tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-370182032693696367.post1066375261186121434..comments2023-12-11T00:24:39.466-08:00Comments on Murdockinations: Mission Impossible 4 and the IlkJZ Murdockhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04366296091345604149noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-370182032693696367.post-71949585610160005432011-12-21T07:39:00.205-08:002011-12-21T07:39:00.205-08:00Thanks for the comments. I come at this not only a...Thanks for the comments. I come at this not only as a viewer but also as a screenwriter. The desired screenplays tend to require a certain format, high concept, high stakes, etc., to the point of being absurd. I find that formula (to supposedly "guarentee" success and profit) ludicrous. Perhaps it's okay as a standard as you have to have something, I suppose, but to be consistently told something won't sell, or worse, won't "work", because it doesn't have the elements many of the produced Hollywood style films have, is at very least, irritating. I find those films that don't follow that format (if they are well done), typically refreshing. But then, that is what is nice about Independent film. My hope in my own screenplays is to go against that grain as much as possible and offer something else in it's place. I understand that means I will have a harder road to progress in an already impossibly hard industry, but such as it is, so shall it be. Of course, I may be the guy at some point, whom you hear about on the evening news who jumped off a cliff out of frustation. But at least I will have given it my very best efforts. Hmmm there may be a film in that....JZ Murdockhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10765706992952885128noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-370182032693696367.post-46096625737140103832011-12-21T02:54:27.665-08:002011-12-21T02:54:27.665-08:00I don't follow Mission Impossible and I though...I don't follow Mission Impossible and I thought the IMF was the International Monetary Fund, but I know the feeling you describe. Plots get tired and then it's like addiction, you need bigger and bigger hits to get any effect. However, it is possible to reinvent, introduce new ideas: the extremely popular and durable British SF series Doctor Who has done that repeatedly: it had run for some time before it emerged that the main character was an alien, then much later his planet had been destroyed, then mystery is introduced about who he really is. Conversely, one of our most popular soaps, "The Bill", a police series, started as a refreshingly realistic look at police life, only slightly more dramatic than the real thing, but when viewing numbers started to drop the response was to introduce a lot of relationship drama (suddenly all these cops had impossibly complicated and troubled personal lives) and dramatic events in buckets. I think there were no fewer than three bombs at the police station and Sun Hill's coppers were getting killed at a rate that would make Detroit cops run. For more time than it deservfed it worked, perhaps because there was still a lot of realistic stuff in it (programmes were actually used in police training to show correct procedures in cautioning or subduing people etc), but finally the increased drama shots no longer worked.SibatheHathttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04502557278669132803noreply@blogger.com