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Ever wonder why modern cinema feels so formulaic? Join us as we examine the films that transformed Hollywood for the worse! From cynical marketing cash-grabs to franchises that killed creativity, these movies set precedents that continue to plague mainstream filmmaking today. Which movie do you think did the most damage?
Transcript
00:00Welcome to WatchMojo and today, we're counting down our picks for the top 10 movies that
00:13are responsible for ruining mainstream cinema.
00:1910. The Emoji Movie
00:30Just the title alone makes you wonder, what cynical marketing executive thought this was
00:34a good idea?
00:40A movie built entirely around smiley faces you send in text messages? Yes, it is as terrible
00:46as it sounds, but too many folks let their morbid curiosity get the better of them.
00:59Having made quadruple its budget back at the box office, the Emoji Movie signified the start
01:04of marketing movies, films made entirely for the sake of raising brand awareness for a
01:08product at the expense of creativity.
01:13Don't get us wrong, it is important to consider what audiences you might be catering to, but
01:17in the case of the Emoji Movie, the awful writing and obscene product placement show where the
01:21priorities were during production.
01:26game over.
01:399. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Parts 1 and 2
01:41Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Parts 1 and 2
01:50For most people, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows was the epic inclusion to an extensive
01:54story we had been growing up with for over a decade.
01:58For others, it indicated the start of a new greedy business practice for movie distributors
02:02to exercise the necessity of splitting movies into multiple parts.
02:05Now, there is a case to be made here that Deathly Hallows was a massive book and was the end
02:23of Harry Potter, so sure, make a big two-parter to cap off the story.
02:27But soon after, other distributors started taking on parts and chapters to movies that
02:31should have been one-offs, looking at you, The Hunger Games Mockingjay, Twilight Breaking
02:36Dawn and Spider- Across the Spider-Verse.
02:428.
02:43Ready Player One
02:52In the world of movies, Ready Player One was the death of the cameo in Easter Eggs.
02:57To compensate for the mediocre plot, Ready Player One was loaded with all kinds of characters
03:02from across movies, television, and video games.
03:14However, they were all just… there.
03:17No purpose in the story, no meaning behind their inclusion, just here's Iron Giant standing
03:22next to Tracer from Overwatch and the Mortal Kombat characters.
03:25Since then, cameos and easter eggs just get put in for the sake of easy fan service and
03:30it's gotten even more excessive in popular IPs like Star Wars, Marvel, DC Comics, and
03:35way, way more.
03:37You think I'm a corporate asshole, that I don't appreciate pop culture, but man, that's
03:42not true.
03:437.
03:44Twilight
03:45How did you get over to me so fast?
03:47I was standing right next to you, Bella.
03:50No, you were next to your car, across the lot.
03:54Remember the flood of movies we saw in the late 2000s and early 2010s that were adapted from
03:59books aimed at teens and tweens?
04:01Well, we have Twilight to blame for that.
04:03Oh, you do smell good.
04:05Alice, what are you?
04:07It's okay.
04:08Bella and I are going to be great friends.
04:10The angsty vampire romance combined with the constant success of the Harry Potter movies
04:14caused many studios to worry about missing out on a possible gold mine.
04:18And so we saw almost every mainstream young adult book get a movie deal the second it published.
04:24The Maze Runner, Jumper, Divergent, and Percy Jackson all fought for the next wave of attention
04:29from the masses.
04:30Some got another movie or two, others never returned, and the chase for the next popular
04:34young adult novel continues to this day.
04:36Bella won't be out too late tonight, you're just going to play baseball with my family.
04:40Baseball?
04:41Yes, sir, that's the plan.
04:436.
04:44Transformers
04:45If you've ever wondered why people weren't keen on Transformers for a while, you can blame
05:00it on Michael Bay's first Transformers flick.
05:02Audiences flock to the theater for this one, only to be met with a bland story driven entirely
05:06by overly detailed CGI.
05:16Movie studios took note of this and immediately began abandoning practical effects in favor
05:20of excessively using CGI.
05:22Unfortunately, this wave of spectacle driven blockbusters has not slowed down much over the
05:27years.
05:28We still see plenty of big budget films made almost entirely in front of a blue screen.
05:33So much so, that more movies are forgetting the true beauty we can be using in the real
05:37world with real materials and real scenes.
05:40Just look at Five Nights at Freddy's.
05:425.
05:43The Avengers
05:44You and me, we stay here on the ground, we keep the fighting here.
05:58The Avengers
05:59The Avengers was the first superhero movie with a major ensemble and a ton of financial backing
06:07from Marvel and its partners.
06:09And it turned out to be an insanely great movie.
06:12Unfortunately, too many movie studios desperately tried to copy its blueprint and failed miserably.
06:17Everything has to be a crossover, everything has to have a world ending conflict, and everything
06:22has to be the start of the next MCU.
06:24What they fail to realize is that the movies that led up to the Avengers, Iron Man, Captain
06:26America, The First Avenger, and Thor were all great films on their own.
06:30There was a reason audiences cared about the Avengers, and it wasn't because, ooh, pretty
06:47world with lots of exposition and special effects.
06:514.
06:52Alice in Wonderland
06:53Those who bemoan the trend of live action Disney remakes will point blame at many different
07:13at many different movies.
07:14It's Lilo and Stitch's Fart, no, it's Aladdin's Fart, no, The Lion King was the
07:19start of that downfall, no, it's actually Maleficent.
07:22If you really want to go back to when this started, it began with Alice in Wonderland.
07:36For just a couple hundred million dollars in investment, the movie brought in over a
07:40billion big bucks for Disney.
07:42I told the company, hey, people want us to milk this stuff, and now some feel the House
07:46of Mouse is a sequel mill and remake factory.
07:49What little originality remains gets little to no attention.
07:563.
07:57Jurassic World Much like Ghostbusters, it seems like the movie
08:06industry cannot move past the original Jurassic Park in 1993.
08:10Ever since the Lost World sequel in 1997, the Jurassic Park franchise has been on a steep
08:15decline in quality.
08:17Jurassic World was apparently good enough for audiences to give Universal a ton of undeserved
08:27box office receipts, and they continue to do so.
08:31No matter how awful the next sequel is, people keep showing up and giving more and more money.
08:37At what point do we realize that we should be asking if we SHOULD make Jurassic Park sequels
08:43instead of if we COULD make them?
08:45Right, Dr. Malcolm?
08:46Yeah, but your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, they didn't
08:50stop to think if they SHOULD.
08:512.
08:52Avatar
08:53There is something to be said about Avatar's enigmatic popularity given how long its story
09:01wallows around and how captivating and immersive its world is.
09:05But what Avatar really ignited was the notion of 3D becoming the future of cinema.
09:09So many movie studios bought into the idea that they needed to match the visual fidelity
09:14and 3D effects Avatar showcased, for whatever reason.
09:27And surprise, surprise, none of them really justified the extra cost of display in IMAX
09:323D.
09:33The movies that followed felt cheap and gimmicky and soon enough everyone went back to watching
09:37movies the way they have been for years, and years, and years before.
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10:081.
10:09Heaven's Gate
10:13If we could rename Heaven's Gate to reflect its impact on the filmmaking industry, we'd
10:19call it the day the auteur died.
10:21Director Michael Cimino caused a lot of problems throughout production in order to achieve his
10:26perfect vision.
10:27So much so that the budget went four times over its initial amount.
10:31But people always get thirsty after a funeral.
10:33I'm not about to sit and watch the grass grow and there's money that he made.
10:40The critical reception was not kind and wound up scaring tons of movie studios in the process.
10:45It didn't help that the film was a major player in United Artists filing for bankruptcy.
10:50Cimino's big blunder showed studios that there was no reason to give directors complete creative
10:55control and so began the practice of corporate meddling and entertainment, with some exceptions
10:59here and there.
11:09Was there another movie you feel has contributed to the downward quality in modern films?
11:13Let us know down in the comments below and don't forget to subscribe to watch mojo video.
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