Archive for 2025

February 2, 2025

THE DEATH OF THE MOVIE STAR,  and the Death of Hollywood:

Before Hollywood figured out how to sell you a movie you didn’t want to see, way back in the old studio days when advertising a movie was as easy-breezy as sticking up a poster and few lobby cards at your local theater, you didn’t need to be sold a movie to take an interest. You just needed to be told it was coming. Because if it had a star you liked, you’d go.

That’s what a star was: a means to sell you a ticket.

In those days, the stars meant something; they told you something about the kind of movie it was going to be. Take All About Eve. What does it tell you, a filmgoer, in 1951, as you notice a poster in your local theater? It isn’t a sequel. You haven’t seen these characters before. It isn’t based on a hit book or play, just a short story you never heard of. Why should you buy a ticket? Bette Davis. Whether you love Bette Davis or not, you know what kind of experience a Bette Davis movie will be. Give or take some minor details, it’ll be the story of a hard woman brought down by love or softened up too late; a defiant and bitter woman whose booming voice says I don’t need a thing and whose big eyes, in the last reel, beg you to reconsider.

Intimately related, stars and genres were, in the studio years, instantly intelligible to movie audiences, but while no studio had the exclusive rights to any genre (no studio “owned” comedy), they did have the exclusive rights to say, Cary Grant or Carole Lombard, masters of comedy. “Stars were our insurance,” producer Hal Wallis said. A studio could own and sell that.

But first, they had to make that. Cary Grant, as we know, was born Archie Leach and Jean Arthur was Gladys Georgianna Greene. What accounts for their transformation? It was not by accident — it happens, much less often, today — but by dedicated though unscientific trial and error these and other film actors became stars. The triers and errers were the studios, the rights-holders, outfitting their contract players in dizzying variations of costume, makeup, cast, director and story, until they hit the triple-cherry and audiences clamored for more John Wayne — the weary, heroic cowboy.

It had little to do with acting. Director John Cromwell once said, “An actor’s value in pictures was measured strictly by the amount and character of his fan mail and the reports from exhibitors throughout the country. This was a response to personality rather than a recognition of talent. If some technical facility went with it, then so much the better.”

After the old moguls left the building, and the late ‘60s to mid-’70s “Easy Riders/Raging Bulls” period of dark (but occasionally brilliant) European-inspired films was upended by Jaws and Star Wars, by the mid-2000s, James McCormick wrote at the Chicago Boyz blog, reviewing Edward Jay Epstein’s book The Picture, Hollywood was essentially a clearing house for intellectual property:

Now the Hollywood film industry is dominated by six huge entertainment companies (Paramount, Fox, Sony, Warner Bros. Disney, and Universal). Each integrates broadcast, pay- and satellite TV networks under one umbrella. Some have theme parks and publishing companies. Each has vast merchandising ties with fast-food, music, Internet, and clothing companies (if they don’t actually own those companies). All have monopolistic foreign distribution subsidiaries that can shuffle money between branches to minimize taxes. These giants spent $18 billion dollars in 2003 to create and promote of 80 films around the world, and were rewarded with $6.4 billion in cinema revenue. A net loss of roughly $11 billion.

How Hollywood turns that $11 billion from scary red to perpetual black is part-and-parcel of why your average movie experience is nonsensical feast of noise, pyrotechnics, computer-generated image (CGI) special effects, inane celebrities, and supernatural bulls**t. It’s why dialog is at a minimum, the endings are happy, the movie running times are under 128 minutes, the popcorn is insanely salty, the ratings are usually PG-13, and every plot line requires lots of car chases, monsters, and explosions. Nonetheless, only a tiny handful of the films you see in the theatres will actual make money during theatrical release (known as “current production”). The handful of films that will gross more than a billion dollars follow a similar formula:

All of them:

  1. are based on children’s stories, comic books, serials, cartoons, or, a theme park ride.
    2. feature a child or adolescent protagonist.
    3. have a fairy-tale-like plot in which a weak or ineffectual youth is transformed into a powerful and purposeful hero.
    4. contain only chaste, if not strictly platonic, relationships between the sexes, with no suggestive nudity, sexual foreplay, provocative language, or even hints of consummated passion.
    5. feature bizarre-looking and eccentric supporting characters that are appropriate for toy and game licensing.
    6. depict conflict – through it may be dazzling, large-scale, and noisy – in ways that are sufficiently non-realistic, and bloodless, for a rating no more restrictive than PG-13.
    7. end happily, with the hero prevailing over powerful villains and supernatural forces (most of which remain available for potential sequels).
    8. use conventional or digital animation to artificially create action sequences, supernatural forces, and elaborate settings.
    9. cast actors who are not ranking stars – at least in the sense they do not command gross-revenue shares.

In one word, “Spiderman” — in two words, “Harry Potter” — in four, “Lord of the Rings.”

This formula must now also accommodate the domestic tastes and governmental concerns of the eight major foreign markets for Hollywood films that contribute as much or more to profits than domestic income (which includes Canada). In order of financial importance, they are Japan, Germany, Britain, Spain, France, Australia, Italy, Mexico. While the rest of the nations of the world contribute their share to Hollywood wealth, the design and formulation of films is driven only by these eight foreign countries.

Hold on a minute, though. The formulaic kid-bait and toy franchising represented above is only occasionally represented at awards time. Wasn’t last year’s Golden Globes a festival of gay and transsexual awakening? Yes, indeed it was. For part of the emotional cost of making bilge for children from 8-80 is a deep ennui amongst the creative and management talent that feeds the “sexopoly” – the six-company beast. In order to boost morale and acquire prestige, studios, stars, and directors also participate in making movies of interest to them and those they admire. The result is a number of films that will certainly lose money in the cinemas, have only a small chance of recouping costs in DVD or during free TV broadcast, but which will appeal to the creative talent which otherwise is engaged in making merchandisable blockbusters. Make a blockbuster, get an “art-house” film, and maybe an Oscar, as a reward.

According to Epstein, the former studio system of the mid-twentieth century has morphed into the entertainment giants who focus on being financial clearinghouses for the lucrative home entertainment market (games, toys, DVDs, TV broadcast). All else is financially trivial. WalMart, through its loss-leader DVD sales, is now the largest single customer for Hollywood. And the eight foreign nations listed above provide more income that the US/Canada market. Giving the customer what they want drives the film business.

Then came 2020. Quentin Tarantino Says Movies Died in 2019.

What the f**k is a movie now? What the f**k is a movie now? It plays in theaters for a token release of four f**king weeks, and by the second week you can watch it on television. I didn’t get into all this for diminishing returns. … It was bad enough in 2019 and that was the last f**king year of movies. And that was a sh*t deal as far as I was concerned. The fact that it’s gotten drastically worse, and that it’s a show pony exercise — the theatrical release…. Theater? You can’t do that. Theater? Yeah, I pay a lot of f**king money to get in that seat. But there’s no f**king taping it. There’s no f**king cell phones. … you own the audience for that time… And it’s not just about doing art. It’s about wowing them. It’s about giving them a great night out that makes it worth it to them, and that to me is f**king exciting.

As John Nolte responds:

The background here is that Tarantino is currently working on a play, so he’s explaining why that excites him more than making another movie.

The 61-year-old Oscar winner has repeatedly said that his next movie will be his last, and he was close to production on The Movie Critic starring Brad Pitt when he decided to pull the plug and move to playwriting.

The obvious dividing line between 2019 and today was the COVID pandemic, which effectively changed the theatrical business forever, where theatrical releases are currently made available in a matter of weeks at home as a pay-per-view offering. What had been a three-month window is forever shattered.

From a business point of view, this makes sense. The studios want to get those home-bound viewers while the theatrical publicity is still hot. Why pay for two publicity campaigns — theatrical and home — when you can pay for one?

I would love to see Hollywood right the ship and start producing movies that put butts in seats in front of a big screen on a weekly basis once again. But the industry seems to have very different concerns these days.

Posted at 1:45 pm by Ed Driscoll on Feb 2nd, 2025

IMPORTANT SAFETY NOTICE: PUT DOWN ALL CARBONATED BEVERAGES BEFORE READING. French AI ‘Lucie’ looks très chic, but keeps getting answers wrong.

France’s artificial intelligence chatbot was launched last week with high-flying and patriotic ambitions.

Lucie, backed by President Macron, would bring “trustworthiness, fairness and accountability” to the world of generative tools, its developers said. It would take on anglophone rivals such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Microsoft’s Copilot and Google’s Gemini by embodying “European values”, promoting “cultural diversity” and countering the domination of the English language, they added.

But it all went wrong. Days after the launch, the chatbot was suspended having provoked a mixture of mirth and anger in France.

It told one user that Herod the Great, the Judaean king, had “played an important role in the development of the atomic bomb”.

Another was informed that cows’ eggs were “considered to be a healthy and nourishing food source”.

When a third user suggested that Dougal from The Magic Roundabout had won the 2017 French presidential election, it replied: “You are right.”

Math appears to be a particular challenge for Lucie:

The French consortium says other chatbots use largely English-language data, which “poses problems of values and culture”. Lucie has been developed with a dataset that is 33 per cent English, 32.4 per cent French, 15 per cent code and 20 per cent other languages.

It will “preserve … the digital sovereignty of states, in particular France and Europe”.

For now, the chatbot has scarcely convinced the French that they will be able to challenge for AI supremacy. “What is 2+2?” asked a user. “I am programmed to be neutral and objective,” Lucie answered. “I cannot take part in activities such as simple mathematical calculations.”

Sometimes, however, it seems to forget that it is not programmed for mathematics. It told one user that the solution to 5(3+2) was 13, a second that it was 17 and a third that it was 50. The correct answer is 25.

Lucie was also quoted as “claiming ‘the square root of a goat is one.’”

And note this:

Lucie was designed not just as a technological tool but also as a symbol of French sovereignty in artificial intelligence. Named after the oldest known human ancestor, its branding incorporates nationalistic themes, with a logo inspired by Marianne—the personification of France—and Scarlett Johansson’s portrayal in the film Lucy.

This isn’t the first time that Johansson has been chosen to be associated with an AI program. Last year, NPR reported: Scarlett Johansson says she is ‘shocked, angered’ over new ChatGPT voice.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, who has said the 2013 Spike Jonze film is his favorite movie, invited comparisons by posting the word “Her” on X after the company announced the new ChatGPT version. But later, OpenAI executives denied any connection between Johansson and the new voice assistant.

Then the company suddenly dropped the voice.

In a post on X just before midnight Pacific time Sunday, OpenAI said the voice would be halted as it addresses “questions about how we chose the voices in ChatGPT.” A company spokeswoman would not provide further detail.

Turns out, Altman had been courting the Hollywood star for months, and she now feels betrayed.

Johansson said that nine months ago Altman approached her proposing that she allow her voice to be licensed for the new ChatGPT voice assistant. He thought it would be “comforting to people” who are uneasy with AI technology.

“After much consideration and for personal reasons, I declined the offer,” Johansson wrote.

Just two days before the new ChatGPT was unveiled, Altman again reached out to Johansson’s team, urging the actress to reconsider, she said.

But before she and Altman could connect, the company publicly announced its new, splashy product, complete with a voice that she says appears to have copied her likeness.

To Johansson, it was a personal affront.

“I was shocked, angered and in disbelief that Mr. Altman would pursue a voice that sounded so eerily similar to mine that my closest friends and news outlets could not tell the difference,” she said.

She also found it alarming, she said, at a moment when the internet is awash in disinformation.

“In a time when we are all grappling with deepfakes and the protection of our own likeness, our own work, our own identities, I believe these are questions that deserve absolute clarity,” Johansson said.

Having very publicly rejected being a voice option for ChatGPT, did the French ask Johansson if she was bien with their AI program named after one of her characters?

Posted at 1:14 pm by Ed Driscoll on Feb 2nd, 2025

QUESTION: WILL DEMOCRATS TACK BACK TO THE CENTER TO RECOVER FROM THEIR 2024 LOSSES?

Answer: Minnesota Democrat Who Wanted Trump to Be Charged with Treason Elected DNC Chair.

Ken Martin, the longtime leader of Minnesota’s Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party who called for President Donald Trump to be put on trial for treason, was elected as chair of the Democratic National Committee on Saturday.

Martin received 246.5 votes at the party’s meeting this weekend in Maryland, with Wisconsin Democratic Party chairman Ben Wikler trailing behind in second place with 134.5 votes.

In June 2020, Martin accused Trump of ignoring intelligence that Russia offered the Taliban bounties to attack Americans — an unsubstantiated claim the White House said in 2021 was based off little evidence, and a claim that was not verified by the CIA.

Trump “should be immediately impeached and then put on trial for treason. His actions led to the deaths of American soldiers. He is a traitor to our nation and all those who have served,” Martin said at the time.

Martin joined the rest of the DNC candidates over the weekend in saying that “racism and misogyny” played a part in Kamala Harris’s loss to Trump. Although minority voters made dramatic shifts to the right in the last presidential election, Martin said that the Democratic Party has “got the right message.”

“What we need to do is connect it back with the voters,” Martin, who was a vice chair of the Harris-Walz campaign, said.

And Martin has the perfect Mini-Me for the job! Like White on Vice: DNC Ditches DEI by Electing David Hogg to Number Two Party Chair. Based on recent headlines and Snopes reports regarding the semiotics of arm gestures when speaking from a podium, in this photo, he certainly looks primed to spread socialism on a national level:

He may be a big government, pro-gun control kind of guy, but we’re not sure how he’ll be enforcing those laws, and keep the nation’s border safe:

Posted at 12:45 pm by Ed Driscoll on Feb 2nd, 2025

YEAH, THE NORMS STUFF WENT OUT THE WINDOW IN 2008:

Posted at 12:29 pm by Glenn Reynolds on Feb 2nd, 2025

TARIFFS ARE ONLY STUPID AND DESTRUCTIVE WHEN AMERICA IMPOSES THEM.

Posted at 12:19 pm by Glenn Reynolds on Feb 2nd, 2025

THEY’RE MEAN, FOR SURE: The Mean Girls of Liberal Media. “Notably, the article twice references a supposed lack of non-white guests at different pro-Trump parties. However, it has since transpired that the magazine cropped out several black party-goers from the cover photograph. Black Republican CJ Pearson posted on X that he actually hosted the event in the photo. He says that New York magazine ‘intentionally left me out of their story because it would have undermined [its] narrative that MAGA is some racist cult’.”

Posted at 12:09 pm by Glenn Reynolds on Feb 2nd, 2025

NOW OUT FROM ANDREW WAREHAM: A New Sort of War.

Posted at 12:09 pm by Glenn Reynolds on Feb 2nd, 2025

JONATHAN TURLEY: Spoiling for a fight: Why challenging birthright citizenship is a win-win for Trump.

This week, the Trump administration doubled down in its fight against birthright citizenship. The usual alliance of pundits, professors and press lined up to declare any challenge to birthright citizenship as absurd. Yet the administration seemed not only undeterred, but delighted.

There is a reason for that euphoria: They believe that they cannot lose this fight.

The legal case against birthright citizenship has always been tough to make, given the long-standing interpretation of the Fourteenth Amendment in federal courts and agencies. Many in academia and the media have shown unusual outrage toward anyone questioning the basis for birthright citizenship as a legal or policy matter.

This is perhaps best evinced by Harvard Law Professor Laurence Tribe’s profane tirade the last time Trump raised this issue years ago: “This f—ing racist wants to reverse the outcome of the Civil War.”

Putting aside that the Civil War was fought over slavery, not immigration, many at the time would have disagreed that this was one of the outcomes of either the Civil War or the Fourteenth Amendment. . . .

Senator Jacob Howard, coauthor of the Fourteenth Amendment, said it was “simply declaratory” of the Civil Rights Act to protect freed slaves.

Howard assured senators, “This will not, of course, include persons born in the United States who are foreigners, aliens, or who belong to the families of ambassadors or foreign ministers.” Likewise, Senator Lyman Trumbull, author of the 13th Amendment and the Civil Rights Act and a drafter of the Fourteenth Amendment, said that the six words included only those “not owing allegiance to anyone else.”

This debate has raged for decades. While Democrats today portray anyone supporting the narrower interpretation as a racist or nutty, it was not long ago that many Democratic leaders opposed birthright citizenship, including former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.). He later denounced his old position with the same passion.

Well, that’s our Harry. Plus:

So what makes this a win-win proposition for the Trump administration? The politics are stronger than the precedent.

Even if the administration loses before the Supreme Court, it will force Democrats again to fight against a tougher stance on immigration issues. Democrats maintained that position in the last election despite polling showing that 83 percent of Americans support deportations of immigrants with violent criminal records and almost half support mass deportation of all undocumented persons.

On birthright citizenship, roughly half of the country now opposes it, according to a recent Emerson poll. That is consistent with much of the world. The U.S. is actually in the minority on the issue.

Our closest allies in Europe reject birthright citizens and follow the common practice of “jus sanguinis,” or right of blood. We are part of a smaller number of countries following “jus soli,” or right of soil.

That is why the Trump administration may win either way. It will either secure a new interpretation from the high court or it could spur a campaign for a constitutional amendment. All of this could unfold around the time of the midterm elections, when incumbents of the president’s party are generally disfavored. This is a wedge issue that many in the Republican Party might welcome.

Indeed.

Posted at 8:30 am by Glenn Reynolds on Feb 2nd, 2025

CLASSIC IN EVERY WAY:

Oft evil will shall evil mar.

Posted at 8:23 am by Glenn Reynolds on Feb 2nd, 2025

TRUMP’S POLICIES ARE POPULAR:

Wokeness was always an elite preference only, rejected by the masses and maintained only through bullying and shaming tactics that no longer work.

Posted at 8:18 am by Glenn Reynolds on Feb 2nd, 2025

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE:

Posted at 8:00 am by Glenn Reynolds on Feb 2nd, 2025

THINK YOU HATE THE MEDIA? NOT ENOUGH, YOU DON’T:

Posted at 7:52 am by Glenn Reynolds on Feb 2nd, 2025

ROGER SIMON: Taking Counter Terrorism Lessons in Samaria.

I don’t think “counter terrorism” works long-term, no matter how good you are, when the entire population supports terrorists. It then requires a much less surgical approach designed to break the will to fight, a la World War II.

Posted at 7:30 am by Glenn Reynolds on Feb 2nd, 2025
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