There I was, waiting in line at the box office to buy a ticket to The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn. I placed my $7.50 on the counter, and tried to avoid the cashier’s accusatory gaze, which pierced me with the unasked question, “Weren’t you just here yesterday?”
All who have seen Twilight have loved and lost — loved watching what seems like the world’s longest, most intense staring contest between Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart, but also lost three hours of their life. Therefore, it comes as no surprise the film isn’t nominated for an Oscar this year. However, this mattered little to the movie-going audience—they rushed the theater in droves.
The Academy Award’s ratings have dropped (with viewership declining from 41.7 to 37.6 million in one year) and no amount of Anne Hathaway and James Franco to lure in a younger demographic can save us. People don’t often go see the nominated films, so they don’t care. They prefer the light-hearted, frivolous flicks.
These movies that we love, but the Oscars rightfully ignore, usually fall under three categories: the chick flick, the horror movie, and I-just-flew-out-of-an-exploding-vehicle-but-can-still-walk-away-to-kiss-Megan Fox action movies. There are the greats that could fall under these categories, like Crazy Stupid Love and Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol, but these worthy movies fly under a fancier flag: the romantic comedy, the thriller, and the action/ thriller.
But the real question is why—why do great films like Woody Allen’s Midnight in Paris or 2008’s The Reader scrape up a measly $56 million and $34 million respectively, when movies like Breaking Dawn smash box office records with $280 million?
True, there are some movies that can do both. Titanic and The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King won eleven Oscars each, and they broke box office records, but gems like these are few and far between.
There is a reasonable explanation as to why the infamous “bad movie” survives: after rushing from class to class and writing paper after paper, we don’t want to go to the movies and think, we want to be entertained. It’s escapism.
Movies like The Reader make you want to curl up under a blanket, never to surface again, unless for the possibility of chips. Sometimes it’s just satisfying to munch on popcorn and watch something frivolous that will make you laugh, either genuinely or from its stupidity.
There’s also the innate human desire for life to be like a movie, especially a corny one. Girls — as much as we hold out hope — the possibility of being kissed by Channing Tatum in the rain, wearing a party dress, while a Taylor Swift song swells in the background, is slim, to say the least. That’s why we go to the chick flicks: to dream, to watch the impossible unfold before us, and to hope that maybe this could happen to us.
Men — as much as you hold out hope — the possibility of you blowing up cars and shooting bad guys alongside Liam Neeson without getting arrested, is also quite slim. Therefore, boys go to live vicariously through their action heroes.
Scary movies simply provide a cheap thrill to spice up your day and a lingering thrill that makes you imagine a man with a foul temper and a chainsaw is hiding in your closet at night. The community atmosphere that fills the theater is also a bonus of a freaky film: That moment when the music builds as our hero slowly shuffles towards a closed door, and a collective sigh when we realize there’s nothing there. Then, bam, there’s a ghost.
It comes down to the guilty pleasure we derive from bad movies; they’re fun. Its great to walk out of a movie and squeal to your friend, “Well that was just awful!” The fact is, we all need a break. Hollywood seems to know this, which is why it keeps producing the fluff.
You could even say, in a perverse way, it even makes us feel better about ourselves. Watching bad acting or bad writing or bad directing, or maybe all of the above, you think, “I could do better than this,” or “Well, if she’s an actress, then I definitely could be.”
We really shouldn’t give ourselves a hard time. Everyone loves to feel good, and sometimes, in order to do that, we need to see something that’s just … bad.
Sources:
Boxofficemojo.com
NYdailynews.com
Twilight premiere (photo): londonnet.co.uk; http://www.londonnet.co.uk/cinema/news/twilight
Admit One (photo): stacksmag.net; http://www.stacksmag.net/2011/05/bump-movies.html
Empty theater (photo): tlc.howstuffworks.com; http://tlc.howstuffworks.com/home/watch-movies-online-free.htm