Why Every Summer Movie Ends in "3"

Plot Device · Jun 12, 2007

The following essay/commentary appeared in the Huffington Post, Huffington, N.Y., June 5, 2007

http://www.huffingtonpost.com

Below is a small excerpt. To read the full article, click here:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alex-remington/why-every-summer-movie-en_b_50851.html

Why Every Summer Movie Ends in "3"

By Alex Remington

... This summer is especially gruesome, as it seems like every movie ends in the number three. (Thank God, The Number 23 won't be one of them.) Just in case you'd forgotten, here are some of the movies appearing this summer at a theater near you: Spider-Man 3, Rush Hour 3, Shrek the Third, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End (P.O.T.C. 3), Resident Evil: Extinction (Resident Evil 3), Ocean's Thirteen and The Bourne Ultimatum (Bourne 3).

Oh, and there's an entry in a quadrilogy (Live Free or Die Hard) and in a heptology (Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix), plus eight plain old sequels: Fay Grim, 28 Weeks Later, Day Watch, Hostel Part II, Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, Evan Almighty, Daddy Day Camp, and Mr. Bean's Holiday.

As you can imagine, it's a bit of a rant. And he even makes a disparaging (and unfair, IMHO) comment about Hollywood suffering from "creative bankruptcy" from its very beginnings by quoting Samuel Goldwyn's harsh words to a scriptwriter:

"Why did you name him Sam? Every Tom, Dick, and Harry is named Sam!"

I was a little perplexed that nowhere in his essay did he mention Lord of the Rings as having any bearing upon all of this, (not that I want that great work of cinema to be drawn into the crosshairs of his loathings).

Oddly, at the end of all his snobbery and condescension, he concludes by saying "there's nothing wrong with all this." (??) So I guess it was a lot of fuss over nothing. Hey--he's gotta make copy, right?

dpaterso · Jun 12, 2007

Plot Device said:
I was a little perplexed that nowhere in his essay did he mention Lord of the Rings as having any bearing upon all of this, (not that I want that great work of cinema to be drawn into the crosshairs of his loathings).

-Derek

Writer2011 · Jun 12, 2007

Next year some movies will end in 4

NicoleMD · Jun 12, 2007

Ugh! This is exactly why I've invested in a big screen TV and Netflix!

:popcorn:

Nicole

Rainy Night · Jun 12, 2007

Plot Device said:
I was a little perplexed that nowhere in his essay did he mention Lord of the Rings as having any bearing upon all of this, (not that I want that great work of cinema to be drawn into the crosshairs of his loathings).

Possibly he ignored LOTR because it was not a summer release, I believe all three were released in December.

I was told once in a screenwriting class that a "#3" comes about if the "#2" grosses 65% of what the "#1" grossed, etc etc... until you end up with a total failure... Batman 4 *sigh*

What I've wanted to rant about lately has been REMAKES - very few live up to the original... coming this December... I AM LEGEND a remake of OMEGA MAN (yes Dpat, I noticed your avatar) with Will Smith in the Charlton Heston role... The original is one of my favorites, I'm excited for the remake, and hoping I'm not disappointed like I was with ROLLERBALL and countless other classic films whose memories I have of them have been tarnished because somebody just had to "update" the original...

Which brings me to HULK 2... Ed Norton... okay I'll give it chance but please don't disappoint me again and can we remake CATWOMAN while we're fixing the problems with #1's, seriously....

Okay... that's my rant...

zeprosnepsid · Jun 12, 2007

I don't think LOTR has any effect on the 3's honestly. Because a lot of these franchises are not trilogies, we just happen to be hitting a lot of 3's this year. They've said they intend to do 5 shreks and 7 s-m's. I think there is a difference between a real trilogy (star wars, lotr, pirates) and a series of films (ocean's, for example).

What is interesting is that until recently, sequels were not expected to make more than the original film. Look at Planet of the Apes or Jaws or something. They were meant to cheaply capitalize on the success of the first film. Sequels being more successful than the original film is a fairly new development.

Bordwell recently had a little discussion about sequels and a lament that people should stop complaining about them: http://www.davidbordwell.net/blog/?p=836

Plot Device · Jun 12, 2007

dpaterso said:
-Derek

Plot Device · Jun 12, 2007

zeprosnepsid said:
I don't think LOTR has any effect on the 3's honestly. Because a lot of these franchises are not trilogies, we just happen to be hitting a lot of 3's this year.

I mentioned LotR because that film series opened the door up big and wide for the production of "incomplete" films that need "to be continued." The original Star Wars was a stand-alone film. The original Matrix was also a stand-alone. The original Back to the Future, etc, etc. Heck, even Gone With the Wind stood all by itself. But LotR was the first to brave/risk/gamble/take the plunge/bet the farm via making its introductory film to be a true and undeniable "to be continued." (Unless you wanna count the other LotR from the late 1970's, which bombed and whose subsequent chapters never saw the light of day.)

zeprosnepsid said:
They've said they intend to do 5 shreks and 7 s-m's.

What are s-m's?

(Awaits the answer with fear and trembling. Prepares to smack own forehead and groan: "Awww! I knew THAT!")

*suddenly remembers*

NEVER MIND! (Spider-Man!!!)

*smacks forehead anyway*

zeprosnepsid said:
I think there is a difference between a real trilogy (star wars, lotr, pirates) and a series of films (ocean's, for example).

What is interesting is that until recently, sequels were not expected to make more than the original film. Look at Planet of the Apes or Jaws or something. They were meant to cheaply capitalize on the success of the first film. Sequels being more successful than the original film is a fairly new development.

Bordwell recently had a little discussion about sequels and a lament that people should stop complaining about them: http://www.davidbordwell.net/blog/?p=836

I have no true complaints about sequels in and of themselves. What I do find annoying is that "sequel-potenital" is now being placed very high up on the list of criteria for greenlighting new films in Hollywood. And THAT ain't cool.

Plot Device · Jun 12, 2007

Rainy Night said:
Possibly he ignored LOTR because it was not a summer release, I believe all three were released in December.

See my reply to zepro above

Rainy Night said:
I was told once in a screenwriting class that a "#3" comes about if the "#2" grosses 65% of what the "#1" grossed, etc etc... until you end up with a total failure... Batman 4 *sigh*

God! Another exmaple of "the suits" taking over Hollywood!

Rainy Night said:
What I've wanted to rant about lately has been REMAKES - very few live up to the original... coming this December... I AM LEGEND a remake of OMEGA MAN (yes Dpat, I noticed your avatar) with Will Smith in the Charlton Heston role... The original is one of my favorites, I'm excited for the remake, and hoping I'm not disappointed like I was with ROLLERBALL and countless other classic films whose memories I have of them have been tarnished because somebody just had to "update" the original...

I don't mind ALL remakes. But Psycho?? C'mon!!!! That was an iconic towering landmark in all of movie history! You CAN'T remake a thing like THAT! What was the point??? Did they think they were improving on it?

War of the Worlds was a great remake. But the Time Machine remake was rather mediocre.

I have a scriptwriting guru with a podcast who said:

"every generation that is born believes that all movies begin with them, and that there weren’t any movies before they were born. And this is why remakes continually happen in Hollywood."

so that's his explanation as to why.

(PS: Rainy, I finally figured out just ten seconds ago why that song "I Love a Rainy Night" by Eddie Rabbit keeps going through my head as of late--it's because of your screen name!

)

Steven Howard · Jun 12, 2007

Rainy Night said:
What I've wanted to rant about lately has been REMAKES - very few live up to the original... coming this December... I AM LEGEND a remake of OMEGA MAN (yes Dpat, I noticed your avatar) with Will Smith in the Charlton Heston role... The original is one of my favorites,

You can't really call Omega Man "the original," given the existence of 1964's The Last Man on Earth, starring Vincent Price, also based on the novel I am Legend by Richard Matheson.

Now that I think about it, does it really count as a remake just because there have been previous adaptations of the same source material? Is Kenneth Branagh's Hamlet a remake of Olivier's?

Rainy Night · Jun 12, 2007

Steven Howard said:
You can't really call Omega Man "the original," given the existence of 1964's The Last Man on Earth, starring Vincent Price, also based on the novel I am Legend by Richard Matheson.

I wasn't aware of that one, but good point. I think it's like PD said... each generation wants to have its own. Possibly we hang on to those memories of the first time or subsequent times we viewed a particular film and try to keep those memories sacred. We want to feel the same emotions again and look forward to the updated version and when the experience doesn't live up to our memories we feel disappointed.

Click to expand...

Steven Howard · Jun 12, 2007

Plot Device said:
God! Another exmaple of "the suits" taking over Hollywood!

Let's not start waxing nostalgic for the lost Golden Age of a Hollywood devoted purely to artistic integrity, unsullied by base commercial concerns.

I don't mind ALL remakes. But Psycho?? C'mon!!!! That was an iconic towering landmark in all of movie history! You CAN'T remake a thing like THAT! What was the point??? Did they think they were improving on it?

Doubtful, since it's almost an exact shot-by-shot remake. I've read different ideas about what Van Sant and company thought they were doing. The most likely explanation I've heard is that they wanted to show it to younger audiences who are turned off by movies touted as "classics," especially when they're in black-and-white.

More on remakes in general: There have always been remakes, from the very earliest days of the movies. How many versions of Ben-Hur, Brewster's Millions, or Uncle Tom's Cabin are there? Most of them only a few years apart.

What's different now (and by "now" I mean "for the past 20 years or so") is home video. Before HBO and the VCR (and now, umpteen premium cable channels, and video-on-demand, and DVDs and everything else), you could remake a movie that was only five or ten years old, knowing that nobody had seen the original in five or ten years. Now that everybody's got access to so many existing movies, there's a sense that remakes have to be justified, that "Why are you making a new version of Psycho?" needs a better answer than "Why are you making Saw?"

So I'm not really down on remakes. I'm down on bad movies, and a lot of sequels and remakes tend to be bad, but so do a lot of "original" movies, too.

Plot Device · Jun 12, 2007

Steven Howard said:
Let's not start waxing nostalgic for the lost Golden Age of a Hollywood devoted purely to artistic integrity, unsullied by base commercial concerns.

I was eye-rolling at the mathematical forumla Rainy Night was offering. A forumla! (Shees! Those bean-counters!

)

DanielD · Jun 12, 2007

To Steven Howard.
I actually seen that movie you referred to :The Last Man on Earth(Vincent Price) a little while back.
Though, I didn't see the entire film.
I tuned in at the point where, Vincent Price is in persuit of a mysterious woman,who'm he chases with great gusto through the hilly fringes of a small town.
Unfortunately, I lost the great battle over who'm bares the remote control.
Therefore, I will have to wait till it's shown again, to see the movie in it's entirety.
Daniel.

zeprosnepsid · Jun 13, 2007

Steven Howard said:
Doubtful, since it's almost an exact shot-by-shot remake. I've read different ideas about what Van Sant and company thought they were doing. The most likely explanation I've heard is that they wanted to show it to younger audiences who are turned off by movies touted as "classics," especially when they're in black-and-white.

Tarantino said it was as a film making exercise. And he loved it. And last night Ted Elliott and Terry Russio said it was to prove that each movie is an individual experience that cannot be recreated even if you do everything the same. They said this in relation to potc:awe, that it wouldn't have been the same movie if they had taken a break in between the two. They also really like it (Psycho that is). It seems to have been very well regarded in the film industry for any number of reasons.

dclary · Jun 13, 2007

Yeah, I can see how this is a modern problem...

"Bad News Bears Go to Japan"
"Damien: Omen II"
"Jaws 2"
"Revenge of the Pink Panther"

Oops, that's 1978.

The only thing worse than a critic is an ignorant critic. Sequels are, and have been, a part of Hollywood longer than he's been masturbating to "Where the Boys Aren't XII"

Rainy Night · Jun 13, 2007

On the remakes off topic discussion... I read today that THE BIG CHILL is being remade... once again another favorite movie of mine whose memory will undoubtedly be tarnished.

Plot Device · Jun 13, 2007

Rainy Night said:
On the remakes off topic discussion... I read today that THE BIG CHILL is being remade... once again another favorite movie of mine whose memory will undoubtedly be tarnished.

But .......... but ........... that film belonged to the 1960's generation. It was made in the 1980's for baby-boomes who (at that point) were in their late-30's and early 40's, and it reminisced for them about the late 1960's and early 1970's.

Are they planning to update it for people who were in high school and college back in the 1980's????? (And who are thus in the late-30's and early 40's today???) If so, it will require MORE than just different music--they need to capture an entirely differnet attitude. The attitude that was reminisced about in the original Big Chill was THAT generation's attitude. The kids from the 80's had a different attitude, different outlook, different set of fears and lamentations, different battlecry, and sang a differnt anthem.

I just can't see it working. I predict it will flop like "Dirty Dancing: Savanah Nights."

zeprosnepsid · Jun 14, 2007

You know it's Havana Nights right?

Anyway, it's being remade for black audiences.

Why Every Summer Movie Ends in "3"

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