And. Hollywood, Hollywood, will you ever learn? By Leonardo Ramos here is a saying; a true artist makes : | his own creation, while a con artist merely plagiarizes it. Well, today’s biggest con artist seems to be living in Hollywood. What I’m getting at is the formula or philosophy that the industry has made is “if it works, make a dozen others like it.” In all over the place. The Chronicles Of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Bridge to Terabithia, The Spiderwick Chronicles, The Golden Compass, The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian, Eragon (if you missed this one, be glad you did), The Seeker: The Dark is Rising. Aren’t people kind of sick of paying to see the same thing wrapped up in a different package? What happened to our sense of “Aren’t people kind of sick of paying to see the same thing wrapped up in a different package?” other words, whenever a movie comes out with large success (be it critical or financial), we then get a whole gaggle of others like it. Sure, there is the factor of sequels, but I’m talking about the over expanded themed season of similar movies. For instance, this October felt like Vampire month, and it’s not because of Halloween; it all has to do with Twilight. As we all know, the sequel to Twilight is coming out this November and the hype for it has been flooding the media waves. Naturally, with the success of the first film, Hollywood has already begun to mix in its replicating formula. How? Well, first Twilight, now Vampire Diaries (a new show on the CW) and lo and behold, another vampire movie entitled Cirque du Freak: The Vampire’s Assistant. But enough with this dark setting, let’s move on to something lighter. Now, it is pretty safe to say that the Bourne Trilogy is a great example of a smart blockbuster (yes, believe it or not, it is one). And with three films set in stone, the third completing the story arc, surprisingly (and yet not surprisingly) a fourth instalment has been planned. Another film called Green Zone, which also stars Matt Damon (who played Jason Bourne) and interestingly enough is directed by Paul Greengrass, the same director of The Bourne Supremacy and The Bourne Ultimatum, is set to premiere. Upon seeing the first advertisements, I actually thought, along with some other people’s comments on YouTube, that it was Bourne 4. It’s not, but it has the same actor, director, feel, look, tone, and general theme. What a surprise. Sometimes this formula can be a good thing. I mean, after Lord of the Rings, we got a bunch of epic historical war films, like Troy, Alexander and Kingdom of Heaven. So what’s the deal? In this case, all these films are unique, and the sudden releases of these types was due to technologically, The Lord of the Rings pushed the envelope. Sadly, this excuse is not the case with many other movies of today’s day and age. Comic book films have a habit of clogging our theatres every summer, to the point where the industry is no longer looking for comics, but graphic novels. Don’t get me wrong; I love many of these comic films, but if that’s all we are getting, then frankly we are not getting much variety. Just this past summer, we got two big robot films Terminator: Salvation and Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. Is it to too much to ask, that for once, as a moviegoer, I would like to see something different in mainstream? Once Lord of the Rings was done, fantasy films were popping 18 taste? What happened to the feeling of metaphorically falling in love with a movie? Wouldn’t it suck if publishers only published the same book, with the same story, over and over again? Wouldn’t the lack of variety and originality in books infuriate readers? So, how come this is not the case for films? One toy film based on transforming robots comes out and now all of the sudden, toy-based films are emerging all over the map. This summer’s G/ Joe: The Rise of Cobra is an example. And get this: Hollywood is getting the director of Hancock to helm Battleship for Universal Pictures, based on Hasbro’s game. Come on! Apparently, it is speculated that Hollywood is planning to doa Cast of Vampire Diaries better so just go with it? I hope not, because if that is the case, then we can forget about good memorable movies that actually meant something. We are smarter than this. We have got to stand up and call for better service because quite frankly, we are not getting it despite the ever-increasing cinema ticket prices. We have got to say, no more! If we pay full price for movies, then it better not be recycled from last month’s hot flick! movie on the board game Monopoly. And of course, there are the game based films. Some of which have been up to par, while others just sucked. To show you how low Hollywood can go, Universal is making a movie based on the Asteroids game. How are they going to make a plot when the game is just about a spaceship shooting at on coming asteroids? You know, I bet that somewhere in a fancy boardroom in California, a bunch of big shot executive producers are thinking: “Boy, are they stupid or what? We can throw anything at them, and we get millions.” Has it come to this? Are we, the audience, like a dog who accepts pretty much anything that gets thrown at us? Have we all just accepted the fact that this is how it is and it is not going to get EMPLOYERS ASK FOR FIND OUT WHY bcit.ca It’s your career. Get it right.