Studios dictate too much, streaming services dictate too little...

[levcore]

...Can there ever be a comfortable medium between the two?

This was a tricky subject to title but I'll sum up what i mean.

It seems that in so many instances of studio funded movies, particularly the big movies, producers and studios are interfering with the film makers vision for a variety of reasons. Perhaps it's a shorter run time for more showings, insisting on reshoots to tone down or alter certain elements, or just generally bringing in other editors to perhaps change the vision of the original movie (sometimes drastically).

On the other end you have streaming services and I'll use Netflix as a big example here, who fund their own movies. It seems that they will often give the film makers, particularly those who have found success/ fame working for major movie studios 100% free reign to do whatever they want. Quite often this seems to be on an unlimited budget. In these instances perhaps there is little oversight or micromanagement that you might find from a major Hollywood studio production. This is great for the artist/ film maker, however then there is nobody to reign them in.

With the former, you end up with stuff like Justice League (2017), a movie severely compromised from its original vision and Suicide Squad, also changed significantly from the original film makers intent (I appreciate i have only used two WB DC examples here ha ha).

With the latter, you end up with movies like The Gray Man and Red Notice. Mega budget productions where the spending has gone crazy but so little of the money is appearing on the screen. Or something like 6 Underground where it seems like none of the film maker's wildest tendencies have been reigned in. It's almost too far the other way.

In an ideal world, the artist would always get to put their vision as intended on the screen, but some of these artists actually benefit from being reigned in a little?

I appreciate that spending in general has just gone crazy on movies and everything seems to cost way too much so the issue of money affects both studio and streaming productions, but i do think it's an interest topic from an artistic/ creative standpoint.

What are your thoughts?

[Foggy]

I think the major budgets for streaming projects are more intended to entice talent to the platform, along with creative freedom. It’s more designed to bolster the legitimacy of these formats in the face of traditional distribution. A large part why suits are seen as having so much oversight of theatrical films are the need to market them in traditional ways, hence safe bets and creative oversight. Netflix and other streamers aren’t really too concerned over releasing trailers and doing media junkets, they can just pitch whatever new major release to the top of the page, plaster some recognisable faces on it and let the algorithm do the work on people trying to kill time whilst hungover.

[s2mikey]

Interesting topic. I’d also argue that the Star Wars sequels were mucked with by suits or maybe dresses and many of the cool ideas and plans got chucked out the window. Of course, the suits don’t actually do any of this but rather they hire or bring in people under them to do it. Justice league is a great example too, as you pointed out.

As for streaming, they have their own set of problems. Look at what was spent on the LOTR rings of power series. Yikes. A lot of cash for nothing, really. They could have used input from real writers and creative minds there. I think the Foundation TV series on Apple also had all the pieces to be great but just doesn’t work and they too could have used some help from professionals that know what they’re doing.

The root of the problem is money, as always. If a studio or streamer is going to put up the cash the. They are going to have some control, regardless of what they claim or say. Sort of like Jerry Jones that owns the Dallas cowboys. He’s the guy with the check book so you bet he’s got input! There is still some great content out there but also so many missed opportunities.