Dane DeHaan and Cara Delevingne in a scene from Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets. Photo / AP
The film industry has had a confused and difficult summer so far. They've experienced some undeniable successes in the likes of Wonder Woman and Dunkirk, but overall it seems Hollywood has done little to combat the downward trend affecting summer movies in recent years.
This summer season has seemingly had more films than ever not reaching their financial goals, leading number-crunchers to predict that studios are due to take in less than $4 billion in revenue from their summer slates - the lowest combined gross since 2007 and a 13-15 percent drop in comparison to last summer.
The great hope of any film studio in the summer is to find new franchises that will remain profitable for years to come. Studios eager to find these franchises have recently looked to existing properties for concepts, ones that would have immediate appeal and a built-in fanbase.
Hopes were high for an adaptation of Stephen King's long-running book franchise The Dark Tower, along with Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets, Luc Besson's sci-fi spectacle that was based on a French graphic novel. But both projects, despite featuring superstars like Rihanna and Matthew McConaughey, ended up turning off audiences or, in The Dark Tower's case, merely confusing them. Despite hopes that both would work as starting-off points for potential franchises, it's doubtful either property will be heard from again.
The failure of these more high-concept curtain-raisers seems to suggest that studios ought to potentially play it safe and produce work that is instantly recognisable to the movie-going public. But playing it safe, as Universal did with their regrettable reboot of The Mummy, resulted in a film that was critically panned and underwhelmed at the box office - despite starring Tom Cruise.
And even that old Hollywood staple of the sequel has proven to be unreliable. While the advantages of a sequel in comparison to starting up a new franchise are obvious, easily piggybacking of the success of its cinematic predecessors, that hasn't always been the case this summer. Despite the strong performance of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, Alien: Covenant failed to live up to the studio's financial expectations despite solid reviews, whilst Cars 3 is on course to become the lowest-grossing Pixar film ever released.
And whilst not a sequel, the film adaptation of Baywatch was yet another financial disappointment this summer, despite the allure of nostalgia and its star studded cast.
But what is causing this downward trend in cinema attendance? Earlier this year director and producer Brett Ratner, the co-financier of Batman vs Superman: Dawn of Justice, claimed review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes is causing "the destruction of the movie business".
"I have such respect and admiration for film criticism," he said during a panel at the Sun Valley Film Festival (via Entertainment Weekly). "When I was growing up film criticism was a real art. And there was intellect that went into that. Now it's about a number. A compounded number of how many positives vs. negatives. Now it's about, 'What's your Rotten Tomatoes score? And that's sad."
Yay positive upticks π
— Dwayne Johnson (@TheRock) May 25, 2017
Fans LOVE the movie. Critics HATE it. What a glaring disconnect. People just want to laugh & have fun. #Baywatchπ₯π€πΎ https://t.co/GrPgdevRuz
Oh boy, critics had their venom & knives ready π. Fans LOVE the movie. Huge positive scores. Big disconnect w/ critics & people. #Baywatchπ₯ https://t.co/K0AQPf6F0S
— Dwayne Johnson (@TheRock) May 26, 2017
This critique was echoed by Dwayne Johnson, who tweeted that Baywatch's flopping was the fault of the critics, and that it was in actual fact made for "the fans".
Websites like Rotten Tomatoes have made it easier than ever for the movie going public to gauge the quality of a film before seeing it, which may have been to blame for big budget flops like The Dark Tower and King Arthur, both of which were panned by critics. Alternatively, Wonder Woman, which has earned over $400 million at the US box office, and Baby Driver, with its net gross of $167 million off a budget of $34 million, were critically praised. Perhaps the solution to Hollywood's problems is a simple one: make better films.
Yet factoring in critical opinion to the film industry's current malaise doesn't seem to offer much of an answer, either. War for the Planet of the Apes was universally praised by critics but ultimately grossed far less money than its predecessor. On a similar note, next weekend sees the release of the Ryan Reynolds/Samuel L. Jackson action comedy The Hitman's Bodyguard, which is projected to open to a healthy $18 million at the US box office. And that is despite a mixed reaction from critics.
The matter has left Hollywood facing a conundrum. Spectacle no longer guarantees an audience, nostalgia doesn't guarantee an audience and critical acclaim doesn't guarantee an audience, either. Even Tom Cruise will tell you that star power is no longer the same draw it once was.
But the critical and commercial successes of Wonder Woman, The Big Sick and Girls Trip, with their largely non-male or non-white casts seem to suggest that there is room for growth in telling new stories that audiences haven't necessarily seen before. Or they can make Top Gun 2...
DID YOU KNOW...
In 2013, Ocean's 11 director Steven Soderbergh announced his retirement from directing films. He decided to come out of retirement for Logan Lucky, which he describes as the "inversion of an Ocean's movie... it's an anti-glam Ocean's movie".