What a month May has been! Spider-man III opens and breaks records, Shrek III opens and breaks records, then Pirates of the Caribbean III opens. I think it has broken records. Such widely diverse movies - what could the possibly have in common?

Look, sequels are a fact of life. Show business is different than a lot of businesses in a lot of ways, but the biggest one is every time they put out a product it’s hugely expensive, has a limited shelf life, and it could sink like a stone on opening day. It’s risky. Sequels are the closest thing a studio has to a guaranteed return on investment. Sequels are the treasury bonds of the movie game.

As a result, sequel strategy has become as predictable as sequels themselves. Before you even make your movie, lock the talent up for sequels so they can’t renegotiate if it takes off. The second you know you’re doing well, announce a trilogy. As much as possible, have the sequels be remakes of the original - same conflicts, same story arcs. It’s permissible to make the second film darker than the other two though, because it helps propel the happy ending in the third.

Or you might be making a series, like the James Bond films. Then, think long haul. Try to top your self with each movie, but not too much because by the tenth picture you’re screwed. Bond is an interesting case, because it’s been around so long that they have recast the lead character 6 times, and even completely restarted the story with this last one.

Yes, restarted the story. This is the tricky part of remaking the same movie over and over again; you have a pact with the audience that each movie is just another chapter in the overarching story of this character. It’s like writing an enormous 3 act play, only you said eveything you wanted to say in the first act, and now they’re making you write it again twice plus add the illusion that progress is being made.

I have a lot of sympathy for the people throwing the sequels around, because making movies is supposed to be fun, and sequels are pure drudgery. Especially the ones we’ve just seen. We both missed Spidey, but my wife saw Shrek III and says it’s just tired. Pirates, which we caught this last weekend, was all set-pieces and no story. My brain was screaming ENOUGH ALREADY about half an hour into it and it didn’t stop all the way to the bombastic yet unsatisfying ending. It was a case where they definitely devoted more time to topping themselves than they should have.

Look, as a consumer of entertainment you can’t ignore sequels. You’re pretty much going to see them whether you think they’re a good idea or not. You have no choice. Just go in knowing why they’re made, and learn to appreciate whatever flashes of creativity the filmmakers manage to sneak in.

I don’t know why they all have to be so damn long though.

This entry was posted on Sunday, May 27th, 2007 at 1:54 pm and is filed under General, Motion Pictures. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.