If Only Charlie Was Right

I stumbled onto an article written by Charlie Wachtel over at "The Film Crusade" about the sorry state of Hollywood films today. He talks about how most Hollywood product is predictable and safe -- which is totally true; he then adds "This 'anti-risk Hollywood' is not only dangerous to the industry itself, but it will most certainly fail."

If only Charlie was right.

H. L. Mencken -- one of my personal heroes -- sagely advised that a person would never go broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public. He was right and Hollywood has embraced that sentiment for decades upon decades -- and made bazillion dollars in the process.

I see around 150 movies a year and I cannot tell you the last time I saw what I consider a great main-stream American film -- aside from classics like "Chinatown" or "Double Indemnity" which are decades old.

Nothing -- absolutely nothing -- comes to mind for an American film in the past few years -- except "Wall-E" and "Grey Gardens" (but that was made-for-cable). Foreign films, yes; independent films, yes. American films? No.

Charlie would be better off if he did (and I suspect he already does) as we do: spend his time and money on independent American films, or films made overseas.

Here are just a few newer films I have recently seen that I highly recommend:

"4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days" (foreign)
"The Aura" (foreign)
"District 9" (foreign)
"Grey Gardens" (American)
"In the Mood for Love" (foreign)
"The Lives of Others" (foreign)
"The Lookout" (independent)
"Nine Queens" (foreign)
"Persepolis" (foreign)
"Sleep Dealer" (foreign / independent)
"The Visitor" (independent)
"Wall-E" (American)

You can read his entry here.