My presentation on the topic of mainstream for CIU211
Dialectical enquiry for the topic of:
“Mainstream”
Hi, you probably all know me by now… and if you don’t…
I answer to ‘Josh’ (most of the time)…
What I’m talking to you about today is;
The mainstream’s role in creative media becoming less creative.
Our reliance, or dependence, as some might argue on things that are considered mainstream is an interesting paradox. We all have a rough idea of what mainstream is…
It’s that thing that people refer to when talking about popular movies, television and music… and for the purposes of this talk, that’s pretty much what I’ll be referring to (with a little maybe a little more detail later).
[slide]
On one hand, universal adoption of a common “Mainstream” set of ideals is an asset to the creative media industry, as it clarifies the kinds of products that need to be made in order to make the creative media a sustainable form of employment (at leas that was the general idea, originally)…
[slide]
On the other hand, the fact that there are so many defined and proscribed parameters stemming from the mass acceptance and reliance on this mainstream concept, what seems to have happened is the industry is touting an overall message of “do it this way or make no money”…
This has had an effect on the products that are being produced becoming homologized and as this reliance increases, the ability to differentiate between the waves of “so called” new creative media becomes more and more of a challenge.
As you may have guessed from that little spiel, I am not currently very impressed with the state of creativity in many areas of the media that I like to consume. Now I will be the first to admit that there is a chance that my jaded outlook is due to the amount of this media that I have consumed over my life… But I strongly feel that the concept of mainstream and indeed the products that include themselves in this heading or category are, at least in part, to blame for this dilution of the truly creative works in the media.
[slide]
For example, some data I found on the movie review site “shotoftheweek.com” stated that in 1981 there were 2 sequels, 1 re-make and 7 original productions in the top 10 box-office films for that year…
… And in 2011 there were 0 (that’s right ZERO) original films, 8 sequels and 2 remakes in the top 10 box office films.
I think that this fact alone states that there is dire need for more creativity in at least the film segment of the creative media industry.
[slide]
The funny thing is, even though Hollywood is blaming the fact that business is down and so they need to make sequels cause they’re a “sure fire thing” (Allan, 2012). A quick look at the box office profit margins published last year by the motion picture association of America indicates that profit over the last 4 years has been steadily rising. The “2013 theatrical statistics” document indicated that in 2009 gross box-office profit was around the 29.4 billion dollar mark… And in 2013 it was around 35.9 billion dollars.
Now I don’t know about you… but when you’re making more money now than you have ever previously before… it’s pretty hard to be believed when you say that things aren’t going well…
[slide]
At this point to bring it back to our topic of Mainstream, I should explain a little more about what I am referring to as mainstream. And (with any luck) this will help outline why I feel that this is the cause of this decrease in truly creative forms of “creative media”.
To that end, I will borrow a concept from our class readings for this week (Mainstream is a metaphor):
The ‘mainstream’ is a tag or label given to the dominant or in some cases ‘most popular’ groups of cultural creative forms (such as movie genres or music styles) but there seems to be this effect where once elements gain a certain weight (ie. Following), they gain something akin to gravity, where there mass attracts more mass in the from of more media that is the same and more followers of the same style… and while this is all well and good up to a point, at some stage, what ends up happening is we get a point where we aren’t seeing anything but this giant “mainstream object” as it eclipses the creativity in the creative media…
[slide]
On a related note, there is still plenty of original creative media being produced… but the struggle to get it produced and published has become illogically hard, one example that came up in my research (though it was hard to find any hard facts about it) was the story of the movie “Inception” which many would say (myself included) was not only an excellent and fairly original film (when compared to other releases around it’s time), but also a success. Interestingly, one article I discovered during my research stated that Hollywood at large was seemingly trying to ignore the success of this film however… presumably so they can get away with producing more “cash cow” sequels.
There was even reference to the fact that even though Christopher Nolan (the man behind the film) was well renowned for his work on the Batman films (which at one time was the 3rd largest grossing film of all time), he had struggled to get funding for the project. Not exactly encouragement to be creative (Harris, 2011).
[slide]
So, the next obvious question is what is our counter to this?
How do we get originality back? (Though one could argue it was never gone)
While I feel there is no single solution, I would begin by suggesting that we “the consuming populous” turning our sights to the short films and independent media outlets.
I also think that we need to address the way the cash cycle for these things is looked at… I’m not saying it’s bad, but we need to look at what is causing the piracy (which Hollywood is blaming for lack of profits and using as justification for it’s re-makes and sequels and general lack of creativity) issue, which many (myself included) feel is an issue with stunted or “walled off” supply failing to meet demand, thus almost encouraging us to go and get the info by nefarious means. But that is a topic for another discussion..
[slide]
In conclusion. I feel that there is a huge lack of creativity in the movie industry (and many other forms of creative media)… and that one of the main driving forces behind this is the concept we call “mainstream” and our almost worship of this concept. To resolve this we need to swim against this mainstream.
[and some references]
References:
Allan, A.S. (2012). Has Hollywood Lost its Way?. Retrieved October 6th, 2014 from http://www.shortoftheweek.com/2012/01/05/has-hollywood-lost-its-way/
Ford, M. (2013). Hollywood’s tendency to remake films makes sense but stifles creativity. Retrieved October 12th, 2014 from http://cw.ua.edu/article/2013/03/hollywoods-tendency-to-remake-films-makes-sense-but-stifles-creativity
Harris, M. (2011). The day the movies died. Retrieved October 10th, 2014 from http://www.gq.com/entertainment/movies-and-tv/201102/the-day-the-movies-died-mark-harris
Masnick, M. (2012). How a $19 million makes $150 million and still isn’t profitable. Retrieved October 14th, 2014 from https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20121018/01054720744/hollywood-accounting-how-19-million-movie-makes-150-million-still-isnt-profitable.shtml
The motion picture association of America. (2013). 2013 Theatrical Statistics Summary. Retrieved October 8th, 2014 from http://www.mpaa.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/MPAA-Theatrical-Market-Statistics-2013_032514-v2.pdf
Image references:
Gravity promo image [image] (n.d.). retrieved October 14th, 2014, from http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/02719/gravity-4_2719869b.jpg
Math and measurement tools [image] (n.d.). retrieved October 14th, 2014, from http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_XOvZqZHv3MY/S8EHLf25h-I/AAAAAAAAACk/n2zRZI4j88Y/s1600/Math+Measurement+Tools.gif
Man with gear [image] (n.d.). Retrieved October 14th, 2014, from http://m.c.lnkd.licdn.com/mpr/mpr/p/2/005/06c/3b2/3c651b9.jpg
The working masses [image] (n.d.). Retrieved October 14th, 2014, from http://blogcritics.org/wp-content/uploads/bcimages/2013/07/article.jpg
Like us [image] (n.d.). Retrieved October 14th, 2014, from http://images.rapgenius.com/ebc2a324ebd5b4dde1ff4d61ebd84b09.800x431x1.jpg
Top 10 infographic [image] (2012). Retrieved October 10th, 2014, from http://www.shortoftheweek.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/Loss-of-Originality-STATS8.gif
Film types – 10 year blocks [image] (2012). Retrieved October 10th, 2014, from http://mediacdn.disqus.com/uploads/mediaembed/images/346/1624/original.jpgif
Box office takings [image] (2013). Retrieved October 10th, 2014, from http://www.mpaa.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/MPAA-Theatrical-Market-Statistics-2013_032514-v2.pdf
Gravity [image] (n.d.). Retrieved October 10th, 2014, from http://news.stanford.edu/news/2011/may/images/nasa_gpb_news.jpg
Eclipse [image] (n.d.). Retrieved October 10th, 2014, from http://wall4all.me/thumbs/space/earth-eclipse-outer-space-science-885026-480x320.jpg
Inception promo [image] (2011). Retrieved October 10th, 2014, from http://enzozid.com/channel/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/Inception-inception-2010-14355477-1680-1050.jpg
Film Slate [image] (n.d.). Retrieved October 10th, 2014, from http://circlemarketing.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/CM_Film_Marketing_slate_64481395.jpg
Create independent film [image] (n.d.). Retrieved October 10th, 2014, from http://pilottvnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Creating-an-Independent-Film.jpg
Indi film [Image} (n.d.). Retrieved October 10th, 2014, from https://s3.amazonaws.com/ksr/photos/130/Stack_logo_button.full.jpg
You are the difference [image] (n.d.). Retrieved October 10th, 2014, from http://uncommonchick.com/wp-content/uploads/you-are-the-problem-you-are-the-solution.jpg
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