In bygone days, Hollywood was a bastion of original storytelling and imagination. The industry produced new tales that inspired us and transported us into another realm. But those days are long over, and we, the audience, have no choice but to endure the production of stale remakes and banal retellings of old narratives.

Hollywood production companies have made their point clear: They are only interested in making money. There is no longer an emphasis on authentic, original stories, especially if those stories cost a significant amount of money. Brian Robbins, CEO of Paramount Pictures, said in the summer of 2023 that “we’re not going to release an expensive original animated movie and just pray people will come.”

Nickelodeon Animation and Paramount Animation President Ramsey Naito tried to clarify Robbins’ statement, noting that the production company will continue to make original animated movies but that it must be careful about which projects to pursue. But Robbins’ sentiment remains: Paramount does not want to create original material that may risk losing money.

I believe there is still a substantial audience for original productions, but it may not be as large as the audience that craves the next installment of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. And Hollywood seems to have decided it will side with the audience that will make them more money. As a result, the dynamism of artistic ideas that previously shaped and formed culture is quickly fading. This is not because there are no more original ideas being shared, but because studio executives will simply not risk the financial investment. Consequently, some artists who have the money to produce original films have broken away from the traditional methods of filmmaking.

In a recent development, Francis Ford Coppola had to sell off a significant portion of his wine empire to self-fund Megalopolis, an original film that cost the filmmaker $120 million to make. Though he screened the film at the end of March to potential buyers, no studio bid on the massive project. One distributor said that “[t]here is just no way to position this movie.” Another distributor noted that “everyone is rooting” for the well-known filmmaker, but “there is the business side of things.”

But it appears Coppola had the last laugh when he received a seven-minute standing ovation following the film’s screening at the Cannes Film Festival. The standing ovation seemed to indicate that original stories are still very much in demand. There are independent studios that pride themselves on producing original material, but it has yet to be seen if the major studios take notice.

An audience with taste can only sit through so many films set in the Marvel Cinematic Universe before craving something more heartfelt or cerebral. The frustration with superhero movies has become so pervasive in American culture that the recent financial flops of these big-budget movies has been attributed to “superhero fatigue.”

However, there appears to be a persistent myth in Hollywood that suggests a film is only as good as the amount of money it makes. The once-flourishing culture of moviegoers meeting up after a film to discuss its theme and cultural relevance is dead. Now, many people would rather skip out on the theatrical release altogether and wait for a film to be released on a streaming service. While it is more convenient to stay home to watch new-release movies, there is perhaps another reason for this phenomenon: Audience members are being crushed between the millstones of big-budget superhero flicks and woke political messaging, both of which wear on people’s confidence in the filmmaking business.

British film director Sam Mendes said in 2023, “I look back at my films and I think American Beauty, Revolutionary Road, Away We Go, these would all go to streaming now and that makes me sad.”

“You look at the multiplexes and people go ‘there’s six screens’ and then you go to those six screens and it says ‘screen one Avatar, screen two Avatar, screen three Avatar’—that’s not a six-screen cinema; that’s just six screens showing the same movie,” Mendes added.

“That is a different understanding of why those buildings were created in the first place.”

Hollywood’s growing refusal to take financial risks by producing original material has been augmented by the advent of artificial intelligence. Some are worried that AI may be the end of art, but it is important to remember that these advanced technologies are only as good as the information put into them. AI cannot survive or progress without using material previously created by humans. Hollywood seems to be in the same boat; it cannot survive without rehashing, remaking, and recycling old stories that we have all seen dozens of times.

My hope is that more actors, directors, and screenwriters take notice of the development and choose to go their own way like Coppola. There are creatives with enough revenue who could feasibly start their own development companies. But for now, it appears Hollywood remains at the helm, churning out old material for new gain.

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