In one of the opening scenes of The Studio, Seth Rogen's scathing critique of Hollywood studios from within the system, Bryan Cranston, the president of Continental Studios, tells Rogen, an aspiring creative director: "There's just one thing that holds me back with you. It's been said that you like artistic and pretentious flops. That you're obsessed with pleasing actors and directors, instead of being obsessed with making this studio as profitable as possible." And Rogen, who up to that point embodied that definition, responds: "I prioritize profits like no one else in this town."
The scene, with all its comedy and fiction, also holds a lot of truth in today's Hollywood ecosystem. Because immediately after, the company's president confesses that they have just acquired the rights to Kool-Aid, a powdered drink that in one of its commercials broke through walls shouting Oh yeah, to make a family blockbuster. "At Continental, we don't make cinema, we make movies. Movies that many want to pay to see," he emphasizes. And it's not hard to imagine that this conversation could be happening right now in an office with different players and, let's say, a superhero, the main character of a video game, a top-selling toy, or a secondary character from a blockbuster franchise as the draw.
In the coming months alone, theaters worldwide await the arrival of Super Mario Galaxy, Toy Story 5, Supergirl, Minions & Monstros, Spider-Man: Brand New Day, Street Fighter, Jumanji 3, Avengers: Doomsday, Dune: Part Three, Paw Patrol: The Dino Movie, and the live-action adaptation of Moana. All heirs to established worlds among the general public, most even stemming from franchises with spectacular box office numbers that now aim to replicate with their new installments. Because that is the prevailing model that Hollywood has built in the last two decades and especially in this latest one. Recycling brought to the big screen. In the last 10 years -excluding 2020 and 2021 due to the pandemic- considering the top 10 highest-grossing films each year, there are only nine that are original. Nine out of 100. And, of those nine, three are animated saga starters, another (F1) is based on a popular sport, and another (Bohemian Rhapsody) is the biopic of one of the most iconic rock stars in history, Freddie Mercury. Neither in 2024, nor in 2022, nor in 2019, nor in 2017 was there a single original film that made the top 10 globally. The same goes for the years 2011 and 2012.
In the first decade of the 2000s, the average number of films not from already established franchises among the top 10 highest-grossing was five, with some years reaching seven. In the 90s, the figure ranged between six and nine, with 1993 having the entire top 10 filled with a cinema model that has now disappeared.
"Undoubtedly, there is a lack of blockbusters, big mainstream films, with original scripts, and above all, there is a lack of solid foreign directors who settle in the United States to make great American-style films as Paul Verhoeven used to. The blockbuster now seeks anonymity, filmmakers who meet the requirements of shareholders, a studio, or a marketing team to ensure success," points out producer Enrique López Lavigne, summarizing this phenomenon as "the battle of originality against algorithms." "Beating the algorithm is very difficult because we are all the algorithm. Betting on originality is more challenging because that's where executives risk revalidating their bonuses or their tenure. Now the risk has been left solely in the hands of international cinema, which has always faced it from the beginning," he elaborates.
Hollywood has found itself in the midst of a sought-after and, at the same time, forced system change. The IP model, meaning the creation, purchase, and management of as many intellectual properties as possible to build an integrated economic ecosystem -the one Disney has been following since the 1950s with its businesses- is the predominant model for studios, which are becoming larger through mergers -the latest acquisition being Warner by Paramount. Added to this is the drop in theater revenues since COVID, writers' strikes, and the rise of digital platforms, which have altered the way we consume movies. "In Europe, there is still some notion of cinema as craftsmanship, in the United States, it is absolutely industry," explains Pablo Berger, author of Robot Dreams. "If we look at its paradigm, there are festivals like Sundance, where an author emerges who makes a small personal film that critics like and that commercially works. For their second film, studios already offer them to make a superhero movie, and most of these young authors fall into the trap. The system does not allow for such careers. In fact, in such a gigantic industry, we can count on one hand filmmakers aged 35 to 40 of that kind. Authors have a price, and I say 'we' because maybe I would fall into that too if I were there," adds the Hollywood director and academic.
Associate Professor at the University of Ghent and the Free University of Brussels, Eduard Cuelenaere, uses the term "recycling" to explain Hollywood's system. Since its inception, major studios have recycled previous works, but it was from the 1970s onwards when they identified that a major box office success generated such revenues that it had to be replicated. That's when franchises that are now omnipresent began to be cultivated. "What is happening today is the consolidation of studios and the rise of streaming platforms as market guardians: a very small number of companies have the largest budgets and control the markets," Cuelenaere explains. He continues, "I would say that recycling movies is not a problem in itself. The real loss lies in what disappears when blockbusters almost entirely consume marketing budgets and screen space: mid-budget original films -the ones that launched careers, told unexpected stories, and took genuine risks- have practically disappeared from major studios' production. The problem lies in the concentration. Some call it the 'complaint gap': the audience loudly complains about remakes and sequels, but still buys tickets. As long as that gap exists -and it doesn't seem to be disappearing-, studios and streaming platforms will continue to produce recycled content," emphasizes this Hollywood expert.
One of his studies shows that 13.6% of the films in Netflix's catalog are remakes, franchises, sequels, or spin-offs. In Prime Video, that percentage is 13.8%. And in Disney+, it rises to 36.6%. If literary adaptations were included, those figures would be 35.8%, 31.2%, and 63.4%, respectively.
"Most platforms focus on quantity rather than quality. A cinema gives you five or six movies each week that you can choose from, while a platform presents you with an infinite catalog. When the industry wants to sell scripts to platforms, it's a done deal, and that exacerbates the crisis. Proof of this is what lies ahead this year: another Mandalorian movie, another Avengers, Toy Story 5, the Harry Potter series... Also, because right now a screenwriter is better paid making a TV series or a movie for a platform. Writing a script is not just lounging by the pool with a beer for a few afternoons; there is a creative and artistic process that needs to be compensated for," explains Fernando Lobo, programming manager at Embajadores cinemas.
Emma Lustres, founder of Vaca Films, also looks at movie theaters as one of the many factors that have led to this situation. Specifically, the prevalence of multiplex cinemas over traditional ones in most cities over the last three decades. "Now movies have to make the most of their box office, at least 80%, in the first two or three weeks, and the quickest way to achieve that is with movies that have already been successful, with characters the audience knows, and where everything is not built from scratch," says the producer, who acknowledges that the "business is more complicated today" as they have to achieve those results in less time due to the competition in theaters and the increase in home consumption. Also, she conveys that the model where a single movie can occupy three screens in the same cinema stresses the system and leads theaters to only give space to those that sell tickets.
Now, let's talk about franchises. "Good American cinema has pretty much stopped being made. I'm referring to high-quality commercial cinema—the kind that used to cost 60, 70, or 80 million to make. Hollywood has become polarized, though there are obviously exceptions. Take the Oscars, for example: generally, the films that make it there are low-grossing, largely unknown to the public, and mid-budget cinema has been lost. Now you have to choose between superhero sagas and that kind of cinema," Lustres points out.
This has opened the door for international cinema—especially European auteur cinema—to sneak into the awards, rake in box office revenue, and earn the label of "quality cinema." The Cannes Film Festival is the great mirror in which Hollywood now sees itself, in search of prestige. And that, says Nacho Vigalondo, director of Daniela Forever, has consequences: "There's a very clear phenomenon: commercial cinema has kowtowed to the public, trying to satisfy much more mechanized needs. And I think that's linked to the fact that auteur and prestige cinema has also ceased to be a product for adults or elite audiences and has become something more family-friendly. Let me explain: it used to be normal for a film that won at Cannes or Venice not to be easy to watch—it was more cerebral, more mysterious, and didn't shy away from requiring the viewer to be educated or intellectually curious. Commercial cinema also has to rely on repetition to grab attention and has abandoned more sophisticated approaches," says the Hollywood director and academic, who cites social media as 'essential' to this shift. "They have fostered a constant stream of on-demand content; we no longer want to consume something that challenges us or take risks when it comes to watching content," he concludes.