By: Jacob Christner
Hollywood made a big mistake.
What was it, you ask? Well, before I answer that, I have a little story to tell you.
For decade upon decade, generation upon generation, and even into the new millennium, there were three main guarantees in life…death, taxes, and if you want to make it big, you had to take a chance and swing for the fences. If you wanted to be big in the finance world, you moved to Manhattan and worked on Wall Street. If you wanted to be a big in country music, you moved to Nashville near the Ryman Auditorium and the Grand Old Opry. If you wanted to make it in boxing, you moved to Detroit and the Kronk Gym, Brooklyn and Gleason’s Gym, or Miami and the 5th Street Gym.
And if you wanted to make it big as an actor, you went to Broadway or Hollywood for stage or screen. You had no choice.
But something happened on the way to heaven. The world changed. The advent of the Internet allowed the world to get much smaller. The advent of YouTube allowed the world to learn absolutely anything they want. Why would you move to Detroit when any kid can watch a free video on slipping the jab and countering with a hook? Sure, you could have still gone old school and moved to be trained by Emmanuel Steward, but he died thirteen years ago, and something tells me he’d be on YouTube by now anyway.
Want to learn guitar? Buy a cheap guitar from a pawn shop and find your favorite YouTube teacher. If you want to be even cheaper, buy Guitar Hero.
Want to learn the Meisner technique? Strasberg? Stella Adler? Stanislavski? You can still go to classes with reputable teachers, and thankfully, plenty do. But all of that is on your YouTube app also. Hell, eight hours of DVDs of Sandy Meisner teaching classes to his students are on there. I should know…I’ve watched it four times, including the original DVDs.
Hollywood has been affected greatly by this change. It used to cost an arm, a leg, your liver, kidney, and blood type to get the equipment to make a low budget movie. Remember American Movie, the 1999 Documentary? That got the green light because it was a dreamer from Menomonee Falls, WI trying to overcome a lot of obstacles to make a movie. There’s nothing special about that now. My hometown(Quincy, IL) has the same population as Menomonee Falls and has had a film festival the last five years. The special guest last year was Eric Roberts.
No one even shoots in Hollywood anymore. The film sets are tumbleweeds. Peacemaker is in Vancouver, half the series and movies are shot in Atlanta, and even “The Floor” with Rob Lowe is shot in Dublin, Ireland. So where does that leave Hollywood?
One thing…Artificial Intelligence, or AI.
Read Hollywood Reporter, Variety, or Deadline. AI is scaring the ever living hell out of the industry. The recent video game actors strike had to do with the use of AI and actors wanting protections for their voices and likenesses against AI replication. As if performers didn’t have that, and a million other concerns(mainly getting a JOB), there’s the introduction of Tilly Norwood.
Who is Tilly Norwood? Only a fully AI character created by Particle6 group’s AI division(Xicoia). This is Hollywood’s dream…actors that can’t age, will always look beautiful, and won’t ask for raises. Movie budgets would be zero percent salaries if studios had their way, so you can see the industry’s concerns.
But there is one issue, and Hollywood won’t see it till later.
They are impatient, so they are introducing this too soon. The younger generation that can call this era “boomer” don’t realize that it’s Gen X…the years 1965-1980, or 45-60 years old. Still young enough to fight, rebel, and spend money however they want. They are either the viewers that want real content, or producers and directors that will create more independent films. Because of this, and all of the streaming options available, I predict independent films will boom like never before.
And my other prediction?
There will be the first fully AI feature film in 3-5 years. Actors, backgrounds, sets, everything. There will be a curiosity, so it’ll make a billion dollars. Overall quality will be ok, but that never matters in the first one. Because of all that money that will be generated, they’ll rush out the next one or two…and they’ll be awful. Meanwhile, there will be a divide of filmmakers like the cultural divide we see now. There will be more film festivals like Justine Bateman’s that will not allow anything with AI near it, and Hollywood will be on its own, only with a head start because of all their money, but also with the possibility of AI fatigue if they push projects too soon.
May the best films win.
And by the way, I’m rooting for the Indies.
