Hollywood is Dead, Long Live Hollywood: The Happening and Get Smart
Tuesday, July 22, 2008


These two movies prove that there's something really wrong with the people who "greenlight" films in the Hollywood system. I don't doubt these movies will make a decent and acceptable return on the money the studios put into them.

A Little History

Currently, the films that are emerging from Hollywood remind me of the last two periods in which they were dying: 1950's and 1970's. The 1950's was the first period of slow death due to the advent of television. It also gave us all those "classic" B-films like Attack of the 50 Foot Woman.

The 1970's was a true near death: the original studio system, run by true media moguls, had been completely swallowed up by corporate bean counters. The films produced were nihilistic, pessimistic and violent.

They offered up nearly a decade of "black exploitation" because of the success of Van Peebles' Sweet Sweetback’s Baad Asssss Song. Following that period Speilberg and Lucas created the blockbuster system, which saved Hollywood. Thereafter, scores of black folks in films and black themed movies disappeared.

Can This System Last? Where's the Full Access?

I see the movie business as archaic and near death as television and music. However, a powerful inertia keeps them all going. These entertainment vehicles exist, because people attend to them out of habit, and it still has the lowest barrier to entry for modest priced entertainment.

My biggest beef with these distribution systems (music, television and movies) is that they won't allow viewers and listeners unlimited access. I shouldn't have to hunt for music or a movie. I should be able to find it the same way we Google for information.

Movie Reviews

M. Night Shyamalan likes to keep folks guessing to the very end.

Unfortunately, The Happening didn't happen. It has terrific visuals in the beginning: construction workers falling like robotic dolls off of a building.

Unlike his past films, Shyamalan doesn't offer any coherent clues as to the reason behind the mass suicides. There are red herrings. Marky Mark (Mark Wahlberg) wears a mood ring, and you wait for it to be a plot point. It yields no clues what-so-ever.

What initially starts off as a good semi-sci-fi-mystery devolves into a tame, lame, and rather boring nature-goes-bad film. I would like for Shyamalan to watch a few Hitchcock films, especially The Birds. He needs to remember these key points: Am I trying to scare them? Make them laugh? Or put them to sleep?

Get Smart had one good thing about it: Dwayne Johnson. It was a shame he wasn't shown more.


This flick is a remake of sorts. Like the horrid Bewitched, it is based on a television series. I could only ask myself: Why? It wasn't smart, or funny. I loved the reruns as a child. I like Steve Carell, but this film is decades late.

Cold War Era films lost their relevance many years ago. The standard plot line in any film coming out of Hollywood today is: the enemy is us. So that being the case, there are no surprises left.

Labels: black exploitation, Dwayne Johnson, George Lucas, Hollywood, M. Night Shymalan, Mark Wahlberg, Steve Carell, Steven Speilberg

posted by GoldenAh
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