wco81

Went to see Bend it like Beckham, which was enjoyable enough. But the plot and the cultural/familial conflicts and the happy resolution seemed familiar. A kind of deja vu because of similarities with a film like Billy Elliot.

To make matters worse, there were previews for Whale Rider and Han ni zai yiki, two upcoming films which also appear to be "ethnic" feel-good movies about children overcoming cultural obstacles to be virtuosos.

All these films, except maybe Billy Elliot, are distributed in this country by Fox Searchlight, which is described as the "a filmmaker-oriented company, creating distinctive films helmed by world-class auteurs and exciting newcomers" (www.foxsearchlight.com/aboutus/).

Now I'm not sure if Searchlight just acquired the US distribution rights to these films after their success in Europe or if they financed it as well, meaning they may have exercised some creative control over their development. But they do feature directors like Chadha as if they're a boutique which nurtures these "world-class auteurs and exciting newcomers."

But if they did have control over the making of these films, it could explain the similarities they seem to have. Billy Elliott just had to make this audition because it was going to change his entire life. Similarly, Jess has to play in this specific game or else she wouldn't have gotten a scholarship (if she was that good, she would have gotten other opportunities, no?). Of course, they overcome the odds and succeed, the feel-good happy ending that people associate with Hollywood.

Ironic, considering that a lot of the audience for indie and foreign films eschew Hollywood formulas like happy endings. Or maybe not so ironic or unexpected when you consider that it's a part of a Hollywood studio that is distributing these films.

I don't mean to single out Fox Searchlight, since they do have a part in directors like Boyle and Bertolucci being able to continue making films. I'm sure the other major studios like Disney (Miramax) also are involved heavily in indie and foreign films, perhaps having pernicious influence on this market. And it could be that films like Beckham aren't being directly shaped to some proven formula as much as indie directors are consciously or unconsciously mimicking other indie films which have found international distribution and success.

But Fox is still owned by Murdoch whose unrelenting drive to dominate all markets seems to suggest that Fox Searchlight is about "Cinema, cinema" as much as the film crew was in Man Bites Dog.

angryyoungman

Aren't you really just saying that Fox Searchlight doesn't really take any real risks with the independent films they buy and distribute? Is this really any surprise?

This doesn't mean we should sound the death knell for independent film, and certainly doesn't mean that independent film in general is becoming for formulaic. Just because Fox Searchlight and some other pseudo-art house subsidiaries of major studios may only be buying uninspired films doesn't mean exciting, original, or risky independent films aren't being made.

lesterlong

What he said. Basically, these foreign or "arthouse" films are commercial enough to sell to the public. They follow a specific genre. That doesn't mean they are the only foreign or arthouse films.

clemente

Exactly what angryyoungman said.

We've reached a point were there are major Hollywood releases and below that you have independant movies that have been acquired by indie branches of those major studios and have pretty large releases, obviously not multiple thousand screen releases, but numbering in the multiple hundreds.

These indie branches are pretty much intrested in the same thing their corporate brethen are, and that's getting lots of people to see there movie, so they've begun to take less chances.

It's not that indie movies have become formulaic, but those that the distributors have chosen to showcase may have become formulaic.

Pants

Furthermore, it's a tendancy in America to think foriegn=art. Bend it Like Beckham is a silly kids movie with enough to keep the adults happy. It played to tweens and teens in England and was a moderate hit. It's like the English equivelent of Holes. It's a good genre piece, but not art. Same thing with Billy Elliot.

So called "indie" studios (that are really just branches of major multinational media conglomerates) would prefer to release a piece of genre junk that has the aire of art because there are accents, then to release something that's REALLY ARTY.

Pants

But another issue that's often being addressed in critic circles is the fact that foriegn countries, weened on as much American junk as Americans are, are creating national cinema that, in the quest for success, is really the same as American cinema, with the same influences and market sensability. A director like Luc Besson is really making American films. His films are shot through with the same influences and asthetic. He likes to use Hollywood stars, comic book stories, special effects, etc. He's not a bad director, he just isn't uniquely french. He's a frenchman working in an American idiom, influenced more by Hawks and Spielberg than by Clouzot or Tavanier.

Yet in America he is considered a Foriegn director and therefore more artisticly conscious. The Fifth Element may be as dumb and artless as Johnny Mnemonic, but since a frenchman made it it must be ART!

wco81

Film production costs being what they are, it was only a matter of time before all the big studios went into indie film production.

Even though all these commercial indie and foreign films come from big media conglomerates, they make the various film festival circuit, which itself has become a part of the film business ecosystem.

The thing is, a lot of the market for foreign and indie films are upscale audiences, maybe with similar demographics as New Yorker subscribers. So there is money to draw in the big players. Indie filmmakers are going to be just as beholden to them as big-name directors (many of whom broke in making indie films) because of the money required to fund and distribute their films.

If for instance an in-depth film were to be made about Sikhs living in London, it would be a documentary and probably not that marketable or appealing to a wide audience.

wco81

I really doubt the people who generally view French films consider the Fifth Element as a French film.

Foreign filmmakers can't make Hollywood movies because of the costs involved. If they really want to make a typical Hollywood blockbuster, they'll probably try to get a deal in Hollywood rather than try to cobble together funding from 50 different European govt. agencies and several TV networks, which is how European films are often financed.

It's true that American films are popular everywhere. But there is certainly a market for differentiated films which are on a more human scale.

DRG

It's for those arthouse wannabe moviegoers... those people who are basically snobby Joe 6 Packs. They want to act like they're into 'classy' stuff, but they really have no knowledge of film. It's like when 'My Big Fat Greek Wedding' finally opened here. It had already made about $100 million at this point. I overheard people talking about it as if they were indie pioneers. "We saw this movie... you probably haven't heard of it... I heard it'll be up for many awards. It's an independent movie, you should really see it." I just had to shake my head.

Pants

Tell me about it. Monster's Ball anyone?

Groucho

I agree with the original poster. I'm getting a little tired of gay cowboys eatting pudding.

wendersfan

I think I have my new sig...

Just to reiterate everything that's been said, the idea that something 'exotic' is somehow more artistic or obscure is silly. Jim Jarmusch and David Lynch are much more self-consciously arty than John Woo or Tom Twyker, in fact, they are about as arty as anyone in the world. Look at it this way - vegetable tempura isn't really any different than onion rings or fried mushrooms, but since you get tempura at a Japanese restaurant and not Fridays it's somehow considered more "highbrow", when it's really just deep fried vegetables.

Pants

wendersfan- It's an honor to be in your sig

wendersfan

Well, imagine my amazement when last night at dinner my wife stated her favorite director was Luc Besson...

Pants

Grounds for divorce if there ever was any.

Pants

Here are some great example of what I'm talking about:

Amelie
Brotherhood of the Wolf
Open Your Eyes
Ringu
Run Lola Run
Wasabi

Some of these film are great and some are crap, but they are all far more influenced by American/Hollywood films than by any of their own national identity. These are foriegn films being made in emulation of Hollywood in the hopes of capturing a popular audience.

Giles

what movie is that?

wendersfan

Pants, I agree with you, but the same charge could be leveled at Kurosawa (actually it was, in Japan) for making films heavily influenced by Shakespeare and John Ford, the French new wavers for deliberately paying homage to American "B-pictures", and for half the planet being influenced by Orson Welles and Alfred Hitchcock.

International cinema is a give and take situation, and truly 'national cinemas' are, for better or worse, largely a thing of the past. In my experience they have recently only happened in Third World countries and/or those with newly emergent cinemas.

Pants

It's one thing to be inspired by or to pay homage to another filmmaker or style, it's another to make a film that is clearly trying to emulate successful H'wood cookie cutter formulas.

Sure Truffaut loved and was influenced by Hitchcock, but would you call any of his films hitchcock-ian? There are subtle references and that's it. Truffaut never made a wrong man thriller.

As far as Kurosaw goes, adapting Shakespeare isn't "Hollywood" and I've never understood the John Ford comparisons. Ford was never apocalyptic. And Ford made films about rugged individuals, Kurosawa made films about communities of people.

I don't want to turn this into a "was such and such auteur really a Hollywood whore" arguement, because it's way off topic. But let's face it, when Godard payed homage to the Hollywood films of Minellie, Lang, and Chaplin it was to a much different effect than when whoever made Brotherhood of the Wolf payed endless homage to Spielberg, Carpenter, and the Wachowski Brothers. Godard didn't care about distribution and included the homages because he loved the films, BotW guy included them because he wanted a hit with American audiences.

joeydaninja

one of the problems of foreign films today was the success of The Full Monty and Billy Elliot. After that Working Title (which I think made both), just stuck with the formula. Unfortunately we were looking to foreign films to be an alternative to Hollywood, but I guess sometimes the lure of easy money is too tempting.

we're releasing our first movie in the States soon (we, meaning, as a country), called Small Voices (Munting Tinig). Unfortunately it also quite formulaic (which is why it is probably being distributed in the first place). But there is a certain "Philippineness" about it that I enjoy, that I'm not sure if everyone can appreciate. I hope people like it still though.

LivingINClip

hmm,...

For every one you named - there are other's that have not became more "American". I think the problem is, the one's you noted are ones that was honestly trying to be more of a mainstream success. Where as something like 'Battale Royal', 'Audition' and 'Ichi the Killer' would never be considered for a mainstream release in America.

Grimfarrow

There are a *lot* of foreign directors who are not trying to sell their movies for mainstream success. For every Luc Besson, there is a Tsai Ming-Liang. There are plenty of films which are not formulaic in the least. Abbas Kiarostami, Claire Denis, Bela Tarr, Aleksandr Sokurov, Kiyoshi Kurosawa, Fruit Chan, Michael Haneke, Gasper Noe, the list goes on.

Part of the problem, though, is that most of the directors above and distributed very limitedly (Kiarostami, Claire Denis). Worse is those whose works are not even released in theaters in the US (Bela Tarr, Fruit Chan).

pro-bassoonist

....problem is all of the movies that you mentioned "were" mainstream non-Anglo productions. Furthermore....that's why they were available in the US. Because they were "easy" to assimilate by the american viewer.

...no question about the fact that European cinema for example creates tons of junk (just as Hollywood does)....problem is that there are tons of quality European films that never make it to American soil because their audience is different. With other words....they could be viewed as "elitist" productions by many americans (remember the "sub-issue and the regular moviegoer)

I can name at least 20 movies from the last 6-8 months that were a major success in Europe, non-mainstream by Hollywood-esque standards, that will not appear on US shores.....

...your statement above scratches only the surface of the issue...

Supermallet

I have to agree with wendersfan and pro-basoonist on this issue. Yes, there are filmmakers from other countries who make films like American filmmakers, or who actually come to Hollywood to make movies. But then again, Billy Wilder was German and came to America to make American movies because he loved American movies. Sergio Leone made spaghetti westerns because he was so enamored with American westerns, etc. Regardless of whether you think Kurosawa actually IS like Ford, the fact is that the Japanese thought that he was too western. And yet, in the west, he is the most beloved Japanese filmmaker. Why is that? Because he took more from western idioms than other Japanese filmmakers of the time. And what about Polanski? He's a very "European" director, and yet has had tremendous success in America.

And I don't see how you can say that Amelie isn't a French movie. It's so French. Rather, it's so Parisian. Jeunet even said he wanted to create a movie that took place in the mythical Paris that he misses so much when he's away from home. You could make a movie with the same plot that took place in LA or New York or London, but it wouldn't have exactly the same feel.

And there are tons of American filmmakers who are influenced by international filmmakers. Wire-fu is just one example.

International cinema is a closed circuit. People see movies from around the world and are influenced by different things in those movies.

But yes, American studios aren't going to take many risks in releasing foreign or indie films.