What is it about action movies that people love? Is there a desire to see explosions and guns? Is it that watching an action movie is about escaping into a reality that is simultaneously like our own and yet, very different?
One of the biggest reasons surely must be the engaging excitement that comes along with watching the action. It's such a gripping ride to see characters have to fight for their lives. Movies are about characters overcoming problems. It's such a visceral movie going experience to see a character get through his problems with guns or hand-to-hand combat.
BUT what if you don't care about the outcome. I.e. what if the movie has not given the characters enough backstory for me to care whether they live or die. Then, to me, the action scenes become meaningless. There are basically, no stakes. No consequences.
And here we come to the reason why I believe many of the action movies Hollywood produces these days are getting increasingly boring.
We live in an age where the photorealistic advances in computer-generated effects and lighting design, motion capture, green screen, stunt coordination, and military-like devices that move the camera are rapid and mind-blowing. The technology being used today on a film that will hit theaters in the summer of 2018 is far more advanced than what we saw in theatres last summer.
Because of this, directors and writers seem so focussed on the spending millions on action sequences that they often seem to forget to spend time with the characters they created, rendering the scenes meaningless. They just jump straight into it, proceeding to grace us with one action sequence after another without much character building at all. It leaves you wondering, who are these people and why should I care what happens to them?
I'm going to use an example of this trend that won't win me any friends - Star Wars: Rogue One. It's a movie that people would probably not have found as exciting had it not taken place in the Star Wars universe. Without that important backdrop and mythology, it could have been any other generic action movie.
It's not because of period, setting, action or casting. Rogue One got all of that right, in spades, especially in the visual support of all four. It's simply that Rogue One forgets a fundamental obligation of storytelling, whether that's Smokey and the Bandit or My Dinner With Andre.
As recycled as The Force Awakens' story was, Rey was relatable through the hard work and the trudgery of the film's first quarter. It builds to her critical judgment not to sell BB-8. Her character is not without flaws - did you miss or forget that she feels some need to return to Jakku? The "lie the character believes" is weak and inconsequential in Rey's case. But overall, viewers warm to her story because they see Rey making choices and imposing her will, or reconciling it with larger forces.
Rogue One worked it backward. Almost nothing in the first half to two-thirds of the film carried any consequence - consequence that could change the emergence of the final battle, or the Death Star's means of shaping it. Lessons from the Screenplay points out that we don't see Jyn, or her compatriots, making any meaningful choices until the final assault on Scarif. While noble, their sacrifice ends up robbed of the meaning the filmmakers intended because of the casual and inconsequential nature of events leading to it.
And there's the crux of it. Many (not all) modern action films seem to forget to do the following two things BEFORE any action sequences take place...
1. Make us emotionally invest in the characters
2. Make it clear what the CONSEQUENCES of them failing is
I used to love action films. Jurassic Park (a film that spends the entire first half making us invest in the characters before any ensuing action) is one of my favourite films. But a lot of modern action films don't seem to do it for me. I hope this changes in the future.
What do you all think? Why am I wrong or right?
One of the biggest reasons surely must be the engaging excitement that comes along with watching the action. It's such a gripping ride to see characters have to fight for their lives. Movies are about characters overcoming problems. It's such a visceral movie going experience to see a character get through his problems with guns or hand-to-hand combat.
BUT what if you don't care about the outcome. I.e. what if the movie has not given the characters enough backstory for me to care whether they live or die. Then, to me, the action scenes become meaningless. There are basically, no stakes. No consequences.
And here we come to the reason why I believe many of the action movies Hollywood produces these days are getting increasingly boring.
We live in an age where the photorealistic advances in computer-generated effects and lighting design, motion capture, green screen, stunt coordination, and military-like devices that move the camera are rapid and mind-blowing. The technology being used today on a film that will hit theaters in the summer of 2018 is far more advanced than what we saw in theatres last summer.
Because of this, directors and writers seem so focussed on the spending millions on action sequences that they often seem to forget to spend time with the characters they created, rendering the scenes meaningless. They just jump straight into it, proceeding to grace us with one action sequence after another without much character building at all. It leaves you wondering, who are these people and why should I care what happens to them?
I'm going to use an example of this trend that won't win me any friends - Star Wars: Rogue One. It's a movie that people would probably not have found as exciting had it not taken place in the Star Wars universe. Without that important backdrop and mythology, it could have been any other generic action movie.
It's not because of period, setting, action or casting. Rogue One got all of that right, in spades, especially in the visual support of all four. It's simply that Rogue One forgets a fundamental obligation of storytelling, whether that's Smokey and the Bandit or My Dinner With Andre.
As recycled as The Force Awakens' story was, Rey was relatable through the hard work and the trudgery of the film's first quarter. It builds to her critical judgment not to sell BB-8. Her character is not without flaws - did you miss or forget that she feels some need to return to Jakku? The "lie the character believes" is weak and inconsequential in Rey's case. But overall, viewers warm to her story because they see Rey making choices and imposing her will, or reconciling it with larger forces.
Rogue One worked it backward. Almost nothing in the first half to two-thirds of the film carried any consequence - consequence that could change the emergence of the final battle, or the Death Star's means of shaping it. Lessons from the Screenplay points out that we don't see Jyn, or her compatriots, making any meaningful choices until the final assault on Scarif. While noble, their sacrifice ends up robbed of the meaning the filmmakers intended because of the casual and inconsequential nature of events leading to it.
And there's the crux of it. Many (not all) modern action films seem to forget to do the following two things BEFORE any action sequences take place...
1. Make us emotionally invest in the characters
2. Make it clear what the CONSEQUENCES of them failing is
I used to love action films. Jurassic Park (a film that spends the entire first half making us invest in the characters before any ensuing action) is one of my favourite films. But a lot of modern action films don't seem to do it for me. I hope this changes in the future.
What do you all think? Why am I wrong or right?
R summary at the bottom of these posts? we'd be super grateful!
