Acorn

Issue date: 2/8/08 Section: Opinion

Media Credit: Desiree Hykes

The endangered princess flees down the corridor. The good doctor concocts a last-second cure. The young lovers reunite in the hidden sanctuary. Ordeals are overcome, temptations resisted, battles fought, escapes made!

But it doesn't matter, because they're all dead anyway.

The senseless slaughter of protagonists is one of those great cinematic traditions that make up the foundation for today's Hollywood movie.

Take three pounds of tragic sacrifice, one ounce of ironic foreshadowing and a spoonful of somber soundtrack. Vigorously stir in a big greasy chunk of CGI and you've got a ready-made masterpiece on your hands. Bake for 90 minutes, and don't forget to dole out a nice sprinkle of cheesy dialogue on top. It's no longer simply acceptable, but imperative to kill off every last interesting character. Thrillers are supposed to be these big, brooding monstrosities, and what better way to underscore this inherent poignancy than by axing off those last few bearable people in unbearable ways?

This sort of robs the story of its dramatic impact. If you put off a resolution in favor of piling on the tension, you're left with a bunch of bumbling idiots stumbling through a hollow ending because the movie used up its steam half an hour before the credits roll.

Of course, inspiration-scavenging is an endemic disease and not limited to any one genre. Mix awkward scenario A with absent-minded/lovesick/unscrupulous/ethnically dissimilar hero B and you've got an instant recipe for comedic success-don't cinematography and Easy Mac have so much in common?

But mostly the dramatic holiday blockbusters are the culprits here.

After all, who needs justification for an arbitrary army of killer robots? It's worked before. Zombies?

Pick your flavor-speedy, sluggish or surly. An indiscriminately mutated creature or flock of creatures exhibiting sudden symptoms of aggression, rapid reproduction and/or gigantism? Sure, why not?

It's not like gratuitous special effects budgets are only strangling coherent storylines or anything.

And those same tired old franchises just won't die.

Generic action shooter? Yeah, I've seen that. Redundant fantasy epic? Check. That other monster flick? Only every time I turn around. These movies are sly bastards.

They lure you in with the promise of something new, prancing about with fancy ad campaigns and those damned catchy slogans that stick in your brain like superglue.

Continued...

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