Theaters are Back! And the Issue with Netflix's Algorithmic Approach
Algorithmic vs word of mouth recommendations, current theatrical releases, bonus content
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Theaters are back in business (and with more original IP)
One of the things I missed the most during the pandemic was going to the movies. It’s nice to have them back. 2021 was a fairly lackluster year for theatrical releases, both in quality and the box office. While we still got the typical franchise releases, such as Spider Man: No Way Home and Shang-Chi, prestige titles that made the festival circuit seemed to have been mainly sold to streamers (CODA, Power of the Dog). Even larger franchise films (The Matrix) were released on streaming services day-and-date, cannibalizing their box office performances. My favorite films last year included both franchise films and originals but on any given weekend it seemed like the choices were scarce. While the future distribution model remains unclear (will day-and-date releases become more normalized?), it’s nice to see theaters with a healthy variety of options again.
In the past month, I’ve gone to theaters three separate times to see movies I genuinely wanted to see, something I wasn’t able to do at any point in 2021 (I’ll discuss later on my thoughts on each of them). It’s great to see original IP back in theaters again. While I love watching special effects on the big screen as much as the next person, there’s something to be said about watching a totally original piece of work in a room filled with people. Everyone is self-aware and probably trying to read the room like you are. Like any live event (concerts, Broadway shows, etc.), being connected to people who share the same short-term goal of enjoying what’s in front of them just hits different. I’ll manifest a wish that the industry seems to be against: original IP still belongs in theaters.
The Netflix crash proves consumers want curation, not made-to-order content
My last post was about the forces that currently drive the industry. Streaming companies are trying to adapt to consumer demand by providing them with more content, faster, while filmmakers are trying to preserve the last remnants of artistic integrity they have. They also want their movies to be shown in theaters instead of straight to home viewing. Netflix, the pioneer of the streaming movement, has shed some blood in recent weeks after their earnings announcement 2 weeks ago. As they revealed that they lost subscribers, their stock price proceeded to plummet by 35%. This was followed by hasty announcements that they were going to start cracking down on password sharing and create an advertising tier. In my prior post, I outlined how Netflix created a product that consumers wanted, starting with home video delivery and then transitioning to internet-enabled streaming services. It’s implied that consumer demand was singularly to blame for their one-track high growth strategy. I left out an important piece of the puzzle, Wall Street. Matthew Belloni puts it very well in his piece on Netflix’s post-crash identity crisis:
But here’s the truth: none of that stuff is Netflix’s fault. The $17 billion in annual content spend, the firehose creative strategy, the soul-crushing culture, the entire philosophy of business—Wall Street made that happen. Wall Street identified Netflix as the key disruptor, the first major mover in subscription streaming. And Wall Street lavished on Netflix a rocketing share price that enabled it to load up on debt and spend without consequence. That allowed Hastings and Sarandos not just to shoot for total domination, but also to dictate strategy to the entire industry, to change decades-old business practices, to muscle Netflix into the M.P.A., to collect huge personal salaries and write the management-advice book and go ahead and buy the Montecito property.
Netflix was tagged as the Streaming Wars’ golden child. Now that other players have caught on, Netflix is left in the dust, picking up the pieces and wondering how they got there. Now they’re trying to make up for it by making rushed decisions that they should have made a long time ago.
The one lesson to be had here is that consumers are not just data points. Netflix is notorious for its data-driven algorithm, their secret sauce. They tag all of their content based on certain traits (cerebral, witty, dark humor) and separate us into cohorts based on what we watch, how fast we watch, and what time of day we watch. They claim to know our taste profiles. On any given day, most people are probably looking to watch something they haven’t seen before and the algorithm is designed to recommend something else on their platform. Filmed content; however, is an area where I think word of mouth discovery is still way more efficient at finding something you’d like than algorithmic discovery. Most of the films I’ve really enjoyed were recommended by close friends, who can provide more tailored recommendations based on your personality. Others were discovered through social platforms like Letterboxd or Reddit. The problem with Netflix’s algorithmic approach is it fuels the content engine to the point where there is too much out there for every single taste profile. Most of the content gets buried among an unlimited amount of choices and most of the films and shows are unmemorable.
Everything Everywhere All at Once: Maximalist filmmaking at its best
Right after the credits rolled, the first thought I had when I left the theater was “this movie was a lot”, and that’s not necessarily a bad thing. How the directors were able to maneuver this film in so many different directions, from the multiple Wong Kar-wai homages to blending a variety of genres together, and still have everything make sense in the end is very impressive. There were so many times when I thought this movie was on the brink of falling apart, yet it was able to maintain its composure throughout, redefining what’s possible to fit into a storyboard.
Daniel Kwan (1/2 of Daniels, the director duo) is a self-described maximalist filmmaker. He describes in a Twitter thread his struggles with creating a film that has so much packed into it in a society that places an emphasis on minimalism:
So much discussion around "important" art is usually focused on minimalism/restraint, subtlety/nuance. But I'm now realizing there is a place for work like ours, especially in a world where there is too much to process, maybe maximalist art is essential to meeting this moment. Often, artistic expression requires minimalism. But that approach can also lead to essentializing, marginalizing, & excluding for the sake of making the art "clean", but to the detriment of whatever/whoever gets cut out. It feels like analyzing data with an incomplete dataset. It took me until recently to decouple "subtlety" from "nuance". While our work does not have much subtlety, we are always searching for nuance. Subtlety is a volume knob turned low, while Nuance is naming new sounds no one has heard before. There is no reason they have to be conjoined. I am learning that we are allowed to be nuanced with a jackhammer. We can discover new liminal feelings no one has ever named before and scream those names from the top of mountains. If we've discovered something beautiful & nuanced... why should we hide it in subtlety?
It seems obvious that a multiverse-themed movie would be maximalist. Other films such as Spiderman: Into the Spider-verse and Doctor Strange take a similar approach. What’s interesting about Everything Everywhere is that while it meanders into so many uncharted territories, it remains anchored by its primary theme: love is multidimensional. This theme is conveyed through the concept of family and the interconnectedness of the multiverse itself. You can’t choose your family; you’re bound together through your lineage. Yet no matter how frustrating your children or your parents become, there is always a human desire to gravitate towards each other. Mistakes are easier to forgive, and apologies come quicker. But sometimes both of those can take more time. Even if a family member does something inexcusable, you at least still think about them and the scenarios that would need to happen to rekindle the relationship later on in life. The most impactful quote for me is when Waymond says to Evelyn, “so, even though you have broken my heart yet again, I wanted to say, in another life, I would have really liked just doing laundry and taxes with you.” Love can be complicated, especially when it involves people who you don’t have freewill to love.
Beyond the wildly original story, there is also so much to celebrate with the release of this film. This film will go down as an excellent case study in word of mouth’s impact on the box office. Two primary metrics that define how word of mouth impacts a film’s performance are its box office multiple (total gross / opening weekend) and week over week box office declines. Jumanji is a film that I remember with an unusually high domestic box office multiple of 11.2x. For context, the Avengers had a 3.0x multiple. In today’s market where the majority of people who are ever going to see a film will do so on opening weekend, Jumanji was an outlier as more families took their kids to see the movie weeks after it was released after hearing about it from others. Everything Everywhere, as an indie film, had a slow rollout so this metric wouldn’t be helpful (there were few screens opening weekend) but we can look at its week to week declines as an indicator. It dropped 0% in its 6th week post release! As an original, diversity-driven film with a sub $30 million budget, this is almost unheard of in modern filmmaking. The future of indie film is in good hands.
Speaking of, diversity is another reason to celebrate this film. As an Asian American, it’s a pleasant surprise that we live in a time where we see can western-made films with primarily Asian casts. Crazy Rich Asians was the modern pioneer for Asian American representation in cinema. Its success, both critically and in the box office, proved that there was sufficient demand for these types of films and others such as Minari, Shang-Chi, and Turning Red quickly followed. Even in TV, the demand for internationally produced and sourced Korean shows (Squid Game) has led to homegrown series being made such as Pachinko. It’s gotten to the point where I personally feel well-represented and seen in the media. The best case scenario is that this paves the way for other under represented groups to get their moment as Hollywood realizes that diversity translates well for box office success.
The Northman: A grisly Viking fable that mirrors Hamlet
After loving The Witch and leaving the theater disappointed with The Lighthouse, I came out of those two films as a Robert Eggers fan. You don’t necessarily need to like every movie a director has made to appreciate their approach to filmmaking. After watching each of his films, I always asked myself, “who is this person?”. The child of an actress who also owned a children’s theater company, he once loved musicals and comic books. But as an adult, he now has a taste for the macabre and can write in fluent old English. The 180 degree trajectory makes you wonder what happened to him as a child to influence his current state. In the New Yorker profile on him, he says “currently, with my best intentions, like, I’m not normal. I look like a poster boy for a Bushwick hipster, but that is where my relatability ends, I fear.” He later describes artists who influenced his more cynical view on life, one of which is the modernist painter Hyman Bloom, whose paintings are influenced by the occult and supernatural beings. The paintings are vivid, sometimes very grotesque, feature demons, and often analyze death. He met Bloom through an art exhibit that his parents took him to when he was 10 years old and they instantly formed a mentor / mentee relationship that carried on for many years to come. The primary message I took home from this story is how important your formative years are in crafting your personality and worldview. Everything you consume at that age has profoundly more impact on your brain and that diminishes the older you get. The secondary message is that Eggers is indeed not relatable. What a strange, strange upbringing.
Needless to say, when I saw that Eggers was set to make a higher budget film about the Vikings, it went straight to my most anticipated movie of 2022. Yet the film isn’t for everyone. Paul Schrader (filmmaker and writer of Taxi Driver) said:
Northman reminded me of Mel Gibson’s Apocalypto. More a terrific NatGeo supplement (I buy them every time) than a reason to go to the movies
I understand what Schrader is trying to say, yet I think he’s being overly harsh. The film does transports you into the world of what it was like in that era, but its themes are what drive the film forward. The story itself isn’t very original and the character development isn’t fully fleshed out. But that isn’t necessarily what Eggers is known for. His films are deeply atmospheric and rooted in mythology, often blurring the lines between the supernatural, fantasy, and reality. Most of the time they are just plain weird, mostly in a good way but sometimes he gets a little lost in his own obsessions. While his films can be considered period pieces, they don’t just document the time period, they also touch on themes that are present today. The film comments a lot on the concept of male heroism. And while we don’t need any more films about toxic masculinity and the pitfalls of too much testosterone, perhaps those concepts are ultimately proved to be futile in the end. The revenge at all costs scenario doesn’t exactly leave the world in a better place. Is revenge something that you seek for your own satisfaction or to balance the justice scale?
The Northman may be Eggers most commercially relatable film yet, but don’t anticipate a war movie. It has plenty of action but that’s not the focus of the film. It’s gritty and violent, the landscapes are beautifully shot (with a wide aspect ratio), and the score is something you’ll play in your head days after you’ve seen the movie.
The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent: Refreshing a film trope that’s easy to mess up
Playing or writing a fictionalized version of yourself in a film has been endlessly explored in the past. The two most memorable examples for me are Adaptation and Being John Malkovich. Often, the primary mistake that those films make is being too attached to the gimmick. I certainly enjoyed those two films but primarily because their creativity and stories made up for their other faults. Massive Talent acknowledges the pompousness upfront, starting with the sarcastic title. I can’t think of a better actor to have the plot centered on than Nic Cage. My last post alluded to his desperation in taking on off-brand films in the hopes of paying down his debt. It wasn’t until after it published that I found out about this movie, which has its roots based off of his current real life situation. The best parts of the movie revolve around the bromance between Pedro Pascal’s and Nicolas Cage’s characters. This is a perfect movie to watch when you want pure entertainment and not have to think too hard. It’s a good addition to Nicolas Cage’s comeback tour - not that he went anywhere.
Bonus Content: Rothaniel
If you only have an hour this weekend and you want to watch something that’s emotionally resonant, raw, and funny at the same time, watch Rothaniel. I’m not someone who watches a ton of comedy specials, but this is the best one I’ve seen since Bo Burnham’s Inside (it was also directed by Bo himself). The headlines will focus on this being the special where Jerrod Carmichael comes out, but it’s about so much more than just that. It also comments on multi-generational trauma and opportunities for second chances. Maybe you need one or maybe you’re waiting to give one to someone else.
It’s hard to remember a time when I thought the directing in a comedy special actually made a difference, but in Rothaniel, it was very noticeable. The closeup shots and the color contrasts provide a sense of intimacy that make you feel like you’re there at the Blue Note in West Village, as Carmichael shares a moment of vulnerability that took years and substantial courage for him to come to terms with.
Am also 1/2 for Eggers films. The Witch was weird but in a good way. Lighthouse was weird but in a very bad way. Excited to check out his latest.