We all know what "on-demand" means, but for many of us, its use has been limited to ordering new mainstream releases via "Pay" TV channels on our cable system. This is but a small part of what on-demand will eventually make possible as it gets perfected and implemented over the next several years. In fact, many believe it will usher in a paradigm shift in the way we watch films, and how we choose what we watch.
Today Hollywood spends countless millions to reinforce established patterns of movie consumption behavior that are rooted in the past. Though DVDs have saved the industry's economic bacon for years now, studios work first and foremost to ensure their new production output is profitable. This measure still determines whether people keep their jobs or not.
Even with all the DVD hoopla over the past decade, the industry would still prefer you plunk down twelve bucks a head to see a spanking new movie in your nearby multiplex. This serves to placate their struggling exhibitors, justify their hefty marketing investment, and at least suggest public endorsement of their first-run output.
Hollywood counts on the age-old idea that people want to see what's new and in theatres because this product is what your friends will have seen when you meet them at the next dinner party. When the topic of the movie is raised, you always want to feel au courant and part of the discussion-or so the reasoning goes.
Also, if viewers just focus on new films, they start to rate them relatively, not in the context of all movies they've seen, but in comparison to what they've seen lately. Therefore, if the quality of current releases is descending gradually, the viewer's taste and expectations often follow. The result: a film which you'd have thought good thirty years ago is anointed great today, because it's among the best of what's out there now.
By this I do not mean that moviegoers are stupid. This again is a subtle phenomenon that we may barely notice because we tend to put the best films from the past in a separate part of our memories, where the word "classic" is stored.
Example: my wife loved Woody Allen's Vicky Cristina Barcelona, and dragged me to it. For her (and many critics who fall into the same mindset), the movie was a breath of fresh air: scenic, sexy, unabashedly romantic. Of course, I was disappointed because the movie had been over-hyped. To me a great Woody Allen film remains Annie Hall or even Hannah and Her Sisters, while Vicky struck me as Woody Allen Light, a pleasant enough diversion, with appealing actors (particularly Bardem and Cruz) and a few chuckles, but nothing close to his best work from earlier days. At the same time, it is among the better romantic comedies in current release. See what I mean?
But back to that paradigm shift I referenced earlier: what will it signify? First -- on a practical level, if you can see most any film-old or new- on-demand, given the economy, the gas crisis and the advent of the home theatre, many consumers will go out to the movies less. Second -- with on-demand in full flower, they will confront a vastly larger universe of choice, representing the entire breadth of this century-old medium, not just the most recent theatrical releases. This may overwhelm some movie-lovers, who'll stay close to what they know and feel comfortable with... at first.
Then, soon enough, a realization will set in: You choose what you watch now, Hollywood doesn't. If you think about movies not only in terms of what's out, but also what's great, you're bound to hit the sweet-spot more often. After all, why should film as an art form be experienced any differently than music or painting? In those latter spheres, we don't tend to care when the work was created, we care how good it is. The Beatles and Ella Fitzgerald, Renoir and Picasso, never go out of style. Like the authentic classics of film, they reflect their own time while transcending it. And achieving this transcendence is most every artist's highest goal.
Getting in the habit of watching older movies or "smaller" foreign films also allows a respite from the numbingly over-the-top style of today's blockbusters, with their signature quick cuts and emphasis on visual effects taking precedence over the fundamentals of character development and script. These alternative movies tend to tell their stories at a more deliberate, realistic pace, inducing viewers to lean forward and engage. Indeed, such vital exposure discourages us and our kids from getting so accustomed to the hyper quality of current popular movies that we all enter a virtual state of A.D.D., constitutionally unable to watch anything that moves at a saner clip and that expects us to inject a measure of concentration.
The single time I met the late director Robert Altman, he said to me: "People forget that it's better to see a great movie again than to watch a passable one the first time. They think they won't be surprised or rewarded, but they're missing one vital fact: even though the movie hasn't changed, they have, so the experience isn't like watching it for the first time, it's actually better."
This valuable insight is not hard to grasp, and with true on-demand, most discerning viewers should eventually adopt this outlook. The idea will be to make film viewing less of a crap shoot, more of a meritocracy. If something stupendous has just been released (say, an "American Beauty" caliber film), they'll choose that, but if nothing new meets their exacting standard, they'll look to outstanding foreign or classic films that are almost guaranteed to succeed, whether it's a first time or repeat viewing.
A young woman immersed in the online world recently told me that the new buzz-word in cyberspace is "curation". With technology simultaneously broadening our horizons and making our time more precious, online users want quick and useful direction regarding everything that shapes their lifestyle, be it restaurants, travel or entertainment. And they would prefer two hundred word recommendations they can act on versus two thousand word reviews they can't use. (Our own site, www.bestmoviesbyfarr.com, is tailor-made to provide just this kind of information.)
In this emerging environment, there seems little doubt that the broadest swath of the viewing public will combine an occasional trip to see a new release with watching top film selections of varying ages and origins at home. Sometimes these same folks will find themselves in the mood to see something new and unapologetically silly. This is on a par with eating a Big Mac three or four times a year; it will not kill you. The downside only comes when eating at McDonald's turns into a steady, seemingly irreversible habit.
Finally, one hopes that in a fully on-demand world, Hollywood gets sufficiently concerned about people going to theatres less to attempt a creative renaissance along the lines of the late sixties, when the industry hit another low point and virtually reinvented itself. Though the element of risk will rise just as it did back then, so too will the potential rewards -- for all concerned.