r/movies • u/LouFerrignosGhost • 17d ago
What are some films that killed genres, stopped the momentum of a fad, or signaled the end of an entire movement? Discussion
A good thing is hard to kill, but that doesn’t make it impossible for something like a trend to die with ease. The history of film is of course littered with trends, popular movements, and genres everyone becomes enamored with, and in more times than not there will come something that’s such a spectacular failure or a overwhelming detriment to a film industry’s funds that it will cause a genre to fall completely out of fashion. The end results often come up as products unbelievable repulsive in comparison to a genre’s heyday, and will discourage audiences, filmmakers, and producers from certain characteristics for a considerable amount of time. This kind of stuff has recently intrigued me, and I’m curious to know what examples exist of a film being the end of an era, so to speak.
The most obvious example (and thus the one I’m gonna beat everyone else to the punch in referencing) is Heaven’s Gate, a film that’s now been critically re-evaluated yet in its original theatrical cut was widely hated and loudly proclaimed that the Western genre, once a ubiquitous part of Classic Hollywood and Television’s Golden Age canon, was completely dead, to the point that further attempts post-1980 tend to be labeled as “resurgences” rather than anywhere close to a revival of the Western’s once prolific nature (perhaps a more extreme scenario of what tends to happen, but still an important death-knell). Not only that, but HG also tends to be the poster child in the death of New Hollywood, the end of that era marked by directors going wildly over-budget and way out-of-control to the point that producers had to step in and reel the reins away (other disasters helped in dismantling the director-driven Hollywood, such as Spielberg’s 1941, Scorsese’s New York, New York, or Coppola’s One From the Heart)
Any definitions on what films ended segments of history can be loose (usually sociopolitical contexts can be more to blame than anything), but I’m just looking for examples that for sure meant something once popular in film was at the very end of its prime.
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u/BillytheBeaut 17d ago
Cutthroat Island killed off any hope for pirate movies for years. Now, unless Johnny Depp is starring in one, there aren’t any pirate movies coming out of Hollywood.
Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer have butchered spoof movies so bad (Epic Movie, Meet the Spartans, Date Movie), it will be a while before those make a comeback. Unless you have the talent of Leslie Nielsen, leave that genre alone.
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u/OneGoodRib 17d ago
It's actually kind of remarkable that there weren't any other pirate movies as far as I know that were trying to capitalize off PoTC's success.
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u/cream_uncrudded 17d ago edited 16d ago
My buddy worked on a 40 million dollar independently financed pirate movie that never got a release. Apparently it’s hard to make a good pirate movie.
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u/ol-gormsby 17d ago
Wow. Did it actually get finished, did the completion guarantors take over, what happened?
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u/cream_uncrudded 17d ago
He was the visual effects supervisor so saw it through to the very end. So it did get finished. He has no idea whatever happened to it.
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u/_thewaltzingdead 17d ago
With the rise of internet parodies, the genre may never make a comeback on film (at least not the style of film that parodies very specific movies, as opposed to genre spoofs). By the time a parody gets to the theatres, it's already been spoofed and meme'd to death online.
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u/IntoDeepLeftField 17d ago
No reason you can't go the Airplane! route and spoof movies from 30 years prior or the Naked Gun / Top Secret route and parody entire genres.
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u/Swayyyettts 17d ago
Gotta watch Black Sails for your pirate fix
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u/BillytheBeaut 17d ago
Will do.
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u/thissubredditlooksco 17d ago
i second his comment. you'll love it so much once you figure out what's going on
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u/wheatthinsbro 17d ago
Even scary movie 1 and 2 were better than the crap they put out.
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u/Markhidinginpublic 17d ago
Though true, I did really enjoy Scary Movie 3... The rest not so much.
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u/WakeUpOutaYourSleep 17d ago
I hate what’s happened to parody movies. In the hands of Brooks and the Zuckers they were hysterical. In the hands of Seltzer and Freidberg, they’re insufferable.
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u/PugnaciousPangolin 17d ago
I remember trying to watch "Cutthroat Island" and. . .just. . .wow. It's aggressively horrible and goes full-tilt for more, More, MOAR in the feverish, desperate hope that more will somehow work despite NOTHING in the movie working.
Not even Frank Langella could save it.
I would say that "Cutthroat Island" is the definitive film to identify for filmmakers considering putting their girlfriend in their movie. If that's not enough, need I mention Madonna's "Swept Away?"
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u/Highintheclouds420 17d ago
The Charlie sheen spoofs we're hysterical. Hot shots
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u/BillytheBeaut 17d ago
Oh damn, I forgot about those. That scene where he dips his fists in caramel and can’t decide between sprinkles or gummy bears always made me laugh.
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u/Highintheclouds420 17d ago
The chicken arrow is genius. There are so many gags in those movies. when Charlie passes Martin sheen and he's playing his character from apocalypse now and they both say "I loved you in wall Street" I'm going to go back and watch those, haven't seen them in years
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u/WorthPlease 17d ago
I just want some more sailing era adventure type movies. Back in between 1400-1800 era style. I don't need pirates or sea monsters, just some "adventure" type movies. You can do survival or thriller too.
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u/kalash_and_beer 17d ago
Never understood the hate that movie, it's so campy and stereotypical pirate with great effects and just overall fun.
If you take it serious at all, you're not gonna have a fun time.
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u/InternetGoodGuy 17d ago
Seth McFarlane is remaking The Naked Gun with Liam Neeson. Maybe that could revive the spoof genre. Hopefully it's not just Family Guy cut away humor.
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u/arcosapphire 17d ago
Hopefully it's not just Family Guy cut away humor.
I think The Orville proved conclusively that he's perfectly capable of respectful parody with zero cutaways.
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u/InternetGoodGuy 17d ago
True but these aren't really the same type of parody. The Orville is surprisingly plot driven and focuses a lot on its characters and social commentary.
The Naked Gun is more similar to Family Guy. The characters and the plot are mostly irrelevant and only exist to get us from one gag to the next.
I'm really excited about Liam Neeson as Frank Drebin though. I think he's going to nail it.
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u/bhugsgolden 17d ago
Battleship killed board game movies.
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u/IrishinManhattan617 17d ago
Board game movies killed board game movies.
Aside from Clue, has there been a good adaptation?
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u/honcooge 17d ago
Jumanji
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u/ArtlessCalamity 16d ago
Was Jumanji a real game first? I thought it was just a device for the movie.
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u/Scott4117 17d ago
Thankfully.
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u/Three_Trees 17d ago
How dare you! Clue is a timeless classic and I am prepared to die on that hill.
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u/nanotech23 17d ago edited 17d ago
The disappointing or straight up terrible box office performances for Treasure Planet and Home on the Range (Disney), & Sinbad and Road to El Dorado (DreamWorks) signaled the end of regularly released 2d animated feature length movies.
edit: from those studios
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u/_Meece_ 17d ago
It was less that these were terrible, and more that Pixar/Dreamworks were drawing a higher box office than even the most popular 2D animated movies.
So that combined with a bunch of flops, just proved to the suits that doing 2D features was not what people wanted.
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u/nanotech23 17d ago
The conclusion I have reached is that it's not like this format didn't attract many moviegoers, but with the box offices that 3d Animation movies were getting like you say, the opportunity cost of continuing to produce 2d films instead of more 3d films wasn't worth it.
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u/_Meece_ 17d ago
Yep, when things like Monsters Inc and Finding Nemo were rivaling Lion King box office numbers. Not to mention Shrek doing the same. Disney knew they had to turn Walt Disney animation into a 3D studio sooner than later.
Even mediocre 3D movies like Bolt grossed more than popular IPs like Lilo and Stitch.
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u/Comprehensive-Fun47 17d ago
It's unfortunate. I find the 2D animation to be so much easier and more interesting to look at. I think it captures more art and expression than the 3D styles.
Lilo & Stitch is hilarious and I can't imagine it in 3D.
I wish there was more of a mixture, but 3D dominates. And probably will forever. Now the older styles are more niche.
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u/floppybarricuda 17d ago
Princess and the Frog also underperformed and Disney just gave up on it entirely.
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u/theyusedthelamppost 17d ago
I feel like Hollywood took a break from the Sword'n'Sorcery stuff after Willow. It was trendy before that, but didn't become trendy again until LotR terraformed the movie landscape.
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u/BuddyAwsum 17d ago
Dungeons and dragons came out a year before lotr. And it was produced by new line cinema also I think. It's so funny out dramatically different their approach to fantasy was.
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u/Snoo38972 17d ago
Conan the Destroyer also didn't help. It was a failure after the successful Conan the Barbarian and had they stuck true to the written stories by Howard and kept the R rating instead of going for a family movie the genre would have kept going
BTW We had LadyHawke and Dragonheart come out in the 90s and the latter is really good
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u/IrishinManhattan617 17d ago
I think that is a unique one because I don’t think those movies ended because of Willow, more that Willow was just the last in a ten year epic era of fantasy adventure movies.
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u/farmerarmor 17d ago
Interestingly lord of the rings isn’t considered “sword and sorcery” per se. they consider it a fantasy epic….. Not much of a distinction in my opinion
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u/Silver_Instruction_3 17d ago
Its also considered hi-fantasy as is Willow. Both are set in make believe lands with their own made up rules that defy our world.
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u/spiritbearr 17d ago
Especially when the only character in all 6 is a fucking wizard.
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u/blharg 17d ago
that uses a sword
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u/climb-it-ographer 17d ago
"Swords are of no more use here". Proceeds to immediately pull out his sword.
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u/PugnaciousPangolin 17d ago
Which is a shame because it's a really good film. One of the best sorcery battles that I've ever seen.
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u/Your-Death-Is-Near 17d ago
Jurassic Park basically killed every future take on dinosaurs. How do you make it completely different than JP and make it still good?
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u/SometimesY 17d ago
Cleopatra signaled the end of large scale epics. It cost so much money that it nearly bankrupted Fox.
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u/kalash_and_beer 17d ago
Damn for real? Now I feel like I should watch it.
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u/NoodlesrTuff1256 17d ago
If you want to see spectacular sets and big crowd scenes that aren't CGI generated and are the real thing, see 'Cleopatra'. Lots of eye candy! The dramatics leave a bit to be desired especially in the second half with Richard Burton hamming it up as Mark Antony. But Rex Harrison as Julius Caesar and Roddy MacDowell as Octavian (Augustus) are both great. Look for Carroll O'Connor (Archie Bunker) in a small role as Casca, the first Roman senator to stick a knife in Caesar. I heard not so long ago that Patty Jenkins want to direct Gal Gadot as Cleopatra in a remake.
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u/LiebnizTheCat 17d ago
It is widely accepted that Roddy MacDowell, in an extraordinary performance, would have got the Oscar for best supporting actor in Cleopatra had the studio remembered to ‘send in the paperwork’. It epitomised the mess that was the production.
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u/dv666 16d ago
Originally it was meant to be two seperate films: One called Caesar and Cleopatra and the second Antony and Cleopatra. But the surmounting costs, as well as the affair between co-stars Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton was tabloid fodder, a decision was made to make them one film. A decision which cost more money as they had to come up with sets and scenes to make it cohesive single movie. The result is a movie that is all spectacle and no heart, as Taylor herself lamented.
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u/Soggy-Essay 17d ago
I feel like Twilight definitely hindered the vampire genre. I read about so many vampire movies and TV series that could've been great, but they were all around the Twilight movies and either got cancelled or they've been in production purgatory.
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u/BellEpoch 17d ago
Funnily enough What We Do In The Shadows is awesome and has Vampires AND parody.
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u/Woodit 17d ago
Great movie
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u/VividTangerine 17d ago
The show is also great.
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u/GregSays 17d ago
It’s hard for me to remember the perception of vampires pre-twilight, because now anything vampire adjacent automatically seems aimed at teen girls. But Blade wasn’t like that, right? And Dracula 2000? Interview with the Vampire?
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u/ConnorMc1eod 17d ago
Queen of the Damned, From Dusk til Dawn.
Naw, the vampire genre before that was UBER adult focused
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u/busybody_nightowl 17d ago edited 17d ago
The 1969 film adaptation of Hello Dolly pretty much put an end to roadshows and signaled the end of the heyday the Hollywood musical. Big budget musicals would continue to be produced (see Chicago, Moulin Rouge!, and La La Land), but they stopped dominating awards season and were fewer and further in between.
Edit: I got a lot of this from a fantastic video essay done by Lindsay Ellis which can be found here.
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u/aelitaproductions 17d ago
Paint your Wagon (also made in 1969) didn't help the situation either regarding musicals becoming outdated.
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u/_bobby_tables_ 17d ago
You shut yer mouth! Paint Your Wagon is classic considered from any angle. Lee Marvin and Clint Eastwood singing, bigamy, gambling, prostitution and gold mining! What more could you want?
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u/acuddleexperiment 17d ago
Lindsey Ellis has a great video about this. It also discussed the concept of the road show release gimmick which was a special showing that was more expensive than the regular showing and included features such as a somewhat earlier opening and a few merch included with your ticket.
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u/busybody_nightowl 17d ago
Tbf, that’s where I got most of this. I’ll add a credit in my comment. Love Lindsay Ellis.
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u/crosis52 17d ago
The failure of the big budget hollywood musical did free up space for more experimental takes on the genre in the 70s at least. It would only be three years after Hello, Dolly that Cabaret would become a smash hit and gain a ton of awards.
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u/zsquinten 17d ago
Look at the UNIVERSAL MONSTERS of the 30's and draw a few lines of comparison to the current comic-book movie market.
It went down the exact same path: team-ups, crossovers, and genre-benders. It was great until it wasn't anymore.
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u/ArcadianDelSol 17d ago
as long as we can avoid "Abbott and Costello meet the X-Men" kind of movies, I think we're going to be okay.
Because the day we get "Jack Black and Josh Gad meet Spiderman", it's all over.
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u/-SneakySnake- 17d ago
Part of the problem there is Universal taking all the wrong lessons from their successes. Even look at Dracula; that movie was insanely popular and it made Lugosi iconic as the character, but he played him a grand total of one other time, over a decade later, in a parody movie. If you're Universal, how could you not want to bring him back? Doubly so when Bride of Frankenstein was so wildly successful.
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u/LiebnizTheCat 17d ago
It was weird when everyone accused Universal of trying to copy the Marvel formula (albeit badly) recently when they’d actually invented it.
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u/Rattlingjoint 17d ago
Van Helsing tanked the universal monster genre for a bit there. To be fair though, the popularity was on life support before Scott Sommers made The Mummy through Van Helsing.
Now every movie they make seems to be a one off and buries the genre for a few years before they try again.
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u/WatchMoreMovies 17d ago
CHIPS essentially killed the short lived "remake a cult tv series into a semi-ironic modern movie" fad from the early 2010's
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u/Berta_Movie_Buff 17d ago
I’d say Baywatch is the better example, since it got a lot more attention.
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u/WatchMoreMovies 17d ago
Both aren't good, but I've actually read people praise Baywatch once or twice. Not many, but I've NEVER heard anybody say anything good about CHIPS.
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u/funbobbyfun 17d ago
it wasn't that bad! had a couple good moments, just have expectations in line with what it is
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u/william-harford 17d ago
Aside from being a painfully unfunny movie, did anyone give a shit about CHIPS in the first place?
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u/flashcapulet 17d ago
we were having a great run of spoof comedies for a while and then scary movie 5 AND movie 43 happened in like the same year and that was definitely the end of that shit
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u/bobslidell 17d ago
Scary Movie 3 is legit though
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u/mlsweeney 17d ago
My dad kept rewinding back to the part, "Tom I'll need a ride home." We were both in tears
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u/AaronianKenrod 17d ago
Every time I watch an M Night movie and he appears, this is all I think of.
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u/AlwaysBi 17d ago
Batman and Robin killed the Batman franchise for a while
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u/bob1689321 17d ago
Only actually 8 years, which isn't too bad in movie terms. I think an icon as pervasive as batman can never really die.
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u/DesignasaurusFlex 17d ago
It took 8 years for the collective conscious to purge itself of Bat nipples. We should never forget, lest we repeat that crime on Batmanity.
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u/Choco320 17d ago
I think people have gotten too used to the idea of super hero films every year
That only really started in late 2000s
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u/Level3Kobold 17d ago edited 17d ago
The early 2000's had spiderman, daredevil, elektra, hulk, fantastic 4, xmen, batman begins, the punisher, and constantine
The 90s had batman, spawn, blade, steel, the mask, the crow, tank girl, and darkman
The 80s had batman, superman, swamp thing, heavy metal, judge dredd, robocop, howard the duck, and a few forgotten hulk movies
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u/Scungilli-Man69 17d ago
It's a damn shame too. Few films are as fun to watch shitfaced with friends. The fight scene between Batman, Robin, and Ivy near the end is a fever dream. As a continuation of the campy Adam West approach, Batman and Robin is unironically brilliant and far better then anything Zack Snyder shat out.
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u/HGMIV926 17d ago
I wouldn't say they stopped a genre, but I think the two films Road Trip and American Pie played a large part in the transition of the scripted, more tame comedies we knew before the 21st century, to the comedies we know and love today, which are made up of a lot of ad-libbing and vulgarity.
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u/nanotech23 17d ago
Not another teen rated movie was pretty decent but once there is a solid parody film of a popular trend, that usually signals the end for what came before it. I say solid because the scary movie and disaster movie etc series of films are deliberately stupid at best. So happy that series has died out
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u/zsquinten 17d ago
Not Another Teen Movie is a masterpiece.
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u/lastcallface 17d ago
Amazing, funny ass movie. God, I hope Chris Evans starts doing comedies again.
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u/Shutupbitchanddie 17d ago
Anchorman pretty much ushered in that absurd comedy we'd come to see as well.
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u/adamsandleryabish 17d ago
While Anchorman definitely kicked off the Apatow era and style, you could easily push it back to Zoolander in 2001 which is very absurd and has a lot of the same qualities.
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u/Typical_Humanoid 17d ago
For awhile now I've considered What's Up Doc? to be both a brief revival and a kind of swan song for that very specific kind of romcom, the one with screwball-like conventions. No other romcom made since is exactly like that, so for me it's a closing chapter for that niche.
Come to think of it it's often said Hello Dolly murdered the big studio movie musical (Aaaand someone beat me to the punch and mentioned it before me) so is Barbra Streisand on a forever quest to destroy the happiest of genres?
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u/Idk_Very_Much 17d ago
No other romcom made since is exactly like that, so for me it's a closing chapter for that niche.
Have you seen Down With Love?
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u/ploppystop 17d ago
Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox story ended the musical biopic genre for like 10 years
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u/PugnaciousPangolin 17d ago
It's been said before, but "Airplane!" killed the disaster genre for a LONG time.
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u/bob1689321 17d ago
What brought it back? Independence Day?
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u/floppybarricuda 17d ago
Twister and Independence Day I think. After that you had Volcano, Dante's Peak, Deep Impact, Armageddon, The Core, Day After Tomorrow, etc...
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u/fucktooshifty 17d ago
pretty sure Backdraft put disaster movies in a 5 year coma right before all these movies came out
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u/oceanic20 17d ago
Backdraft wasn't a disaster movie, it was a firefighter drama. There were lots of those in the 80s and 90s, and it may have killed that genre. I went to the theatre to see it and I was the only person there.
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u/PugnaciousPangolin 17d ago
Good question! I feel like "Independence Day" is more sci-fi/action than disaster but it's certainly a viable choice.
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u/bob1689321 17d ago
I think I lump it in with disaster movies because it's the same director as Day After Tomorrow and other proper disaster movies so in my head it counts lol
I haven't actually seen it in over a decade so I don't remember much, you're probably that it's more of an action film.
What are some other good disaster movies? I only really know those few haha.
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u/PugnaciousPangolin 17d ago
Well, you don't care about logic AT ALL, then "The Core" will have you laughing your ass off. Here's the trailer:
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u/karma_the_sequel 17d ago edited 17d ago
I would argue that Airport ‘79 killed the disaster movie genre and that Airplane! actually revived it, albeit in an unexpected way.
I think the only reason Airplane! even got made was that, after Airport ‘79, the industry realized that the genre was so played out that the only play left was for it to parody itself (a strategy Scream would later follow). What nobody anticipated was that the Zuckers would be so absolutely brilliant at it.
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u/SaltySteveD87 17d ago
Showgirls basically killed the mainstream NC-17 feature. It was a slim chance that the rating would've become more commonplace but the fact that it was attached to such a laughably bad movie was the nail in the coffin.
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u/bluesmudge 17d ago
Showgirls is the highest grossing NC-17 movie of all time though. I would argue there never was such a thing as the mainstream NC-17 feature.
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u/SaltySteveD87 17d ago
While this is technically true it was still a financial failure; the movie didn't turn a profit until it was released on home video. And even then it was viewed as a cult movie.
We've yet to see another NC-17 movie get any kind of mainstream attention since.
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u/OzymandiasKoK 17d ago
Ratings past R have an audience-limiting feature. It shouldn't be all that difficult to understand why movie makers and movie theaters avoid them.
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u/bob1689321 17d ago
Its weird, here in the UK there is an 18 rating that is technically more severe than NC-17 in terms of age restriction, but has none of the stigma attached. But generally it's the sort of movies considered "Hard R" that get an 18 rating. Like Watchmen for example, which has bloody violence, a graphic sex scene and constant full frontal nudity.
R-rated movies are split between our 15 and 18 ratings. The big difference is nobody below those ages can see the films in cinema, regardless of adult supervision.
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u/Quaytsar 17d ago
The US (MPAA) is messed up in that G (General) and NC-17 (No one 17 and under; equivalent to UK 18) are essentially unused. Movies are almost all PG, PG-13 or R because G is seen as only for toddlers and NC-17 is seen as only art-house porn, even though neither of those is true. So both ratings kill the box office. So you get added swearing to up the rating or incredible violence without blood to drop it. Or things like Kill Bill making one scene black and white, but just as violent, to avoid NC-17. It's so stupid.
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u/snrup1 17d ago
Is NC-17 even a thing anymore? What would be the point if theaters won’t show them? It seems that it’s only given out to force directors to cut specific content to get an R rating.
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u/crosis52 17d ago
There are still NC-17 movies being made, Blue is the Warmest Color is a fairly recent and well-known one from 2013. It's just vastly more common for studios to re-edit them to get an R (like was done with Wolf of Wall Street, Midsommar, Sausage Party, Evil Dead, Prisoners, every single Saw movie, etc etc)
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u/2somethingsomething 17d ago edited 17d ago
Wrath of the titans in 3D. Everyone was loving 3D and didn't question paying for it till this movie ripped them off.
It was Clash not Wrath.
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u/Silver_Instruction_3 17d ago
3D was killed off because vast majority of 3D movies were not shot in 3D and the conversions got worse and worse.
Also, the glasses and overall experience was just not very comfortable.
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u/2somethingsomething 17d ago
Correct and it was Clash that did the first BS 3D conversion.
I was running a theatre back then and everyone loved 3D for the sites with a digital projector allowing us to show RealD. It was one of the reason I went to this site.
3D was often selling out first and Guest settled for 2D. It all flipped after Clash and suddenly the guests had questions and weren't sure if they were being bamboozled by more money grabs that benefited the studios and theatre chains.
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u/beyondrepair- 17d ago
3d was given the bigger, better screens and seats. it wasn't a fair comparison.
thank fuck that's finally over with. i've watch more than one movie half blurry because i refused to wear those awful glasses.
planet of the apes had maybe 4 scenes that were blurry. the rest of the film was absolutely fine to watch without glasses on
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u/2somethingsomething 17d ago
The 3D equipment was placed on a big, middle and small size house. Early on it was in the larger house cause it's what guests wanted. Then it was only in the larger houses if the studios made us (Disney with Star Wars) or we had too many 3D films so something had to take up a big house and have it sit nearly empty for the 3D show.
I think these days most are happy it's gone since they used it wrong and tried to force it down the consumers throats.
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u/ReverseJackalope 17d ago
Saw changed the horror genre from self aware Scream knockoffs to torture movies like Hostel & Martyrs.
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u/hackerrr 17d ago
Gimme Shelter - the Maysles brothers documentary depicting the weeks leading up to and the events that occured at the Altamont Speedway Concert with the Stones.
The Altamont Festival is generally considered to be the end of the counter-culture/hippie movement in America, and the film serves as perfect monument to that.
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u/live_laugh_redrum 17d ago
Waterworld-killed the post apocalyptic epic for a while. Unless you count the Postman. Those two combined were Costner’s version of the Double-Tap, make sure it stays dead.
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u/Christyboy2000 17d ago
This isn’t a specific film, but, beginning in 1981 (and probably even before that), assloads of low budget slasher films, that were almost certainly going to make a profit, were being churned out by studios to the point where the public got tired of the genre. A Nightmare On Elm Street is one of the only successful exceptions after 1981. After that, it was mostly only sequels to the biggest slasher names. Of course, this didn’t kill the genre, but it was definitely burned out too quickly and the genre hasn’t been the same since. You also don’t see so many of them in theaters, you really only see them as direct-to-video films that most people haven’t even heard of.
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u/Wandos7 17d ago
Not quite ended the genre, but World War Z and all its problems seems to have stopped the momentum of the zombie genre in 2013.
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u/whatzzart 17d ago
I heard on here somewhere that China doesn’t like the zombie genre so it’s not going to be profitable to invest in.
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u/_Madison_ 17d ago
China hates anything to do with the undead. It's why they censor skeletons in games etc.
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u/Silver_Instruction_3 17d ago edited 17d ago
I have to disagree with your assessment of the death of the Western. Its time was just due since these movies covered a period of time that had since been surpassed by major historical events and changes to American society. The classic Western was the first film genre that focused on the American hero. They were the first real action films. As America progressed and social reforms happened, the idea of the American hero has shifted several times.
First off, the resurgence of the Western took place in the late 60s and was the result of a change in American’s perceptions regarding morality. People started to see right and wrong as more of a gray area due to all of the major social changes that were taking place at the time. This led to the popularization of the anti-hero. Human rights movements also saw a shift in the social conscious making movies where the good guy kills native Americans less popular. Edit: Pretty much all of the Westerns made in the 60s to mid 70s had criminals as the protagonist and the government as the antagonists. Outlaw Josey Wales comes to mind as peak of this genre.
In the late 70s, we also saw the emergence of the blockbuster. The success of Star Wars and Jaws shifted the paradigm. In the 80s we also got the action star. Arnold, Sly, Willis introduced America to a new type of hero, the one that not only fought enemies foreign, but also domestic. The western hero had morphed into a wise-cracking New York cop and the Indians were replaced with suited up Germans. “Yippee ki yay motherfucker”.
I can go into a lot more detail about many other reasons why the Western died but I think I made my point.
So while Heaven’s Gate may have signaled the end of a certain way movies were made, I don’t think it was a sign of the end of the Western as a trend, that had already happened.
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u/gordonious 17d ago
Not a film but I feel streaming has killed the comedy genre. Comedy is subjective and people are aware of that. Now that we have the option to, people would rather just watch a comedy film online than make a trip to the theater. Now, I could be totally wrong. But what’s the last theatrically released comedy film that made a big cultural impact? “The Hangover”?
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u/Lamont-Cranston 17d ago
comedies fit into the 'mid-budget' of film making and that has been killed by the studios blockbuster mentality+online
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u/wBuddha 17d ago edited 17d ago
Going the other direction.
Jaws ruined the lo-bud summer bubblegum movies, showed it was possible to make a Summer Blockbuster, big big dollars, now it is rare to get a throwaway movie in the summer.
2001: A Space Odyssey killed anyone from making B-Movie space opera flicks, moved the standard way up.
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u/artskyd 17d ago
Not to detract from Dunkirk and 1917, but story-based war movies are gonna need a champion for war movies to not get too far up their own butt.
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u/midjt 16d ago
Honestly think Saving Private Ryan and the other Hanks/Spielberg WW2 miniseries set such a superb standard that everything that has come since in this genre, despite trying to be unique, has almost felt like they’ve fallen short.
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u/oli4king 17d ago
For me at least, Avengers: Endgame.
It kind of killed a certain feeling for every following marvel movie.
I liked Spiderman: far from home. But there's just something that makes it feel like "just another superhero movie" Instead of being part of a bigger continues story.
Idk, hard to explain...
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u/MrLee723 17d ago
For me personally I would consider Disney’s The Princess and the Frog to be the death of mainstream 2D animated films. It made quite a decent amount of money its first weekend and was generally liked by both critics and audiences…and then one week later James Cameron’s Avatar was released and changed the game for everyone.
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u/karma_the_sequel 17d ago
Nobody’s comparing James Cameron movies to Disney 2-D animation.
Pixar 3-D animation movies are what killed off Disney 2-D movies.
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u/ethman14 17d ago
Movie musicals have had their ups and downs, deaths and revivals...but something tells me Tom Hooper's dismal adaptation of Cats from 2019 may scare Hollywood from investing in the genre in the coming years.
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u/McIgglyTuffMuffin 17d ago
We just had In the Heights and coming up is Spielberg's West Side Story, Dear Evan Hansen is coming out shortly, Tick Tick...Boom is hitting Netflix in the next couple of months.
I don't think the genre is dead at all right now.
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u/karmicbreath 17d ago
Great answers here, but y'all are missing the greatest example of all! Iron Man was the beginning of the end for studio-produced mid-tier to high-tier original auteur movies.
The MCU completely changed the economics of Hollywood. Everything every studio prioritizes now are large budget shared universes.
Netflix and the other streamers do their best to cater to legacy auteurs. But other than Spielberg, Nolan, and Villeneuve, there are no more great auteur works financed and produced by the studios.
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u/Werty071345 17d ago
Austin powers killed bond/campy spy films.
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u/shiksa_feminista 17d ago
It's not a spy film, but "Barb and Star go to Vista Del Marr" is the first movie I've seen in years that felt like Austin Powers. Campy, stupid but fun, with secret lairs and ridiculous stakes, starring an SNL cast member in multiple roles, and a romantic interest who is famous in their own right, but playing a character wildly outside of their usual comfort zone.
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u/LastDanceGuy12 17d ago
Not true, Bond at his campiest has literally never under performed at the box office. Austin Powers shined a light on it sure, but it didnt even come close to slowing the train down.
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u/Madazhel 17d ago
Bond movies ditched the camp with Timothy Dalton in the late '80s. Austin Powers was spoofing something that had long been dead.
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u/lastcallface 17d ago
They brought it back with Pierce Brosnan. Like, there was an invisible car in one of them.
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u/BobTheGC 17d ago
The Wild Bunch. According to John Wayne, it killed the myth of the old west. From that point on, westerns were way more cynical and forwent a lot of the idealism that was previously a staple of the genre. (Which imo is a good thing. Any movie John Wayne hates is one I love.)
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u/BigPoppaPuff 17d ago
Divergent seems like a pretty clear example. For a while everything was YA-dystopia after the Hunger Games but that series bombed really hard and never even got completed.