Smeared Type

I was in Los Angeles with my wife a few days ago, and we had dinner with Steve Eich, Theatrical Producer and Director (“Picasso at Lapin Agile”), Russ Smith, Co-founder with John Malkovich of Mr. Mudd Productions (“The Dancer Upstairs,” “The Libertine,” “Juno”), and Susan Morgan Cooper, Documentary Film Director of the recently acclaimed “An Unlikely Weapon.”

Naturally as we were dining in West Hollywood, the conversation turned to movies pretty quickly.  Russ made the point about how the movie business – like many other industries – is being chopped up into specialty niches. The major studios look to their summer blockbusters, catering primarily to a teenage audience, to produce the “big bucks”.  This summer’s current offerings include: “Terminator Salvation,”  “X-Men Origins: Wolverine,” and “Star Trek.”  These are all Sci-Fi special effects spectaculars, and the word on the “street” is they will all do well.

Another niche is the star-studded major-studio productions.  Anything with George Clooney or Brad Pitt or other big stars would fill this bill.  Perhaps, this summer’s “Angels and Demons,” with Tom Hanks also qualifies, but this production prequel of “The Da Vinci Code” will have to do a lot better at the box office.

As Russ pointed out, the studios also like and need productions that might not be for the mass market, but which may qualify for awards.  Often, these come from overseas with fine actors and directors such as “The Queen” with Helen Mirren, and this year’s Academy Award Winner, “Slumdog Millionaire.”  A further niche is filled by the independent movie makers, of which Mr. Mudd Productions is one of the more successful companies.  However, current financial constraints and problems obtaining distribution have had their affect on the amount of independent productions that are hitting the market. Foreign films particularly from the UK, Europe, and now China and India always have their following.

And finally, there are the documentaries often for the movie purist, which have been gaining in popularity due to the successful productions by Michael Moore (“Sicko,” “Fahrenheit 9/11”) and Al Gore (“An Inconvenient Truth”).  But for the most part, documentaries struggle to get adequate distribution.  Susan described the hard work, which has led to the success of her latest Documentary, “An Unlikely Weapon.”  This is, she believes, primarily because of excellent publicity, television interviews, and strong newspaper reviews (The New York Times) which have helped her to obtain distribution bookings across the country.

I listened intently as the conversation flowed about the trials and tribulations of achieving success in the movie industry today.  I couldn’t help but think that, despite the glamour, movie making like so many other businesses is a real tough business, particularly in the current economic environment.

Ellis M. Goodman, author of Bear Any Burden: www.bearanyburden.com

Tags: Documentaries, Hollywood, Movies

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