General > General Technical Chat
Are Cinemas_Theaters still Alive in your Area?
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mendip_discovery:

--- Quote from: Bud on July 20, 2023, 10:37:42 pm ---
--- Quote from: vad on July 20, 2023, 11:52:36 am ---Absolutely, and the cinemas are full. Yesterday, I tried to buy Friday night tickets for "Oppenheimer" at the nearest AMC theater, but without success - all seats were fully booked.

--- End quote ---
Online booking does not have to do with reality. Last  time I was booking, 70% seats  appeared booked. When we came, the total audience was 10 people including 3 of us.

--- End quote ---

Some studios are known to buy tickets just to pump up the excitement. If tickets are all booked it generates news articles and that creates demand.

I'm my area the small cinemas in the towns have closed mostly becuase the multiplex ones with several screens, bowling and some fast food places overtook the small ones. The one in Wells closed in the late 90s stating issues with subsidence on the old building, it was empty for years then reopened as a nightclub. Another local is now a Wetherspoons. The big multi screen ones seems to be still there but they are 1hr away and this means a trip to watch a film is a bit if a track, 2hrs travelling, 45min of adverts and then >2hr film just makes it not worth the >£14 they want to watch a film I can get on the TV at home in less than 6months.
Zero999:
What do people think about the Hollywood strikes?

Many people think they could result in the downfall of TV and cinema, but I think it would be a good thing in the long term. It'll get rid of the lazy crappy companies who don't innovate, churning out the same boring politically motivated bollocks and promote smaller innovative content creators who make interesting and entertaining material.
coppice:

--- Quote from: Zero999 on July 23, 2023, 04:11:03 pm ---What do people think about the Hollywood strikes?

Many people think they could result in the downfall of TV and cinema, but I think it would be a good thing in the long term. It'll get rid of the lazy crappy companies who don't innovate, churning out the same boring politically motivated bollocks and promote smaller innovative content creators who make interesting and entertaining material.

--- End quote ---
I thought most of the writers in Hollywood had been on strike for the past 10 years. If not, where are all the missing stories?
tom66:

--- Quote from: Zero999 on July 23, 2023, 04:11:03 pm ---What do people think about the Hollywood strikes?

Many people think they could result in the downfall of TV and cinema, but I think it would be a good thing in the long term. It'll get rid of the lazy crappy companies who don't innovate, churning out the same boring politically motivated bollocks and promote smaller innovative content creators who make interesting and entertaining material.

--- End quote ---

The outcome of the first set of strikes in 2007-2008 was reality TV.  The barely-scripted format with drama and overacting from non-professionals who are coaxed into creating scenes required little to no union staff involvement, proved cheap to pump out and disappointingly successful with the general public.  I hate to see what will come out this time, but probably more low cost reality shows are likely.  Short term the streaming networks will just increase their back catalogue and buy content in from other distributors, which will probably lead their revenue to stagnate as subscribers leave.

I understand why writers and actors are afraid of GPT/chatbots and AI image generation.  However, this is going to happen regardless of their strike.  I doubt serious writers will be replaced any time by AI, because it takes genuine talent and generalised intelligence to come up with an original and gripping story.   AI is very good at regurgitating ideas and tends to create short stories accurately with little adventure or surprise in them.  In other words, it would probably be pretty good at writing modern episodes of the Simpsons, but it is not going to create new dramas with millions of viewers tuning in to watch.  Comedy is also likely a safe area for now;  AI sucks at comedy, because it requires a proper human understanding of why a joke is funny (and also context-dependent, like political or current affairs comedy). 

For actors, there's the star factor... I don't think fake actors generated by AI would cut it.  I can see a risk for extras, there is one studio already that is famous for getting their extras on set for a day but the contract assigns all rights to their image for the remainder of the shoot and CGI is used to add them into scenes as needed.  So suddenly you go from having someone being paid a reasonable amount for a month's worth of shooting, getting only one or two day's pay.  That's quite bad for those guys.  But the major A- and B-list stars are safe for some time,  no one wants to see AI Tim Cruze,  they want to see human Tom Cruise because they know he's a real guy and they see him on the red carpet and on chat shows and all sorts.  CGI could, with enough effort, already replace a lot of these actors, but it hasn't.  That's because these actors are as much actors as they are marketing for the film.
mendip_discovery:

--- Quote from: tom66 on July 23, 2023, 05:04:57 pm ---
--- Quote from: Zero999 on July 23, 2023, 04:11:03 pm ---What do people think about the Hollywood strikes?

Many people think they could result in the downfall of TV and cinema, but I think it would be a good thing in the long term. It'll get rid of the lazy crappy companies who don't innovate, churning out the same boring politically motivated bollocks and promote smaller innovative content creators who make interesting and entertaining material.

--- End quote ---

The outcome of the first set of strikes in 2007-2008 was reality TV.  The barely-scripted format with drama and overacting from non-professionals who are coaxed into creating scenes required little to no union staff involvement, proved cheap to pump out and disappointingly successful with the general public.  I hate to see what will come out this time, but probably more low cost reality shows are likely.  Short term the streaming networks will just increase their back catalogue and buy content in from other distributors, which will probably lead their revenue to stagnate as subscribers leave.

--- End quote ---

Yup we will no doubt get more of that. As well as a slew of not very factual documentries.


--- Quote ---I understand why writers and actors are afraid of GPT/chatbots and AI image generation.  However, this is going to happen regardless of their strike.  I doubt serious writers will be replaced any time by AI, because it takes genuine talent and generalised intelligence to come up with an original and gripping story.   AI is very good at regurgitating ideas and tends to create short stories accurately with little adventure or surprise in them.  In other words, it would probably be pretty good at writing modern episodes of the Simpsons, but it is not going to create new dramas with millions of viewers tuning in to watch.  Comedy is also likely a safe area for now;  AI sucks at comedy, because it requires a proper human understanding of why a joke is funny (and also context-dependent, like political or current affairs comedy). 

--- End quote ---

I think for a few years there have been a lot of writers in a room with very little real content written. It goes to the old adage of "too many cooks spoil the broth". With so many people who want to throw some input in there are many storylines that get thrown out because of an inability to agree. I wouldn't put it past them to have already abused AI stuff to write some of the stories.



--- Quote ---For actors, there's the star factor... I don't think fake actors generated by AI would cut it.  I can see a risk for extras, there is one studio already that is famous for getting their extras on set for a day but the contract assigns all rights to their image for the remainder of the shoot and CGI is used to add them into scenes as needed.  So suddenly you go from having someone being paid a reasonable amount for a month's worth of shooting, getting only one or two day's pay.  That's quite bad for those guys.  But the major A- and B-list stars are safe for some time,  no one wants to see AI Tim Cruze,  they want to see human Tom Cruise because they know he's a real guy and they see him on the red carpet and on chat shows and all sorts.  CGI could, with enough effort, already replace a lot of these actors, but it hasn't.  That's because these actors are as much actors as they are marketing for the film.

--- End quote ---

I can see why they are worried as with the deepfake abilities they may no longer be needed other than to provide samples for the CGI experts to use. Who holds the copyright on your image/likeness etc. even after your death?
Imagine a company that gets a bunch of people to turn up for a couple of hours and they take all the images they need and then that person ends up being paid a nominal fee but ends up on 100s of films, a bit like stock images. But even worse is when that person becomes a well-paid actor but this firm still has your image they can sell on. Loads of fun for the Scum Sucking Lawyers.
Currently with the streaming options its not clear how successful a program/film is and many actors rely on the residuals to survive.
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