Netflix pledges to spend $8 billion on original content in 2018
Netflix has already disrupted and upended the film and television industry. Their goal? Have you glued to Netflix so you’re not watching anything else or spending your money elsewhere to get your entertainment. Their latest aim? Invest in themselves and license less content from other sources. What they want is at least 50% of the content available on Netflix to be original Netflix content. That’s going to be tough — Disney, movie studios, countlesscCable channels, TV networks and competing streaming networks also have tons of great content that audiences want. But Netflix is going to make it as difficult as possible for their competitors; they’ve pledged to spend $8 billion in content for 2018, up from $6 billion last year. We won’t see the full results for a while, but Netflix has thrown the gauntlet down once again. And with money to spare, don’t think that the other players haven’t noticed.
Zack Snyder leaves “Justice League” and the movie is a disaster
Coming off the revitalizing, hopeful narrative of “Wonder Woman,” (a big critical and financial hit), all Warner Bros. had to do was deliver a halfway decent “Justice League” movie and their troubled cinematic universe would be back on track. Complications arrived early however, when director Zack Snyder left the film during the middle of post-production due to a family tragedy (one of his daughters sadly committed suicide). A troubled shoot spiritually, going into production just as “Batman V. Superman” flopped with critics and disappointed at the box office, rather than rethink the film or even fire Zack Snyder (which was apparently on the table), Warner Bros. trudged forward, desperate to hit their 2017 release date and try and catch up to Marvel with at least two films released in a year. Along the way, Snyder was stripped of his DCEU oversight powers — which surely didn’t help the director helm their “Justice League” film — and filmmaker Joss Whedon was brought on midway through production to lighten up the script’s mood. When Snyder exited the project, the entire film was dumped on Whedon’s shoulders to finish the job and take on costly reshoots. The result was Frankensteined mess — Snyder’s darker, mythic sensibilities, Whedon’s irreverent, jokey proclivities and the studio’s affinity for playing it safe and catching the most flies. The consequence? Not only a widely condemned movie and worse, a dreadful box office outcome. “Justice League” will end up the lowest grossing movie in the DCEU franchise history both domestically and internationally, and even lower than 2013’s mildly received “Man Of Steel.” To add further insult to injury there was also a whole mustache-gate embarrassment, but this movie has already suffered enough in this capsule.
Kevin Spacey replaced with Christopher Plummer in Ridley Scott’s “All The Money In The World.”
2017 was filled with firings, oustings and replacements. In Ridley Scott’s “All The Money In The World,” Spacey had a major, arguably lead role of a penny pinching sociopath, the richest person in the world, who refuses to save his grandson by paying a multi-million dollar ransom. With Spacey disgraced and ‘Money’ just a month away from release, its award and commercial hopes seemed doomed. Instead, Ridley Scott, one of the fastest shooters on the planet, decided to recast the entire role with Christopher Plummer, and reshot all of his scenes in just nine days (!!). What’s amazing is not only how seamless the entire new shoot is (you’d never be able to tell outside of one CGI shot), but just how phenomenal Plummer is in the role. Already earning a Golden Globe nod and possible Oscar nomination, Scott basically salvaged his film and breathed new life into it in a land speed record time. The main discovery here if you hadn’t already learned this lesson? Never, ever, bet against Ridley Scott.
Louie C.K.’s career also collapses in wake of sex scandal
As the walls tumbled down on sexual harassment cases and women were finally emboldened to speak out, few, if any, men in Hollywood escaped their past-due fates. Harvey Weinstein was the big brick that cleaved an irreparable crack in the once-impregnable fortitude of silence and shame, Kevin Spacey further demolished the wall, and comedian Louie C.K. also fell from grace. Rumors about the actor/writer/director and creator of “Louie” circulated for years, but 2017 finally caught up with C.K. Having long refused to address the allegations directly, C.K. gave up the jig and copped to all of his awful behavior. Caught in the crosshairs, aside from his entire career (FX fully cut ties with the filmmaker and all his various projects at the cable network), was his newest film, “I Love You, Daddy.” An ill-timed, Woody Allen-esque comedy that practically begged you to consider the rumors about Louie C.K’s harassment allegations and raised the question of whether you can love the art even if you hate the artist, “I Love You, Daddy” was picked up by The Orchard following its premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival. Planned for release in the middle of the Weinstein tsunami, critics were already looking at “I Love You, Daddy” sideways, and it wasn’t long until the premiere and then release of “I Love You, Daddy” was ultimately scrapped. The Orchard wanted to wash their hands of the fiasco so badly, they actually sold the rights of the film back to C.K. Will it ever see the light of day? Will C.K.’s career ever recover? That remains to be seen.
Quentin Tarantino announces R-rated “Star Trek” movie & takes responsibility in Weinstein flap
Filmmaker Quentin Tarantino is always talking out the side of his mouth about projects you know he’s never going to make. One of those “what if” projects he brought up around the time of “The Hateful Eight” was a “Star Trek” film. Strangely enough, an excerpt of that podcast, where QT floated his interest in “Star Trek,” randomly went viral this year and started the conversation all over again. TMZ asked him about it and he didn’t rule it out. But most of us assumed it was just QT being QT, after all the filmmaker has vowed to retire after 10 movies and only has two more slots on his list. But lo and behold, it was announced that Tarantino is actually developing an R-Rated “Star Trek” movie with J.J Abrams which he might direct. Pardon our skepticism, but here’s the thing; the screenwriter of “The Revenant” is penned the script and Tarantino always writes his own movies. Sure, he’d rewrite it for his taste if he was interested, but will he actually direct the thing? Time will tell, but one thing’s for sure, Tarantino being granted the space to develop an R-rated “Star Trek” movie shows you just how lost Paramount is with this franchise that has underwhelmed and underperformed at the box office.
Meanwhile, it’s worth noting in the world of Tarantino that the director, whose career has been inextricably linked to Harvey Weinstein had one of the best male response to the fiasco, admitted his culpability in the story, his knowledge of what was going on and his own silence, with a vow to do better. Tarantino is obviously a controversial figure, not afraid to open his mouth, piss people off and or say something politically incorrect, so it was refreshing for the filmmaker to land on the right side of things with a thoughtful and accountable reply.
#MeToo makes history
Tarana Burke actually created the phrase “Me Too” on MySpace in 2006 to empower women of color who had been subject to abuse. Beginning with the Harvey Weinstein scandal, however, a number of female public figures began to speak out (or, sadly, were finally heard) over their own incidents with sexual harassment, assault or rape. Rose McGowan and Alyssa Milano became prominent voices encouraging other women (and men) to speak up. Just a week after the Weinstein story broke Milano suggested using #MeToo to generate more awareness. It became a rallying cry for not only other Weinstein victims to speak out, but for notable names such as Viola Davis, Rosario Dawson, Bjork, Terry Crews, James Van Der Beek, Evan Rachel Wood, Lady Gaga and Ellen DeGeneres, among others. Politicians such as Senators Claire McCaskill and Elizabeth Warren also tweeted out in support. The hashtag is part of a larger movement beyond Weinstein that has shook the entertainment industry. In just three months, Matt Lauer, James Toback, Sen. Al Franken, Dustin Hoffman, Charlie Rose and others noted separately in this feature all came under fire under multiple allegations. The movement has also encouraged other women and victims of previously accused harassers such as Bill O’Reilly and Donald Trump to speak out publicly. It’s reached all corners of the globe and shows no signs of slowing down anytime soon.
