“We’re saving Hollywood,” said Netflix CEO Ted Sarandos in an interview with Variety, speaking on Netflix’s impact on movies. “Folks grew up thinking, ‘I want to make movies on a gigantic screen and have strangers watch them [and to have them] play in the theater for two months, and people cry, and sold-out shows’ … It’s an outdated concept.”
There is no doubt that filmmaking can be a commodity. This is not an innately-bad thing; it is the dream of any artist to support themselves as a virtue of the success of their art. After all, the “film industry” is still an industry. Yet, there is a tremendous epidemic in contemporary cinema, where filmmaking is seen exclusively for its value as a product to be sold, with little regard for a work’s intrinsic value as a piece of expressionism, politics, or entertainment. This plague extends all the way up to directors that may seem untouchable, like John Waters, David Lynch, Elaine May, Frances Ford Coppola, or Martin Scorsese. It begs the question: if directors who are part of the canon of modern-film history struggle to secure funding, what exactly makes a film worth funding?
“[Lynch] came into Netflix to pitch a limited series which we jumped at,” Sarandos said in an Instragram-tribute to the late auteur Lynch. “It was a David Lynch production, so [the project was] filled with mystery and risks, but we wanted to go on this creative ride with this genius … Some health uncertainties lead to this project never being produced but we made it clear that as soon as he was able, we were all in.”
A year before his passing, Lynch confirmed that Netflix rejected his passion project of over 20 years. Lynch indicated that this personal creative initiative, an animated film titled “Snootworld,” was his only work in development. In an interview with Indiewire, Lynch said “Just recently I thought someone might be interested in getting behind [“Snootworld”], so I presented it to Netflix in the last few months, but they rejected it.” “Snootworld” would have been Lynch’s first feature film since 2006’s “Inland Empire,” and his first work since “Twin Peaks: The Return” in 2017.
Sarandos is not alone in rejecting these types of theatrical releases. Martin Scorsese’s latest film, “Killers of the Flower Moon,” was distributed by Apple TV+ and received no physical release. Apple TV+’s decision to keep the film exclusively available to their digital platform makes it the first Scorsese film to not receive aftermarket distribution — even in spite of several advances from the Criterion Collection, the premier physical media publisher for revivalist and arthouse film. This is a broad representation of the goals of Apple TV+ and many streamers alike: to hoard film distribution from iconic directors under the guise that they are artists-first companies, but limit the films accessibility to attract subscribers. This, I believe, is consequential of a colloquial upheaval towards in-home content consumption which has been facilitated by streamers intentionally. It is advantageous, it is greedy, and by all means, it must come to an end.
Although this issue is recent as of the streaming age, it is not uncommon. In an interview with IndieWire, filmmaker Waters said no studio had “a penny of the budget” to fund his already-written film “Liarmouth,” based off of his best-selling novel of the same title. Likewise, Coppola spent more than 40 years attempting to fund and produce “Megalopolis,” which he ultimately financed independently by starting his own wine brand. May, an actress and director, can’t seem to fund her fifth and final film, “Crackpot,” without an “insurance director,” despite the film already having big-name talent Dakota Johnson and Sebastian Stan attached. Even auteurs who can get funding from studios, such as director Greta Gerwig, have trouble maintaining the artistic integrity of their works. Recently, Gerwig has had to fight Netflix for several months to distribute her upcoming remake of “Narnia” to theaters. Even so, the film will only be distributed for a two-week window.
It’s evident that most major studios’ prerogatives are based on financial success or gaining prestige, regardless of the quality a film may have. “We have to [give movies theatrical releases for] qualification for the Oscars,” said Sarandos. “But I’ve tried to encourage every director we work with to focus on the consumer.”
Art is inherently political, and art is inherently representative of its maker. In its simplest essence, art proves the existence of an ideology, a circumstance, or a technological revolution. The French New Wave was a reflection of the bubbling civil unrest across France post-war. VistaVision’s advancements in aspect ratios was necessitated as a response to Technicolor’s vibrance. American-naturalist films followed the postmodern uncoupling of suburban standards in the seventies. Whilst other “eras” of cinema are defined by technological advancements or political expressions, we are in the first era of filmmaking defined solely by commercialization.
“It’s a different world now,” said Lynch, “and it’s easier to say no than to say yes.”
