LISA YAMADA
Staff Writer
Ten years ago, the thought of a stripper once named “Bonbon” gracing the stage of the world’s grandest award show, the Academy Awards, would have been met with high-nosed scoffs and impatient smirks. Today, that same stripper, who now goes by Diablo Cody, walks off that same stage, golden Oscar in hand.
The recent success of Cody’s sleeper hit “Juno,” as well as other independent films such as “My Big Fat Greek Wedding,” “Napoleon Dynamite,” “Crash” and “There Will Be Blood,” have pushed independent films into the Hollywood spotlight and into mainstream appeal. And with film festivals — the largest being Sundance in Utah – showcasing these independent talents, the indie flick is becoming, as Juno MacGruff puts it, “totally boss.”
Bryan Givens, Pepperdine history professor by day and “dabbler” in all things film by night gives, proposes one reason for the recent indie explosion and success.
“It seems that traditional
Hollywood has run out of ideas,” Givens said. “There’s a crisis in traditional film-making where a lot of the stuff is pretty formulaic, a sort of paint by numbers model that’s pretty tired by now.”
This apparent void in Hollywood filmmaking has caused audiences to flock to these smaller, independent titles.
“Filmgoers enjoy what can often be a fresh, less bombastic, more character-driven approach to films that often don’t exist in movies made within the corporate strongholds of the traditional movies studios,” said film studies professor Stephan Parmelee in an e-mail.
This is one reason why “Juno” exploded like it did, precisely because of its character-driven story. Produced for $7 million, peanuts by Hollywood standards, “Juno” has grossed nearly $200 million to date, hitting a particular nerve with audiences young and old (even though most adults were probably stupefied by much of the film’s witty teen quips). While starting in a conventional way, the film did not turn out quite so conventionally, which might be one reason the film was such a hit.
“There was an unexpected twist by the end, but it still rang true,” Givens said.
Tiffany Marie Brannon, a film studies minor agreed.
“It’s so real. It’s heartwarming, but hilarious at the same time,” Brannon said. “Blockbusters today are so hyped up filled with every special effect that there’s no substance, no character development or compelling story. Independent films go back to the story and people.”
After winning acclaim in film festivals, including the nod for first runner-up for a People’s Choice award at the Toronto Film Festival, “Juno” was picked up by Fox Searchlight. The rest, as they say, is history.
Although independent films have been around since John Cassavetes in the ’60s, the real breakout success of indie flicks occurred in 1994 with blood-and-gore monkey Quentin Tarantino’s “Pulp Fiction.” This is when film studios discovered they could purchase and distribute these smaller films relatively inexpensively, according to Parmelee.
Now, studios are scouring festivals more than ever, plucking out noticeable potentials and flinging them into mainstream release. Already, studios such as Sony Pictures Classics and Fox Searchlight — both offshoots of major film companies — have scooped up promising showings, including “The Wackness,” a coming-of-age comedy-drama about a teen (Josh Peck) doping out pot deals to his psychiatrist (Ben Kingsley), and “Choke,” adapted by Clark Gregg from the novel by Chuck Palahniuk, the author of “Fight Club.” Both films arrive in theaters this summer.
While much debate occurs over the exact definition of what constitutes an “independent” film, generally it deals with a film’s distribution and initial funding. Although a major studio like Paramount or Sony Pictures may later pick up and release a film, Givens says that initially an independent film is not concerned or funded within the major studio system.
Last semester Givens himself presented Pepperdine with the “Bryan Givens Film Festival,” which included critically acclaimed though virtually unknown independents such as “Ghost Dog,” starring Forest Whitaker, and “The Machinist” starring Christian Bale, who turned himself into a walking skeleton by dropping 63 pounds to play his role in the eerie, psychotic thriller. This semester his festival includes Julie Taymor’s visionary adaptation of Shakespeare in “Titus,” starring Anthony Hopkins, which will show Friday.
While movie-going is ultimately an escape from reality into a make-believe world of massive explosions, vulgar humor and gooey love scenes, even mindless entertainment can feel constricting.
“I want to be impacted,” said junior Brady Nordstrom, a self-professed lover of art-house flicks. “Independent movies are good because they’re made for the sake of film. They allow for more risks where major films wouldn’t necessarily go.”
04-03-2008
