Genre Films and Disney.

Is religion the opiate of the people as Marx said?" Or are Genre films the opiate of the people? Genre films have a long known tradition for being massive products with no interest to better-cultivated moviegoers and film critics. According to Judith Hess Wright, Genre films—such as the western, the horror, the gangster and the science fiction, to which I would include the romantic comedy and the musical—have been the “most popular products (and thus the most lucrative) to emerge from the machinery of the American film industry.” (p. 41) Without a doubt Hollywood industry is the most powerful film industry in the world, only followed by Bollywood. This big corporation industry, as any other corporation, has only one main priority: make money.

It’s known that these kinds of films are the main studios way of making money. But, in recent years Hollywood products have become extremely repetitive and monotonous to the point where there is complete lack of creativity and it’s becoming almost a line production system, like a car factory. Lately, many of the big Hollywood studios have been using the same kind of formulas they have been using for years, the same romantic comedies and the same actions films as always, which just shows that Hollywood is still the same.

However, there is still hope. Independent brands of studios (which don’t really fall into the independent category any more) are making films that can be more interesting and are opening doors as they are making people more open minded about their interest and raising the bar for quality film making.

On a side note, the Disney article we read this week, regardless o how well criticize it was and how right it is, I agree with Alex and how kids are looking at the bigger picture. When I was reading this article, although I was very aware of the issues that were being raised, what was going through my head was the music soundtrack when I was reading some of the lyrics that were written in the article; and instead of paying attention to the article I was focusing on how much I used to like these films and still do and no matter what was being said, it took me back to my childhood and the good times I had when I saw these films.