to Drive-In theaters here in LA.  They are almost always packed, which is a great sign for the theatrical industry.  It’s hard to know the future, but if what I’ve seen is any indication, the movie theater industry may not nearly as dead as we thought.

The Streaming Summer Games – How the Streaming Race Has Fared in the Stay at Home Era

Under normal circumstances, we would be having a much different experience this summer.  This mid-August week would have seen the closing of the 2020 Tokyo Olympic games, which would’ve been a unifying and celebratory event for everyone around the world.  At this point, we would have had an exciting post-Comic Con outlook to get excited about, as the industry would’ve been rolling out all their most exciting news in the mega Summer event.  And at this point, we would have had a robust Summer movie season with the likes of Black WidowWonder Woman 84Tenet, Pixar’s Soul, and many more already in our rear view mirror.  But none of that has happened.  The coronavirus continued to rage on for the entire summer, even hitting it’s peak in July, and that left us with no Olympics, no Comic Con, and no movie season whatsoever.  2020 is almost certainly going to be seen as the “lost year,” with so much in the way of entertainment and sports having been either altered or cancelled outright in the hopes of flattening the curve of the pandemic.  Worse yet, it’s a problem that we still haven’t seen the light at the end of the tunnel with yet.  We know that like most other pandemics it will eventually burn out, but the impact will be felt long after it has subsided.  Movie theaters will forever change, as will sports and fan conventions.  We may never see the box office numbers that were once the life blood of the industry the same way again, and at the very least, it will take several years if not a generation to get it back to where it was during the 2010’s.  And yet, people are still able to find entertainment that has helped them to endure through these hard times, and it’s been through a platform whose development could not have been better timed for the era that we are going through right now.  For the moment we are in right now, streaming has been the life preserver for an industry and an audience that needs fresh and new entertainment.

The year 2020 will be known for quite a lot of things, but it will probably also be known as the year that Streaming came into it’s own as a vital part of the entertainment industry.  With movie theaters, performance venues, and sports arenas all shut down in compliance of the disease control requirements, streaming became more essential for the average household than ever before.  For the last decade, streaming was just a secondary option for anyone wanting to watch something new on television; competing more directly with say cable television than with any other entertainment output.  But, with things the way they are now, people are looking more and more at streaming as the future of entertainment.  With the “Stay at Home” orders coming down hard on many American states at the first outbreak of COVID-19, people were distressed by the fact that it left them with so little options for entertainment.   But with the loss of movie theaters and sports venues came a boom for streaming services.  The streaming market saw a nearly 20% increase in new subscriptions in just the first half of 2020 alone, greatly outpacing even their most optimistic of predictions.  The market leaders, Netflix and Amazon benefited greatly from these market conditions, but the same was also true for the fresh new crop of competitor whose launch over the last year could not have been more opportune, even though it came in the middle of a pandemic.  For some like Disney and Universal, streaming came as a much needed life line to help save them from the struggles of the economic hit that came from the pandemic.  And while the market has given a favorable hand to the streaming newcomers, it hasn’t all been spread out equally.  With this tumultuous and empty summer about to soon come to an end, it’s makes sense to take a look at who the winners and losers are in this Summer of Streaming.

First, we definitely need to examine the strength of these services by the factors that they themselves measure their success.  Chief among them is the rate of new subscribers to their service and the retention rate that they yield over time.  Netflix has managed to build it’s empire through a very high retention of old and new subscribers over it’s decade long history of streaming content.  As a result, they now have nearly 200 million individual accounts that pay the monthly subscription cost, which generates monthly revenue for the company in the billions, which in turn goes into the production of new exclusive content that will help them to grow their subscriber base even further.  This cycle has enabled Netflix to not only compete with the major studios as a formidable producer in it’s own right, but has up to this point also put the theatrical market into a defensive mode.  Amazon, though they operate a bit differently offering their streaming service as an extension of their Prime membership, still has a high retention rate of their viewership, which has firmly put them in second place overall.  But there is also the other marker of success that the streaming market has been making progress within, and that’s in the accolades it receives.  It’s not enough to have a high quantity of viewable content on any given platform; it also matters if it’s quality as well.  That has been the thing that upstart Hulu has proven among it’s bigger competitors.  Despite having launched well before Netflix and Amazon, Hulu’s subscriber base has remained relatively small.  But, they made up for it by making history as the first streamer to have won the top award at the Emmys, taking home Best Drama for The Handmaid’s Tale.  There are certainly several ways in which the newest competitors can tout their achievements, and the one’s shown from Netflix, Amazon and Hulu have proved that.  And given the shake-up that 2020 has made, these factors may end up being the new barometer for success in a very changed industry.

Considering all the factors, new subscribers, high retention, and accolades for the quality of the content, there are certainly some winners in this Summer streaming season.  Of the newest contenders, there is no doubt that Disney+ takes the crown by a significant margin.  Launching last November to much fanfare, Disney+ positioned itself perfectly to not only put itself in strong contention with the streaming giants of Netflix and Amazon, but to also have a strong foothold just in case something crazy and unexpected happened, like say a pandemic.  Once theaters began closing, Disney made the risky but overall right choice to bring their short-lived box office champ Onward (2020) immediately to the platform.  Onward only managed a two week run in theaters before the shutdown, and while it did cost Disney money to cut it’s run short, it did benefit Disney+ with more interest from prospective subscribers.  Couple this with earlier than expected premieres of Frozen II (2019) and Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker (2019) on the platform as well, and Disney+ was generating some much needed buzz for a still relatively new streaming service.  And then they pulled out their ace in the deck; the musical Hamilton.  Originally intended for a theatrical release in 2021, Disney instead opted to launch the much anticipated filmed version of the blockbuster stage musical on Disney+ instead; and on a well timed Fourth of July premiere too.  With this, Disney not only propelled themselves ahead among new streaming competitors, they also gave the top dogs a run for their money.  Hamilton was the most streamed film on any platform this summer, even higher than any Netflix premiere, and by a wide margin.  If streaming is going to challenge the norms of Hollywood distribution in the next decade, it may not be Netflix that leads the charge but Disney given the huge swings they are currently taking, and that’s without having played their Marvel cards just yet.

One thing that has also benefited Disney+ plus thus far is their ratio of value to content at the core of their service.  Their $7 a month price tag is relatively reasonable and perhaps even a bargain given what they already have put on their service.  Not only is every Disney movie ever made available, but also every Star Wars, Marvel, and Pixar film, plus a whole host of 20th Century Fox and National Geographic titles as well.  Netflix by comparison has a higher $12 a month base subscription, but their decade long production of original material has helped to back up the value of their service.  Eventually Disney will raise their price once they fill their platform with more original content, but for the meantime, their launch comes at a reasonable rate which has allowed for new subscribers to flock to them quickly, even in the middle of economic hardship.  And for a start-up, that value to cost ratio matters and it probably is what is separating the leaders from the rest of the pack.  This price point in particular is what is holding back what could have been one of the other top contenders from reaching where it should be.  HBO Max, the streaming platform run by Warner Media, has touted itself as the new home for everything under their media umbrella, including Warner Brothers Entertainment, HBO, DC Comics, Turner Classic Movies, Cartoon Network, as well as exclusive rights to Studio Ghibli.  However, while their lineup of content was impressive, their starting price was not; $14.99 a month.  Charging more a month for a platform with very little content than what Netflix has with their huge library, was a hard pill to swallow for many potential subscribers, and in many ways it has been what has prevented it from having a huge start in the market, which has alarmed some in the Warner Media empire.  Still, a last minute deal made with cable giant Comcast has given HBO Max some legs to stand on, but their continued absence from other streaming hardware makers like Roku and Amazon Fire may also dilute any success for them in the future.  For HBO Max’s shaky start, they can only hope that future high profile exclusives like the Snyder Cut of Justice League (2017) can give them the boost they’ll need to gain ground on the likes of Disney, Amazon and Netflix.

It makes you wonder if HBO Max had not made that eleventh hour deal with Comcast that they might have crashed and burned upon release.  It shows that more than anything that succeeding in this new market depends greatly on a good strategy.  Disney benefited from ideal timing and the strength of their catalog, but also being able to improvise in a time of crises has given them the edge they needed to stand out on top.  While HBO Max has had to figure their strategy out in new circumstances, other new platforms are making themselves stand out in other ways.  Apple TV+ launched two weeks prior to Disney+, and did so with lesser fanfare, but also with an entirely different roll-out model.  Apple’s platform runs through their iTunes store, making each of their exclusive content available to purchase separately without a subscription, but also makes this available as well at a bargain rate of $4.99 a month.  The downside is that Apple’s exclusive offerings are the smallest of any of the streamers, but again the smaller monthly price helps to match that value ratio.  In addition, Apple has also given people who have purchased any of their hardware products within the last year a free year long subscription, which is helping to bring people to their service who otherwise would’ve passed it by.  It’s too early to say what their retention rate will be once those free year subscriptions are up, but it nevertheless is a smart strategy for a newly minted service to start out with.  The same could hold true for late comer Peacock.  Launched recently in July, Peacock is taking a very different strategy by offering a sizable chunk of their content for free.  Once potential subscribers sign up for the service, then they are able to watch a number of shows on the platform at no charge, with the remainder available behind a pay wall.  Again, it’s hard to know if this may entice new subscribers to pay more for the premium content, but giving away so much for free at the get go is a smart strategy to entice people to try the service out first; like giving them a test run to see if they like it.  Once Peacock starts offering more exclusives and puts more of it in the premium paywall column, they could likely benefit from all the free subscribers who have enjoyed their service up to that point and find people more willing to pay up.  The times right now favor experimentation when it comes to making a streaming platform work, and for Apple and Peacock, they are experiments that could lead to good things down the line.

But, from what we have seen over the summer, there is certainly one example that will probably stand as a prime example of how not to launch a streaming service.  Poor Quibi almost seemed doomed from the get go.  The pet project of former Dreamworks Animation founder Jeffrey Katzenberg and his chief investor, former Ebay CEO and California gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman, Quibi was and is an odd little duckling in this streaming battlefield.  Instead of competing with the big studios over challenging the likes of Netflix, Quibi sought to carve out it’s competition against another internet giant; YouTube.  Quibi’s format centers around short 10 minute long videos that are ideally watched on mobile devices; with some shows uniquely formatted to play in a smart phone’s portrait mode.  Though short in length, each show would be given polished production values, and would be produced by some top tier filmmakers with marquee names attached to them.  No doubt Katzenberg was calling in quite a few favors from some of his many Hollywood friends, and there were some interesting projects announced to help launch the service.  The unfortunate thing is Quibi’s very format model does not justify it’s value of a subscription service.  YouTube offers millions of hours of content to for free to anyone who opens up their web page, supporting itself and it’s community of content creators through ad revenue.  No one would want to pay extra to watch something similar to that format, and that is what is at the heart of Quibi’s failure.  Upon launch, Quibi couldn’t muster 1 million subscribers in it’s first week; a number Disney+ achieved in it’s first hour.  And since then, their subscriber base has dwindled more than 80%, leaving the struggling streamer with the smallest overall viewership of any streamer.  Sure, it was a unique angle to take, making what are essentially bigger budget YouTube videos, but it does not justify the cost of Quibi’s subscription value, and as of right now, Katzenberg’s baby is sadly on life support.  Nobody wants to be a cautionary tale, but Quibi may indeed be what we look back on as the model for exactly the wrong way to build a streaming service.

It will be interesting to see what the competition that this summer has brought to the streaming wars will create for us in the years ahead.  Disney is certainly happy to see their streaming platform become a huge success, especially when all the other divisions of their company are suffering during this pandemic.  The upcoming experiment with Mulan on premium VOD will be yet another monumental movement by Disney+ that may change the film industry even more in the future.  And though HBO Max, Peacock, and Apple TV+ are all growing their viewership much more slowly, their experimentation may pan out in the years ahead as well; perhaps even putting them in contention with the industry leaders.  The only certain thing right now is that Quibi is not very likely to last long in this market.  If they couldn’t make their move in a period of time where streaming was the only game in town, then there is little hope for their future.  They’ll likely end up on the ash heap of other failed industry experiments like MoviePass, with their assets likely sold off to each of their competitors.  And let’s not forget, Netflix and Amazon continue to grow as well with this ever expanding market.  Netflix enjoyed it’s best quarter ever in fact, with all the people waiting on the fence finally diving fully in once the loss of the movie theater business made streaming more essential than ever.  At this point, we are learning what it takes to make the best moves in an industry that is rapidly changing.  When many of these streamers set out to launch themselves over the course of the last year, I’m sure that none of them thought that their value would be so needed so soon.  And as a result, we are seeing what could be the start of the new power base for the future of the industry; especially if the theatrical market fails to recover from this pandemic.  Some are winning and some are losing, but the race to the top is a long game, and it’ll be interesting to see what each streaming services pulls out of their sleeves in the years ahead, hopefully in a more stable world than we live in now.

Evolution of Character – Emma Woodhouse

There exists a stereotypical viewpoint over the works of an author like Jane Austen.  The books that she wrote over the course of her all too brief life have been the inspiration for many costume period dramas that more often or not are targeted towards middle-aged women heading to the movies with their friends after an afternoon lunch at a local wine bar.  Sure, Austen’s fan based has skewed female over the years, but it is such an underestimation of her impact on literature.  Her works are evocative of an era in pre-Victorian England, but the themes therein throughout her novels are just as provocative today as they were back when she wrote them.  On the surface, her novels are comedies of manners, but they also tackle harder issues such as class differences, the roles of women in society, and perhaps most pointedly, the manners of sexual activity.  She was not afraid to point out the abuses that men enact upon the “fairer” sex, and also challenge the definitions of masculinity and femininity in her novels.  Though still bound by the constraints of her time, Austen still managed to prove her free-thinking ideals through her writing.  It’s probably why she has endured so long as a favorite writer to many, because her writing was so ahead of it’s time.  As women have gained more equality over time, Austen’s novels take on a far more nuanced poignancy, as modern day critics begin to view Jane Austen as a pioneer for cementing a feminine voice within the canonical institution of Western Literature.

What particularly stands out in Jane Austen’s writing are her heroines.  In contrast to her contemporaries, Austen wrote about women burdened by societies expectations and constructed narratives that gave her female protagonists more control over their own destinies.  In the single most famous sentence of any of her works, the opening passage of her 1813 novel Pride and Prejudice, she wrote, “It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife.”  In a few simple words, she diminishes down exactly what men expect of the women in society, so that throughout the rest of the novel, she can focus far more on the complexity of her female characters, and how they challenge these “truths.”  In her short lifetime, Jane only published four novels, with two more (Persuasion and Northhanger Abbey) published posthumously.  Each of her novels focuses on much of the same thing, women torn between their independence, societies expectations, and falling in love.  But for the most part, she also goes out of her way to draw sympathy from the reader towards her heroines throughout the narrative.  Except for one.  With her fourth, and last published novel, Emma (1816), Jane Austen set out to in her own words, “take a heroine whom no one but myself will much like.”  With the character Emma Woodhouse, Jane created what may end up being her most richly complex character overall; spoiled rich and hopelessly naive, and yet endearing in her pursuit of self-realization and personal satisfaction.  What is interesting about Emma is that she is a character so far ahead of her time, that translating her story to modern day diminishes nothing from Jane Austen’s original vision of the character.  That is what has given Emma Woodhouse such an interesting presence on film throughout the years.  What follows is an interesting collection of some of her most noteworthy screen appearances, with some interesting contrasts that enrich the character and Austen’s writing even further.

JUDY CAMPBELL from EMMA (BBC FILM) (1948)

It may be surprising to know that Emma’s cinematic presence actually emerged relatively recently, as opposed to the other works of Jane Austen throughout the years.  Pride and Prejudice famously made it to the big screen in 1940 with Laurence Olivier and Greer Garson, but Emma would have to wait another half century before that would happen.  Instead, the story of Emma Woodhouse made it’s debut mostly through the medium of television.  The first ever adaptation of the novel outside of theater was this televised production put on by the BBC network in England.  Unfortunately, because the BBC never kept back-ups of their aired content due to their routine of recycling old tapes (Doctor Who fans know about this all too well) the original broadcast of this film is lost to us, surviving now only in scant still photographs like the one above.  It’s hard to judge how well this version translates Austen’s story, but it is interesting noting how this version came to be.  The project was spear-headed by actress Judy Campbell, who played the title role in addition to writing the teleplay adaptation.  A colleague of notable playwright and actor Noel Coward, Campbell was popular performer in her native England and she used the new medium of television to give herself a creative spotlight in the post-War years.  No doubt she viewed Emma Woodhouse as an ideal role to play, showcasing her knack for comedy as well as drama.  Other roles of hers that have survived throughout the years give us a sense of her talent, and you can imagine what she likely brought to the character in her performance.  Sadly, the lack of forward thinking on the part of the BBC has prevented this very first adaptation from surviving to the present day.

DOARN GODWIN from EMMA (BBC MINISERIES) (1972)

Given a couple decades to learn that it’s better to preserve for posterity, the BBC finally revisited the story of Emma Woodhouse again, this time with a version that was intended to last.  The lavishly produced mini-series (which also aired here in the States the same year on PBS) leaves no stone un-turned in the 6 episodes devoted to telling this story.  With that amount of time, the series does give an extensive amount of time to developing all the characters within the fictional village of Highbury.  The character of Harriet Smith, Emma’s friend and “pet project”, gets far more extensive development of character here, as we see the effects of Emma’s meddling in her advancement take a hold over the prolonged story-line, played effectively by actress Debbie Bowen.  Where I think that the mini-series falters slightly is in the depiction of Emma Woodhouse herself.  Actress Doran Godwin’s portrayal is perhaps a bit too restrained for the character.  Emma has to be nosy and at times very rude, but Godwin’s Emma is a bit too refined.  It’s perhaps because the BBC was churning out all these similar themed period dramas, including others based on Jane Austen’s other novels, that Doran Godwin was just filling in that expected Austen heroine persona, which she does convey well enough.  But, remember, Emma Woodhouse is not the same kind of character.  Her growth as a character is in discovering her own faults and that’s something that I don’t believe comes through in this telling of the story.  Emma, as a character, is Jane Austen’s critique of misplaced confidence among the idle rich, and it’s something that in many ways calls for a less conventional portrayal.  As classy as Doran Godwin’s performance is, it’s perhaps too refined for what the character needed.

ALICIA SILVERSTONE from CLUELESS (1995)

Of course, this is as far from conventional as you can get for adapting a Jane Austen novel, and in doing so, it managed to hit a bullseye.  Writer and Director Amy Heckerling took Jane Austen’s Emma and brought it up to date with a very contemporary re-telling.  To capture the essence of Austen’s vision of wealth mixed with naivete over gender roles and sexual destinies, she changed the setting to the one place that still fits within those conventions today; Beverly Hills, California.  In doing so, she transformed Austen’s high-spirited but naive heroine from a rosy-faced pre-Victorian debutante to a dim-witted but open-hearted American teenager.  A lot of the comedy comes from the different ways that Heckerling examines the “clueless” bubble in which her characters exist within.  Emma Woodhouse becomes Cher Horowitz (played to perfection by Alicia Silverstone) whose ambition to improve the lives of others clearly is over-matched by her lack of actual expertise, and whose focus is often dictated by fashion trends.  Despite the difference in time periods, Cher’s story is nearly beat for beat what Jane Austen imagined for Emma.  She spends the movie delighting in playing matchmaker and giving social outcasts their time to shine, such as the Harriet Smith stand-in Tai (played by the late Brittany Murphy).  But like Emma, she only realizes later on that her ambitions have taught her nothing about actual love, and that part of her loneliness has come from misjudging others.  Her crush turns out to be gay (already wed in the book), and the one she really discovers feelings for is the one who always pushed back against her attitude, that being her ex-step-brother Josh.  One improvement that Heckerling made from the book was reduced the age difference between her heroine and her ultimate love, which she did well by casting the ageless Paul Rudd in the role (seriously, 25 years later, he still looks the same).  It’s amazing that the best adaptation of Austen’s novel is the one least like the book, and yet it’s faithfulness to the ideals of the character as absolutely spot on.

GWYNETH PALTROW from EMMA (1996)

Of course, it only took a year later for us to get a film adaptation of Emma that actually sets itself in it’s original period.  In contrast to Clueless, this version of Emma is far less focused on pointing out the absurdities of it’s main character.  For the most part, Emma’s flaws come about more out of her tireless ambition that her lack of knowledge.  This version, played by then rising star Gwyneth Paltrow, is extremely assertive and intelligent, but is shown to be unfocused or perhaps too stubborn to understand what effect her meddling in other people’s affairs is actually doing.  Following a string of lavish productions based on the works of English classics during the 1990’s, including the many Merchant Ivory productions as well as Ang Lee’s lavish adaptation of Sense and Sensibility  (1995) written by Emma Thompson, this adaptation of Emma was a no-brainer.  Given the recent popularity of Clueless a year prior as well, the works of Jane Austen were experiencing something of a revival, and many people were anxious to see how this movie would indeed stand up.  While the movie itself is wonderfully produced and looks beautiful, and also has some great supporting performances from the likes of Toni Collette and Ewan McGregor, it’s portrayal of Emma herself unfortunately suffers, and there is something of a tragic reason for that.  American actress Gwyneth Paltrow was still fairly fresh in Hollywood at the time, and hadn’t quite mastered the British accent at this point, though she would improve by the time she played her Oscar-winning role in Shakespeare in Love (1998) a couple years later.  At the same time, she was being haunted on the set by Miramax chairman Harvey Weinstein who was grooming her for stardom and “other things.”  Now that we’ve seen the disgraced former producer finally be brought to justice,  Paltrow has come forward detailing  her own awful encounters with the predatory Weinstein, and it explains in a way the cloud that hangs over this movie and her performance.  It would have been interesting to see where she might have gone with the character had she performed under better circumstances.

KATE BECKINSALE from EMMA (ITV FILM) (1996)

Not to be outdone by their American counterparts, but British television also offered up their own new adaptation of Emma in the same amount of time.  Produced by independent British cable company ITV, this adaptation is a beautifully lavish production that does indeed feel true to the time period of Austen’s England.  Though lacking the budget of Miramax’s version, this television is still impressively mounted and features a stellar cast of British character actors.  But, what makes it stand out even more is Kate Beckinsale in the title role.  Long before Pearl Harbor (2001) and the Underworld series, this was the role that launched the actress into stardom.  She was celebrated for her performance, and it’s largely what got her attention in Hollywood soon after.  With regards to how it stacks up to Jane Austen’s vision of the character, her performance is certainly closer to the book than any other we’ve seen up to now.  She is less restrained than Gwyneth Paltrow and Doran Godwin’s portrayals, but is not a caricature like Alicia Silverstone’s Cher.  She balances both the comical and the dramatic with ease, and captures the gentility of the character perfectly well, but at the same time shows a bit of edge that helps to ground her in present.  Of all the earnest adaptations of the novel, this is the version of Emma Woodhouse that feels the closest to what is on the page, and that is a testament to Beckinsale’s range as a performer.  She would of course have a prolific career on the big screen, including a role in another Austen adaptation, Love & Friendship (2017), based on Jane Austen’s last posthumously published novel, the unfinished Lady Susan.  Given the crowded market of new films all adapting the same novel in a two year span, it’s a special thing to have this one stand out as well as it does.

SONAM KAPOOR from AISHA (2010)

It seemed inevitable that Jane Austen and Emma Woodhouse would find their way to Bollywood eventually.  Set aside the troubled influence of the British Empire on the Indian subcontinent, but English literature has found an interesting niche within Indian society, and in particular, has been a reliable source for adaptation in their vibrant film industry.  Jane Austen’s stories in particular fit very well with Bollywood’s love of melodrama and glamour, and of course Emma would be among them too.  Indian society is still grappling with issues of class strata and the expanding roles of women in society, and the plot of Emma lends itself very well to this dynamic.  I also wonder if the movie Clueless also influenced this adaptation, as it sets the story in the present day and it also a movie centered on fashion and pretty people living in pretty houses.  But, the essence of Austen’s story is still there, and the portrayal by actress Sonam Kapoor does follow the exact same attributes that we expect from the character.  She’s open-hearted, but also oblivious to what she really needs to do in order to find happiness, and obviously that involves her looking beyond superficial status.  Integrated society is something relatively new to India in the last couple generations, so seeing the heroine here using her influence to help out her lower class friends is something bold to show in a Bollywood film.  Kapoor herself probably identifies a lot with the character given that she is Bollywood royalty herself, being the daughter of one of India’s most famous actors, Anil Kapoor (Slumdog Millionaire).  What her portrayal definitely shows is the universality of Jane Austen’s work across the world, inspiring women from all walks of life to define their own destiny, while also holding onto their ideals.

ANNA-TAYLOR JOY from EMMA. (2020)

The most recent adaptation of the novel brings the character far more into the 21st Century with a decidedly more cynical take on Austen’s narrative.  This new film enjoyed a brief theatrical run in the early Spring of 2020, before theaters closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and largely got overlooked as a result.  Which is a shame, because it’s probably the film version that more closely follows Jane Austen’s intentions with the character than any other adaptation we’ve seen thus far.  In this version, we do get a version of Emma Woodhouse that is hard to like.  She is dismissive to others that she finds annoying, often rolls her eyes at inconveniences, and is clearly out of her depths with regards to what she believes is best for those around her.  It’s like filmmakers made this earnest, straightforward adaptation of the novel, but with the awareness of the movie Clueless.  The satire of Amy Heckerling’s modern adaptation certainly influenced this version, which places the story back in it’s appropriate setting, but combines it with a knowing wink to it’s audience about all the absurdity of it’s era as well.  Anya Taylor-Joy certainly relishes her time in this role, and she conveys so much through just her facial expressions alone.  I especially like the fact that she captures Emma’s unwarranted superiority in the early part of the film, showing the smugness of the character that I don’t think I’ve seen in any other version to date.  Through this, we see much more of an evolution that the character undergoes throughout the story.  In many ways, it’s a brave thing for the actor to do in starting off their performance by making the heroine less appealing and more spoiled.  If done correctly, the actor can earn far more goodwill from the audience when they see the hard edges of a character soften throughout the film, and Anya does that very well here.  It’s still fairly new, but already I feel like this version of Emma Woodhouse has cemented her place in the albeit short cinematic history of the character.

The work of Jane Austen is likely not going to diminish anytime soon, and surprisingly it has been the inspiration for not only some lavishly produced period adaptations of a long ago time, but also some rather sharp social commentaries of our own times as well.  Clueless for one thing holds up remarkably well today on it’s 25th anniversary as a satire of a specific class of people that still exist in our society; the idle rich.  When Austen first conceived of Emma Woodhouse as a character, she imagined this well-to-do upper class lady who felt that her own station in life granted her this authority to determine the destinies of those around her.  Though done without malice, Emma’s naive notion of thinking that she can make the best choices of partners for all the people in her life comes out of her lack of awareness over her position.  People in lower class can figure out love for themselves, they don’t need the guidance of an “enlightened” girl with very little to distress her.  Too often we see today people with wealth and influence try to inject themselves into an issue, and despite them meaning well, it only leads to more complications than what might have existed before, and in turn, reflects badly on said wealthy individual.  I think that is why Jane Austen wanted to write Emma as an experiment.  She wanted to shift the focus away the traditional “lowly” girl elevated to high standing through a dream husband that defined so many novels at the time, including her own, and instead show the flaws of a rich individual who understands so little while proclaiming to be an “expert” in love.  Emma Woodhouse as a result remains Austen’s most layered character and a character that remains surprisingly and disturbingly relevant to today’s society.

The New Normal? – Did Universal and AMC Change the Theater Industry Forever?

Within a matter of days, it will have been 5 full months since the silver screens went dark across the United States. The COVID-19 pandemic continues to rage on with only the faintest view of the light at the end of the tunnel emerging, and we still don’t know if and when it will be safe to go back to the movies.  My optimistic outlook on the summer movie schedule for this year sadly didn’t pan out, and for the first time ever, the Summer Movie Season did not happen.  Once the launching point for some of the biggest blockbuster openings of the year, the Summer this year saw not one single theatrical opening.  Sure, the odd independent film did make it to a Drive-In here and there, but those were done at the same time as a day and date Video on Demand release, where the actual money was being made.  It’s a sad reality, but one that is unavoidable.  It’s just not safe or possible right now to cram people into a dark confined room and expect them to return in the same numbers as they have before.  As a result, the entire theatrical industry has had to completely restructure itself just to be able to survive.  The largest chains in America, AMC, Regal, and Cinemark have had to take out massive loans just so they can cover the substantial rental fees that their un-opened theaters require to remain standing.  AMC in fact is verging on the edge of bankruptcy and may even begin subtracting their reach in order to survive into next year.  All the while, the theaters are struggling with the ever increasing threat of streaming and VOD taking their business away for good.  This led to the very contentious showdown between AMC and Universal over the decision to release Trolls World Tour early , in breach of Universal’s long-standing contract with AMC.  This led many to believe that AMC would no longer run any Universal film as retaliation.  But, as we learned this week, the two parties came to a new agreement, and it is one that shockingly may forever affect the theatrical industry forever.

Here’s what you need to know about what this new agreement.  Upon the release of any new film under the Universal umbrella, the movie will play first theatrically in theaters like AMC exclusively for a period of 17 days.  Then at the end, it has the option of offering the same films as a VOD rental, thereby allowing the studio to make money off of audiences who prefer to stay at home much sooner than they have before.  What this does is close the previous window of 75 days (or roughly 2 1/2 months) that existed between theatrical and home video releases; a previously agreed upon deal that allowed theaters to benefit much more from the long tail lingering box office runs that have helped to keep ticket sales strong long after opening weekend.  With AMC and Universal closing that exclusive window down to just 2 1/2 weeks, it means that movie theaters only have that short amount of time to make the most of a movie’s opening box office before they lose to competition from on demand.  Now, the deal also gives AMC a bigger slice of the VOD rental revenue on Universal films as well, but upon looking at the deal as a whole, it’s hard to see where AMC really benefits at all.  Ticket sales alone aren’t what keeps the theater afloat; its the concessions sales that actually brings in the profit.  And with a still raging pandemic making concessions sales a harder sale even if the theaters reopen right away, it almost looks like AMC is the losing party in this, because that window of exclusivity is so much smaller.  But at the same time, AMC no longer had any solid ground to stand on.  The thing that makes this new deal between the two entertainment giants so eye-opening is the fact that it is in complete contradiction to what has been the norm in the theatrical machine of cinema for most of it’s history.

With Universal and AMC’s new distribution deal, we see an unprecedented shift in the dynamics between the theaters, the distributors and the studios.  The thing that has drawn so much attention is that this 17 day window is not standard across the industry; it’s just between Universal and AMC.  Naturally, other studios like Disney, Warner Brothers, and Paramount complained to AMC about them giving this special consideration to their competitor rather than them.  And Regal and Cinemark raised concerns as well, saying that AMC was changing a norm across the industry that is going to hurt their long term futures as well.  Sure the pandemic has led to drastic measures to be taken to allow for movie studios to be able to still make revenue during the closure of theaters across the country, but no one thought that Universal and AMC would shorten it by so much.  As of right now, Regal, Cinemark and many other smaller chains maintain contracts with all the studio distribution departments that enshrine that long-lasting tradition of a wide theatrical window.  With AMC’s supposed capitulation, it puts the pressure on the other chains to reconsider their own contracts, as the other Hollywood studios are demanding shorter windows like Universal has gotten, so that they too can remain competitive.  This has led many to believe that this change in the length of exclusivity for theatrical runs may be part of the new normal that we are likely to see after the pandemic has run it’s course.  And it is a new normal that will forever change what we think of as the theatrical experience.

What will change most is the way that we judge a movie by the revenue that it makes.  Particularly in the last decade or so, box office became the barometer of a movie’s success.  If a movie didn’t open well in the first week, or even in the first couple days, it would be labelled forever as a box office bomb, which for some movies becomes a stain that is hard to wash off.  Sometimes, movies would benefit from long theatrical runs, and become a box office hit steadily over time.  Remember, neither Titanic (1997) and Avatar (2009) opened to record-breaking box office, but they continued to build their audience over successive weeks and eventually became the highest grossing movies of all time.  But, with the exclusive theatrical window shortened, that long tail effect is far less likely to happen.  The movies will still be able to generate profit with the VOD option being made available sooner, but box office numbers will likely plummet after that 17 period.  And at that point, we may have to reconsider what we label as a flop and a hit, because many movies make money on different scales.  Something big like a Marvel movie no doubt has a huge front loaded opening weekend, which helps to cement a reputation for being a box office champion, but there are sleeper hits that quietly become profitable long after they’ve left the silver screen.  With a shorter window, the terms box office hit and box office flop become far more relative.  Do we begin to combine these two revenue generators together, or do we abandon the entire notion of judging a movie by how many tickets it sells?  This is one of the things that is likely going to change dramatically with this new normal that is likely going to take place, and it’s one that puts far more pressure on the theatrical market than it does the studio.

What this also means is a huge reversal of established law that prohibited the studios from having too much influence over the theatrical market.  Here’s a history lesson for you:  the United States Supreme Court made a landmark decision in the Hollywood Antitrust Case of 1948, otherwise known as United States vs. Paramount Pictures, where it was stated that film studios could not own movie theaters, nor hold exclusive rights on which theaters would show their movies.  This decision effectively ended a practice known as block-booking, which is where a studio sells to a theater a collection of films as a unit, to which the theaters had to screen, regardless of the quality of the films themselves.  This benefited the studios, because they then could ensure the profitability of their movies regardless if they were good or not, which itself caused an unfair advantage towards what was known as the Big Five of the time (Paramount, Warner Brothers, 20th Century Fox, MGM, and RKO) all of whom owned the same theaters.  The smaller independent studios like Republic, United Artists, Columbia and yes Universal (the ones who didn’t own theaters) complained that block-booking squeezed out business for them and they took the majors to court for what they saw as a violation of Antitrust Laws.  The Supreme Court ruled in their favor and the theatrical and distribution machine that ensured profitability for the major studios were completely upended.  Theaters now had to run independently, and it was now upon the studios to reassess what kind of movies they would be making for theatrical release.  It was a time of significant upheaval, because the studios no longer force theaters to buy nearly 400 movies in a given year, and it led to many layoffs and closures of theaters across the country.  At the same time, television emerged to fill that gap, and the studio system became effectively a shell of it’s former self.  But out of this emerged new innovations like Widescreen and surround sound, which made going to the movies again a special engagement.  And movie theaters likewise adjusted.  The newly formed independent industry grew, and eventually evolved to create multiplexes across the country, creating more theaters than before.  But, under the circumstances that we are in now, a lot of consideration is being given to reexamining that past decision.

There is no doubt about it; the Paramount Case was a violation of Antitrust Law, which stifled competition in the marketplace, and by breaking up the studios from the theaters, it did open the industry up to more independent voices and renewed competition that would help it grow.  But, in a time when the very existence of movie theaters is at a precarious point of collapsing altogether, some are wondering if studios should once again take a larger role in the theatrical distribution market.  There have been exceptions over time.  Many of the major studios today can hold an interest in publicly traded companies that operate movie theaters, although not with a majority stake.  A small chain like Pacific Theaters, which owns the popular brand Arclight in some major American cities, has investors like Disney as a part of their portfolio.  And studios are allowed to have ownership of independent screens as well.  Disney owns the landmark El Capitan Theater on Hollywood Boulevard here in Los Angeles, and have used it as their home base venue for premieres and special screenings.  More recently, Netflix purchased the nearly 100 year old Egyptian Theater down the street from the El Cap, and have used it for their own screenings, while still maintaining the partnership with American Cinemateque that existed previously with the venue.  But the change that we are seeing with AMC and Universal is an unprecedented quid pro quo that we haven’t seen between theaters and studios since that Paramount Case decision.  What does that mean for the future?  The two parties are not exactly breaking the statute of the law, since AMC is maintaining as an independent body, but by giving so much leeway to Universal, it’s granting so much more power to a studio body to distribute the way it sees fit than we’ve seen in a very, very long time.  Is it going to lead to even further control of the theatrical market by the studios from here out?

One thing to consider is that changes have been made many times to the theatrical experience to suit the times, and they have been funded largely by the studios themselves.  The reason why movie theaters converted all to digital projection 10 years ago was because the studios invested in the technology.  They saw the money that was being made by 3D movies like Avatar, and they wanted to be sure that the widest possible reach of the audience could be maintained, so they helped the theaters update their equipment.  The existence of multiplexes are another example of this; when the blockbuster era emerged, more screens were needed to meet demand.  Now, with theaters closed and in need of cash flow, who else can they turn to than the movie studios for a lifeline?  Federal loans can only help in the short run; a long-term plan is going to be needed to get the movie theaters back to normal.  The question remains, do studios step in temporarily or is it time for industry to revert back to its old ways.  The Paramount decision remains in place, but it has been chiseled back over time, and with our current administration, who knows really how much oversight is in place.  Up until now, I would’ve said that the Paramount Decision ensured a far better environment for all parties; it granted more autonomy for the theaters to operate the way that they saw fit, and that put more pressure on the studios to change the movies that they make.  It was a balance that was not always perfect, but nevertheless allowed for more creative freedom to build business more effectively.  But the times call for immediate reassessment of the flaws in the system.  There’s no doubt that part of why AMC is in such a desperate situation is because of their recklessly unchecked growth.  No doubt they felt the pressure to hand more influence over to Universal.  The question is, what is Universal going to do with it?

One thing that is certain now is that enough has been done to ensure that the major theatrical chains will eventually reopen once this pandemic has run it’s course.  That is good news for people like me who greatly prefer the theatrical experience because after spending months watching movies in the home, I can say that there seriously is no substitute.  But, in the case of Universal and AMC, have we seen too much given away in exchange for these theater chains to survive the pandemic closure.  AMC’s window of profitability is much smaller now, and Universal now is able to ensure it’s financial security at the former’s expense.  Not only that, but the other chains and studios are now put into the situation that they have to reconsider their own contracts in response.  Are we now going to see a complete breakdown of the separation of powers tradition in the industry, and witness exclusive engagements between different studios and chains as a new normal?  It’s hard to believe that only 5 months of closed movie theaters could change so much in the industry overnight.  It remains to be seen if the deal made between AMC and Universal will indeed change cinema as we know it.  The next Universal release won’t even be until next year, as they’ve completely given up on the rest of 2020.  With other studios still holding onto their 2020 releases, do they make similar deals with the theaters to ensure their bottom line?  The thing that I worry about the most is that movie theaters, who were already struggling against the rise of streaming, are going to be forever relegated by this move.  We may likely see a complete reduction of the theatrical market in the years ahead, with the larger chains forced to close many of their under-performing locations forever.  Many other contractions in the past have led to periods of renewal after, and movie theaters have made resounding comebacks over the years.  But, this time is different.  The studios have a new way to make money, and it’s putting the theaters in an ever increasing position to prove their worth.  The pandemic is testing that at this very moment.  We’ll know in time what this will all lead to, but it’s safe to say whatever comes out of this time of turmoil for the movie theater industry is not what we would’ve called just a few months ago anything close to “normal.”