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FacebookThe Girlfriend informed me there’s a Robocop sequel in the works (scheduled to come out 2010). Do you/I/we need further proof that the movie industry is driven by sequels? Robocop is so 80s. Yes, it had a strong fanbase (in the 80s)…but it’s not like any of the movies were good. Sure, the premise was amusing and the first film was tolerable–but no one is out there clamoring for a “Robocop 4.” Yes, I know people will see it because moviegoers are stupid and will seeing anything with a number in the title (I have a friend who saw “Hellboy 2” even thought he skipped the original). But if you show me one person whose life is incomplete without another Robocop movie–someone not living in their parent’s basement or sharing any of the characteristics of Comic Book Guy–I’ll show you someone who is a completely useless part of our society. Another Robocop…I’m appalled.
My brother will vehemently disagree with me on this one, but I hate montages in movies. They really offer nothing for plot forwarding, humor, or entertainment value. Montages are nothing but time-fillers. They’re used to motivate the audience and manipulate feel-good emotions when the filmmaker has no substance to put into his film.
That’s not to say every movie that has a montage in it is crap. I just feel that a montage is a cheap copout for filmmakers. Montages don’t tell a story. In some cases it can be used to show the passage of time; but more often than not montages are unnecessary and come off like cheap music videos.
A few years ago I went to go see the “Flight of the Phoenix” remake in theaters. It was a January movie so I should’ve known better, but my buddy and I were bored. The movie was absolutely terrible–but that’s not what I want to discuss. There was a montage in the movie where the survivors all worked hard to repair the plane while listening to OutKast’s “Hey Ya!” I remember really feeling pumped up and energized by that scene because I liked the song; I didn’t realize I was manipulated to feel that way. The song had nothing to do with the movie. It was merely a hit song at the time and the only thing I liked about the sequence was the music. And that’s exactly what I mean by calling a montage a cheap ploy.
I don’t remember the running time of “Phoenix,” but I know Hollywood uses montages to stretch out the length of a film. The worst, most blatant use of montage-stretching I’ve ever seen was in “Rocky IV.” The move was a hour and a half long and if you take out the montages, it probably cuts film down to 17 minutes of actual dialogue. The movie was filled with four-minute montages followed by two minutes of dialogue followed by another four-minute montage. Sylvester Stallone seemed more obsessed with promoting bad 80s music and directing music videos than making a decent movie (add me the endless list of people who bash “Rocky IV” on the internet). I watched that movie a few years ago and couldn’t believe how terribly bad it was. “Rocky IV” has to be the “Citizen Kane” of crap.
Even with those over-the-top montages.