Richard Linklater Says Now Studios “Only Make Films For 12 Year Olds"

In the 2010s, Marvel reigned supreme and dominated the movie industry. Critics were on-board as well, eating up what they were being fed by the superhero movie juggernaut. This, in consequence, shifted thinking in big studios, and IP-driven content has been all the rage ever since. In consequence, the mid-budget movie slowly disappeared.

Here’s an interesting interview with Richard Linklater in which he ponders the disappearance of films for adults at the multiplex. He blames infantilism and the scourge of superhero flicks that have invaded the big screen:

This just is Hollywood. It’s cinema of this generation. […] Gosh, I’m glad I’m not a kid now. Being a young person, let’s say 10 through 13... The only reason I went to movies was because they were all adult movies. You had to find your way into the movie. Now, we make films for twelve-year-olds. They’ve done a great job at convincing adults that those are good films. Just stay a kid forever. Keep reading comic books. That’s movies. They’ve just abdicated adult filmmaking and all its complexities, which includes sex. They’ve just tossed that out largely. That’s the studio’s game. They just thought it was probably more profitable to just make films for kids and the kids in all of us.

Linklater nails it: culture is "bending to kids" and sanitizing movies for adults. There is no mainstream hunger for challenging cinema anymore.

There is evidence pointing to potential superhero movie “fatigue” having occurred these last five years, ever since 2019’s “Avengers: Endgame.” Many MCU and CDEU flops have happened since, with, particularly, Marvel/Disney having to rethink their entire strategy and content, opting to release less of these movies on a yearly basis.

However hopeful and positive the recent shift in audience attitude towards Marvel might be, Hollywood hasn’t gotten the message and continued on with its infantile-marketed strategy as a slew of Mattel and Nintendo movies have now been greenlit thanks to the success of “Barbie” and “Super Mario Bros.”

When it comes to cinema, audiences are and have always been hungry for good storytelling. Sadly, they’ve all migrated to streaming platforms, where shows and mid-budget films are a safer bet to find an audience than in theaters. There’s those that argue a studio should not invest in one single $300 million movie, but rather 10 films that cost $30 million, but that’s just not the way studios operate.

Participant, which produced two Best Picture winners and earned 21 Oscars, recently shut down after 20 years in operation. Their library of 135 films included “Spotlight,” “Green Book,” “Contagion,” “Good Night and Good Luck,” “Roma,” and “Lincoln.” Sadly, the market for those types of films has been slowly evaporating, with audiences shrinking for mid-budget movies aimed at adults.

That’s just the way things have been going and Participant couldn’t continue on in the current state of the industry. However, I’m still of the firm belief that if you bring back quality movies to the big screen, films that actually pull moviegoers, lure them in with the power of an adult-driven narrative, then maybe the mid-budget movie can become semi-successful again.

With that said, we will probably never go back to a time when a film like “Dances With Wolves” could make $400 million at the box-office. Those days are long gone. The pandemic forced studios to quickly send much of their new content on VOD/streaming. Many moviegoers realized just how much more comfortable, and less headache-inducing, it was to watch at home than to go to their local theater. Not to mention, ticket prices having soared in recent years, to the point where going to the movies has become a pricey luxury for many. I do not believe we’ll ever be able to get that demographic back into theaters.