![]() | Big and Bigger (The Year in Movies) |
The 1995 holiday season in the movie biz was a ``blood bath for the industry,'' according to an anonymous film exec quoted in the New York Times. The same description could have been applied to the entire year. Simply put, there was a whole lotta hype for a whole lotta critical and box-office disasters last year. On paper, however, things looked good in Tinseltown, but not great. Total box-office revenues increased 1.8 percent in 1995 to a record $5.4 billion, which translates into approximately 1.22 billion tickets sold, a paltry .8 percent more than 1994. In 1994, 10 films topped $100 million, with Forrest Gump and The Lion King coming very close to the $300-million mark. But 1995 saw only eight films gross $100 million or more, and none even touching $200 million. Anything less than a $60 million take nearly qualified a film as a loser. A lot of films that would have been hailed as winners in years past were now sadly welcomed as also-rans. If you couldn't hit one out of the ball park -- as Batman Forever, Apollo 13 and Toy Story did -- then you might as well not even step up to the plate.
This is, as you might expect, not the best thing in the world for innovative thinking about the art of film. It's pretty much agreed by critics that the most interesting films these days are coming from independent filmmakers and smaller distributors such as New Line and Miramax. The big boys just can't afford to take chances. So they don't. And instead, we end up with Forget Paris and The Scarlet Letter.
There's even been some talk (in a recent Entertainment Weekly article) that the most interesting work is coming from your television screen. A good episode of ER makes you think that there's some truth to that. And recent releases offer further evidence.
Let's start with the fall. Showgirls and Jade, both written by the notorious screenwriter, Joe Eszterhas, resulted in big losses for MGM and vindication for everyone who ever thought Eszterhas was an absurdly overpaid hack. Jade shared the dubious honor of opening on the same day (Friday, October 13th) as Strange Days and The Scarlet Letter. Together the three films lost an estimated $400 million in production and marketing costs. And that ain't all. Does anyone remember Assassins (Stallone tanks again)? Fair Game (which may have sent Cindy Crawford back to the House of Style? Steal Big, Steal Little? All have been relegated to the dustbin of movie history with abysmal grosses and little, if any, audience interest.
The grim news continued into the crucial holiday season when the studios released a nearly unprecedented 22 films in five weeks -- and saw a large number of them fail miserably. The biggest bust was the Geena Davis vehicle Cutthroat Island, which cost more than $100 million to make and grossed only about $7 million in its first 10 days of release. There were many more films, even relative successes such as Nixon and Sabrina, whose costs outstripped their earning power.
On the other hand, there were some smashes in 1995. Jim Carrey justified his enormous paychecks (he will collect $20 million for the upcoming Cable Guy) with Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls, a movie that grossed $37.8 million in its opening weekend. He's come a long way since he was ``the white guy on In Living Color,'' his unofficial moniker for years. But most of the happy news in Hollywood came from unexpected quarters. The bleak and unrelentingly violent Seven was a surprise smash (attribute its success to the Brad Pitt factor), and Get Shorty continued John Travolta's astonishing comeback in fine style. (Though the same can't be said for White Man's Burden.) The engaging and technically remarkable Toy Story continued the seemingly unstoppable Disney animation juggernaut with earnings of $150 million by early January. Perhaps the weirdest success story of the fall was another Disney release, Powder, which rode out a firestorm of publicity to box-office success ($30 million earned on a $9-million budget) when it was discovered that the director was a convicted child molester. Maybe marketing is everything after all.
But the 1995 film that might have the most lingering impact on the industry was one that had predominantly black audiences (and anxious Twentieth Century-Fox execs) breathing easy through the holidays. Waiting to Exhale, starring Whitney Houston, Angela Bassett and relative unknowns Lela Rochon and Loretta Devine, blasted to the top of the Christmas weekend grosses with an unprecedented following among black audiences. As of January, it showed every sign of crossing over to white audiences driven in part by a powerhouse soundtrack. But whether the film makes that final leap or not, it's likely that we'll be seeing even more all-girl features with women of every hue in the year or two ahead. That certainly seems to be the trend for now anyway, with How to Make an American Quilt, Now and Then and Exhale making respectable debuts in 1995.
As summer approached, despite the success of small and independent films, it appeared that Hollywood was still obsessed with ``big, boffo'' and ``blowing up stuff.'' But after the Oklahoma City bombing, there was some talk about toning down the ``blowing up'' in films and television. However, the huge opening of Die Hard With a Vengeance (approximately $21 million over Memorial Day weekend alone) quelled that discussion fast. The American fascination with exploding stuff hadn't diminished a bit, despite Oklahoma City's graphic demonstration of the horror a real explosion can wreak.
Die Hard With a Vengeance might have packed the biggest boom in the early summer but it receded as the summer brought near-record box office receipts. A reconfigured Batman Forever featured not only Carrey but also a lighter spirit and a more kid-friendly approach thanks to its new director Joel Schumacher, taking over the series from Hollywood's quirkiest big-box-office director, Tim Burton. The result was the biggest opening since Jurassic Park and $100 million in 10 days. And there was also Apollo 13, a thinking man's thriller starring Tom Hanks, who is perhaps the most powerful and well-loved actor in Hollywood at the moment. Yes, the film was about an event that a significant proportion of the movie-going audience doesn't even remember, but with Ron Howard upping the tension and Hanks's natural charm, it was the most grown-up popcorn movie of the summer, and it kept on growing, fueling a summer box-office bonanza that usually relies on kiddie fare. The summer also gave us The Bridges of Madison County, featuring the softer side of Clint Eastwood and Meryl Streep (getting to work out her Italian accent this time) and the already successful hard-guys (Denzel Washington and Gene Hackman) in the sub flick Crimson Tide. Sandra Bullock's breakout charmer While You Were Sleeping (in which Bill Pullman gets the girl) was around through the summer, Casper opened with hauntingly large grosses and the annual animated Disney extravaganza -- 1995's was Pocahontas -- needed Central Park for its premiere extravaganza, solidifying Disney's stake in New York.
Outside Hollywood, the two summer films that had the biggest Pulp Fiction-style buzz after this year's Cannes Festival were Gus van Sant's To Die For (starring the suddenly omnipresent Nicole Kidman) and Larry Clark's frighteningly raw Kids (written by a 20-year-old guy named Harmony Korine who was once one of Sassy magazine's ``Ones to Watch''). While, like Pulp, neither racked up big numbers at the box office, both established (or in van Sant's case, reestablished) their director's reputations.
Art-house buzz aside, the film that defined the summer, and that may redefine the movie industry, was Kevin Costner's Waterworld. Okay, he didn't direct it, but he starred in it, produced it and finished it up after director Kevin Reynolds quit after delivering his cut. It's the most expensive movie ever made. The budget was $175 million -- an amount that insiders say is unlikely ever to be recouped. More importantly, even if it was a Gump- or Lion King-level smash, spending nearly $200 million to get it onto the screen makes $300 million (the Gump gross) look like small potatoes indeed. Interestingly, and unusually, Universal made no attempt to counter the reams of bad press and nasty speculation surrounding the movie. The only person to speak up was a disgruntled writer of the film, who took out a full page ad in Variety to chastise the naysayers who hadn't seen a frame of the film.
Things should get even more interesting as the elections approach. Presidential hopeful Bob Dole fired the opening shot (to use an inappropriate metaphor) in early June when he took the industry to task for films such as Natural Born Killers and True Romance, which he called ``nightmares of depravity'' (though he didn't see either movie). ``We have reached the point where our popular culture threatens to undermine our character as a nation,'' he thundered, although, intriguingly, he didn't go after Arnold Schwarzenegger's heavy artillery. Some, particularly in the industry, guessed that Dole didn't include the star in his attack because he's a well-known Republican. Whether it was a heartfelt cry or a bid for political capital, Dole's complaints started a firestorm of punditry and made it clear that, for better or worse, Hollywood remains a part of the political process.
So what does it all add up to? Pronouncements about the future of the movie industry are made all the time but they're hard to make accurately. Did anyone think that Forrest Gump would really become a cultural touchstone? Don't bet on it. But you can bet that the explosion of the entertainment industry worldwide will fuel a continued interest in movies that have the broadest possible appeal. That means more blockbusters based on proven commodities (such as Batman Forever and Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls) and the ongoing search for stars whose appeal crosses as many lines as possible (keep an eye on Sandra Bullock). The multimedia world is just beginning to touch the way films are made and distributed, and it's an influence that's sure to be felt this year. Stars will continue to be paid ludicrous amounts of money as long as they can put fannies in the seats. That's one thing about Hollywood that's not likely to change. The rest remains to be seen. As William Goldman so wisely observed about the industry he's toiled in for so long, ``Nobody knows anything.'' They're all just looking for the next big thing. The search will continue.
Martha Southgate is a senior writer at Premiere magazine.
Copyright © 1996 by INSO Corporation. All rights reserved.