Are we stuck in an era of reboots of older movies? Chances are, in the last few years you've probably seen your favorite movie getting a remake. Most recently, Ghostbusters, Jumanji, even Beauty and the Beast are getting redone.
So has Hollywood really run out of ideas?
The answer is no. There are plenty of fresh ideas floating around Hollywood, just look at the list of upcoming movies for 2016. There are so many movies coming out in the next couple years that just prove that it's not imagination that Hollywood is lacking. The truth is, movie studios are simply trying to come up with fresh spins on classic movies.
Movie directors are simply looking for ways to bring the films that they loved and grew up with to a modern audience. Take Christopher Nolan's Batman Trilogy for an example. It's a story that even then seemed overdone. But the three films not only gave fans a different side of the Batman, they also started the superhero revolution of movies that we are living in today. Plus, they gave record-breaking box office numbers.
Shane Black, director of The Predator, recently revealed that he will be a part of the reboot for a new Predator movie.
In an interview with Thrillist he said, "I think the first one was great, and it was contained, and it was a perfect little gem for what it was. I think there's an expansion that needs to take place, and also just a love for that era, that movie, and the mythology of the Predator."
However, it's safe to say that not all reboots in the last few years have been the absolute best. Take 2001's Planet of the Apes, directed by Tim Burton. Though the movie is considered a catastrophic failure, it still did 362.2 million- making it the tenth-highest grossing film in 2001.
Directors keep throwing the same story lines at us because we keep paying to see them. Why waste time coming up with original content when the old stuff can make just as much money? Hollywood isn't the problem here, it's us. We keep expecting new ideas, but we don't want to pay for new ideas. Directors don't want to try new things with so much at stake, and so much money on the line.
Movie studios keep digging further and further into the past, and nothing is left behind. These movies are becoming so overdone that they have started looking for things from maybe 10 or 20 years ago.
We can't exactly get mad at studios for giving us exactly what we want. We are more willing to pay for old ideas, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. Of the top 50 grossing movies in 2015, only 18 of them were original movies, meaning they weren't reboots, adaptations, or reboots. If we don't want to be fed the same movies over and over again, then we need to stop paying for them.
At the end of the day, the movie industry is simply that, a movie industry.
