Hollywood Is Broken

The fix lies out there beyond the entertainment business.

Americans are starved for entertainment. A recent survey found that most teens are … wait for it … bored. You did not misunderstand. The average US teenager is bored with his/her life. That is why we witness on TV and the Internet some of the most bizarre, some would say, stupid behavior in the history of the world. Here is the punch line; most movies are cut for a teen audience. And yet, the average movie released this year will fall short of insider expectations at the box-office. In other words, Hollywood cannot seem to make films their target audience wants to see despite the fact that the audience is bored to tears and looking for distractions.

That is where we come in. We, the aspiring screenwriters located out in flyover country, the non-insiders.

An unfortunate reality is that the odds of a writer living outside of Los Angeles or New York selling a spec script is about as good as winning the lottery, for now. But for how long? Hollywood is run on money. Those of us out here in the boonies find that hard to believe given the poor to terrible quality of most films, especially those considered blockbusters.

Case in point, 10,000 B.C. I recently attended a private showing in a pristine theatre. The showing was private because my daughter, son-in-law and I were the only ones who bought tickets and the theatre was sparkling clean since no one attended the previous screening. $150,000,000.00 to make a film with a weak plot, little character development and an ending that left one saying, “What?” And before you defend this massive failure as non-typical, remember King Kong, The Golden Compass and I could name a dozen if pressed to do so. The movie business is currently clueless on appealing to their customers' desires.

Back to my point, money makes the film go round. So, how long will the money people continue to give huge sums of cash to people to produce movies with sketchy track records of returns? Especially given the entertainment industry’s ability to manipulate the numbers to reward some and screw others. Eventually, one would think, the money people would seek out new. New, defined as anything but those currently wasting money hand over fist.

Aspiring writers keep writing. Continue to search out any and every opportunity to sell your work. Dare to dream. It may be a long shot but the odds are shrinking.