Movie Wars: How Hollywood and the Media Limit What Movies We Can See [Hardcover]

Jonathan Rosenbaum (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 1, 2002

Questioning the assumptions that govern our culture, this book focuses on one medium -- the movies. In particular, it examines how movies are packaged, distributed, and promoted, exposing industry secrets such as how Miramax often buys distribution rights to movies it then fails to distribute, presumably to make sure its competitors don't get them. The book shows, for the first time, how the corporate ownership of movie theaters defies antitrust laws and precedents stretching back over 50 years. While the average American can usually find a book or record that has not been endorsed by the mainstream media, when it comes to movies, consumers are powerless against what Rosenbaum calls "the media-industrial complex".

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

"Consider what might happen if Roger Ebert couldn't find a single movie to recommend on one of his weekly shows," Rosenbaum asks provocatively in this freewheeling critique of the American movie industry. Arguing that American moviegoers are consistently denied the right to make up their own minds about what movies to see, and even how to think about them, he reveals the powerful influence market researchers, production studios, advertisers, film critics and publishing concerns ("the media-industrial complex") have on how films are made, marketed, released and reviewed. Citing such diverse examples as George Lucas's draconian exhibition contracts for The Phantom Menace (which bound theaters to a lengthy run regardless of audience size), distributors' offers of free film junkets to bribe critics and the use of canned reviews and industry-sanctioned lists of "the 100 Best American Films" written by "professional blurb writers," Rosenbaum drives home his point that there is far more commerce than art in American film. Occasionally, his arguments are overheated (the fact that film festivals are often popularity contests is no surprise), but for the most part they are well-supported and potent, and successfully address broader questions of consumer culture and capitalism. Rosenbaum's journalistic style makes this animated treatise accessible to film buffs who want to know more about how movies get made, while his sound arguments make it a good bet for academic readers as well. (Nov.)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review

"Essential reading for anyone who cares about movies" -- Martha P. Nochimson, Film Quarterly

"Jonathan Rosenbaum has become our leading writer in the zone where academic film studies overlap reviewing." -- The San Diego Union-Tribune

"Jonathan Rosenbaum has become our leading writer the zone where academic film studies overlap reviewing." -- The San Diego Union-Tribune

"Jonathan Rosenbaum is...one of the best writers on film of any kind in the history of the medium." -- James Naremore, author of Acting in the Cinema

This book exposes producers who maul directors' work [and] distributors who hoard gems... -- Chicago Magazine

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 256 pages
• Publisher: Chicago Review Press; 1st edition (July 1, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1556524064
• ISBN-13: 978-1556524066
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.2 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (16 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,541,171 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Movie Wars: A Book Review, December 19, 2000

By 

Harvey S. Karten "Director, NY Film Critics O... (Brooklyn, NY United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Movie Wars: How Hollywood and the Media Limit What Movies We Can See (Hardcover)

"MOVIE WARS: How Hollywood and the Media Conspire to Limit What Films We Can See," by Jonathan Rosenbaum: Chicago, a capella, 2000. Review by Harvey Karten [e-mail].

Jonathan Rosenbaum, film critic with the Chicago Reader, is on the left politically as one can easily see from his latest book, "Movie Wars." His central position is that while we have a free press in the United States, the capacity to go to virtual or actual book stores and find just about anything we want to read (particularly in the giants like Barnes & Noble and Amazon), we do not enjoy such freedom in choosing our movies. Rosenbaum expresses a belief in the wisdom of ordinary moviegoers who might like to take in screenings of important films but who, thanks to the power of the so-called movie industrial complex, are often unable to do so. In other words, the big studios and the large newspapers, TV and radio stations scheme with one another to push certain movies our way and to discourage our viewing of others they do not wish to market.

Of all the evidence he supplies, what got me (as a film critic) thinking most is Rosenbaum's contention that the media and the big studios in effect bribe supposedly impartial critics to push certain films. Since recognized movie critics, particularly in areas of the country like New York and L.A., are given free access to hundreds of movies each year, some might be tempted to cooperate with the studios and write fluff pieces out of gratitude for the invitations. I like to think that we're invited merely with the hope that we'll spread good news about the films: that negative commentary may not be welcome but that the companies recognize that those of us who praise almost everything will lose credibility with our readers--and then what good will we be when we honesty laud a good movie? However, there is one group that Rosenbaum accuses of succumbing to outright bribery: the critics who are feted by the studios with fancy junkets. According to the author, certain select reviewers are invited to fly to L.A. or New York or even Hawaii and Paris to screen films and review the talent on site. The implication is that if these writers do not knock out what the studios would like the readers to see, they are not invited back. Now, if you were given free air tickets, put up in a first-class hotel for two nights, and given cash for daily expenses while reviewing and

interviewing, would you be tempted to be overly generous? Rosenbaum thinks so. This is one way that the big companies in effect control the output of the writers.

And what about those blurbs that you see in the newspaper ads for the movies? Some of them are not even extracts from long reviews but are supplied by professional blurb writers--with the film companies actually "suggesting" what the blurber should write.

In yet another indictment of the ways that studios

manipulate our freedom to select movies, Rosenbaum suggests that critics are persuaded not to bother reviewing movies whose advertising budgets are marginal. Important films that the public may indeed be tempted to see are not talked up by either the advertisers or the reviewers, and in fact the author was forced on a Chicago show called Chicago Tonight to speak almost exclusively about big studio releases. Rosenbaum also believes that some reviewers do not care for what they're doing and write not from their own hearts but from what they think the readers want to hear. In doing so, they are merely ratifying preconceptions set up by ads and promo campaigns. These critics assume that audiences, unlike sophisticated critics, are not tolerant of films that demand thought and patience, and what's more the critics believe that their editors are of the same view. Again: the independent film, which may move more slowly than the typical biggie, will not be reviewed by most media and will not be advertised by releasing companies.

As for foreign films? Same deal. I've heard said that only one percent of movie goers attend foreign language films at all. Why? Presumably the studios and editors believe there's no way that the ordinary people on the street will want to read the subtitles or would be interested in seeing the output of the non-English-speaking world. Whose fault is that? Rosenbaum is more of a democrat than I. My own view is

that you can advertise the latest from Theodor Angelopoulos or Krzysztof Znussi all you want--you won't find lines outside the theaters.

A short review can barely skim the surface of this author's accusations. He takes on Miramax, for example, for deliberately limiting production of potential competitors by buying up the rights and then shelving the films simply to keep them away from contesting their own releases. "Movie Wars" is to the current film industry as "The Jungle" was to the meatpacking industry--an important work charging big media and studio corporations with censorship to get us to patronize only those movies they want us to see.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Essential for those who take cinema seriously, December 17, 2000

By 

"printersrow" (Chicago, IL USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Movie Wars: How Hollywood and the Media Limit What Movies We Can See (Hardcover)

Jonathan Rosenbaum takes cinema for what it is and what it could be. The author is a passionate movie critic, who believes passionately in the power of the "movement-image." He writes weekly reviews in the Chicago Reader. He might be the only critic I know of in the US who actually DEFENDS certain movies. His highly vitriolic discussion of the practices of major movie studios is refreshing and right on target. Rosenbaum's exploration of the socio-economic and cultural reasons why US audiences cannot easily access foreign movies leads him to a larger reflection on the very nature and/or possibility of an "American" cinema in the age of globalization. Rosenbaum vehemently criticizes the current status quo and the US film industry for treating movies as disposable commodities and the audiences as hapless consumers. He also shows how the "entertainment-industrial complex" has taken over the shaping of the public's taste through mainstream media outlets. Rosenbaum argues forcefully against the cliche that so-called art movies - and those who enjoy them - are hopeless elitists. As a matter of fact, in the book he discusses Starship Troopers and Orson Welles' Ambersons with equal interest. He makes the case that movies can tell us crucial things about the world we live in, or in other words that movies - foreign, US, artsy, indie, whatever - matter because of their ethical value. A vital, and extremely minoritarian position nowadays. In summary, a very lively and at times very funny book, which considerably enriches the discussion on cinema. Invaluable in the era of the E! channnel.

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars There is more to good movies than Miramax., March 1, 2001

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[e-mail] (Edmonton, Alberta Canada) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Movie Wars: How Hollywood and the Media Limit What Movies We Can See (Hardcover)

For years now there have been two kinds of movie critics: those who like the movies that win the Academy Award for best picture and those who are actually worth reading. Rosenbaum as a critic clearly falls into the second category and his book is invaluable for the perspective it presents on modern cinema. Hollywood has become increasingly depressing over the past two decades. The autopsies of Pauline Kael in 1980 and Mark Crispin Miller in 1990 have been vindicated in spades. The Academy Awards, instead of honoring the usual middlebrow works such as Amadeus, goes for such lowbrow historical works as Braveheart and Titanic. To the isolated critic, the appearance of such films as Fargo and such companies as Miramax appears as an oasis. The value of Rosenbaum's book is that it shows that this is a mirage.

The problem, says Rosenbaum, is not that there are not good movies being made anymore. The problem is that most of them are foreign movies and both Hollywood and the media take an obtuse and philistine approach towards them. One could simply look to the Village Voice Critics List and one would see such films as Beau Travail, The House of Mirth, Yi Yi, The Wind Will Carry Us, L'Humanite, and Time Regained all in the top 10, but they would be virtually unknown to the rest of continent. Rosenbaum is particularly fond of the Iranian director Abbas Kiarostami and the Portuguese Manuel De Oliviera. But these and many other directors that Rosenbaum mentions do not get the attention they deserve. Miramax concentrates on "feel-good" foreign films, such as Life is Beautiful or Chocolat. Rosenbaum's description of Miramax's version of The Wings of the Dove, as middlebrow soft-core porn that traduces its source, emphasizes the problem. Miramax picks up the distributing rights to more challenging fare, not to show them, but to prevent other companies from seeing them. Rosenbaum is particularly cutting about how Mirimax executives monopolize media discussion at Cannes by putting down other movies and appealing to xenophobic and philistine instincts of American reporters. Critics are often obtuse about films. (Rosenbaum is particularly cutting about the cheap Francophobia of such well respected writers as David Denby and James Wolcott). This unpleasant isolationism is all the more dangerous because the American industry has such an enormous influence on the rest of the world's movies.

Rosenbaum emphasizes the self-serving illusions of Hollywood hacks who say they only make what the public wants. After all, they claim, people won't watch movies with subtitles or in black and white. As Rosenbaum points out, audiences had no trouble watching subtitles in Dances with Wolves, and watching black and white subtitles in Schindler's List. The basic problem is that the movie testing machine is designed in such a way as to give the audience limited choices and to verify the prejudices of studio heads. The book is not perfect. One may feel that if one needed to defend a Hollywood picture you could have a better choice than Small Soldiers. Likewise, one may wonder whether Paul Verhoaven is a brilliant satirist or just deeply cynical. And if you think that Casablanca, or Quientin Tarantino are better than Rosenbaum suggests, you will not find much counter-argument here. But if you have never heard of Robert Bresson, you must read this book.