Today's mirthless cinematic landscape

[Monterey Jack]

Watching Me Time on Netflix last night (lightly amusing, an easy way to pass 95 minutes) made me think...what the hell has happened to movie comedies on the big screen? Up until the early-mid 2010s, you'd see at least two dozen or more star-driven comedies per year in theaters, almost all of which would be cheap to produce (usually under $40 million, and often under $25 mil) and frequently gross up to and exceeding $200 mil worldwide. Even a turd like We're The Millers cost $37 million, and grossed $270 mil(!). I haven't seen an out & out COMEDY on the big screen this year aside from The Lost City, and, pre-Pandemic, probably Good Boys. Of all film genres, you'd think that comedies would benefit the most from seeing them with a crowd of laughing people, but now stuff like Me Time or The Man From Toronto become "Netflix originals" that are forgotten after a week, watched alone on your living room couch while folding laundry. the forthcoming Bros (from the consistently solid Nicholas Stoller, who made Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Get Him To The Greek and Neighbors) seems like an anomaly, and I hope it's successful enough to get studios to start putting comedies in theaters again, where they belong. Considering the sh!tty state of the world, don't studios think people want a good, honest LAUGH when going out to the movies?

[AndyDursin]

I agree but right now I'd be concerned there's just no audience anymore for anything other than the big-studio name-brand product. It's incredibly sad and I don't mean to just be relentlessly negative, but I truly feel things WERE changing before COVID as the attendance was dropping off. And with COVID and people staying home -- and the rise of streaming -- all of this has just gutted movie-going as we know it altogether. I mean, FOX threw in the towel and sold off its film division for a reason...they could see where the future was going and, at least in their minds, it wasn't theatrical exhibition.

For the most part the only things reliably making money are the films "fanboys" will go to, movies with IP names we all know and running series that have a built-in appeal. MAVERICK did great (even though it, too, is another IP revival/sequel) but it's an anomaly. It was finished 2 years ago and sat on the shelf, was able to be massaged and readied and -- yeah -- it got great word of mouth and people went out to see it in big numbers.

But what's behind it? Where's the next one? Doesn't look like there are too many things like it. And even with Warner Bros. saying they're done with the HBO Max simultaneous stream and doing theatrical only, they also pushed back AQUAMAN from Christmas 22 to Christmas 23 and all kinds of other movies into 2024. Nobody is in a hurry to supply product to theaters and things are just DIRE right now. Even INDIANA JONES -- the new one -- sounds like it's going to be embraced by us fans as warmly as LIGHTYEAR was.

I just think movie-going as a normal, routine social activity/part of life for most people...it's over. Certain movies are going to get people to go but on a regular basis? I just don't see it coming back. People thought movies were going to die back in the 50s when TV started because they thought people were all going to stay home -- instead they weathered the storm. But I really think they've gutted it this time. Between the internet and home streaming options, there's too much competition for the average person to feel "hey I've got to go to the movies" this weekend as a social activity -- especially when there's NOTHING to see. How they fix it is going to take something beyond just making more CRAP...and this time, I don't know if they can.

[Paul MacLean]

I think the paucity of comedies is partly down to the studios catering more and more to Chinese audiences -- on whom western humor is lost.

I can't remember the last time I saw a comedy in the cinema. I look to television when I want a laugh.

[AndyDursin]

That's also true. There's little foreign revenue coming in from comedies, its usually all domestic. Another residual effect from the rise of Super Hero Cinema.