Live data from Hacker News

'Backrooms' Stuns with $81M Debut

variety.com

31–40 of 201 posts

Re: 'Backrooms' Stuns with $81M Debut

#31
All they had to do was simply hire a talented person who knows how to make compelling narrative art. This is lost on the movie industry, though Hollywood has been treading water for over a decade now, failing to examine its failures and coasting on inertia.

In general, there is sooo much free money on the ground for large, hierarchical American corporations to do the following

1. Give young talented people resources and freedom

2. Don't put them through endless bullshit internal status games

The reason why the tech industry in the US thrives so much is partially due to the fact that it is one of the few industries that gives people high salaries and agency in their roles without a huge amount of experience.

Almost everywhere else is just an artifically gated series of internal politics, nepotism and pointless rituals in too-big-to-fail industries, which attract people who prefer these games over actual results.

Re: 'Backrooms' Stuns with $81M Debut

#32

That really shows the hunger for original stories and IC among cinephiles. Major studios were too afraid to produce something fresh instead of numberless sequels and reboots in the last decade or so.

Matt Damon talked about this somewhere. The risk aversion stems from the move away from DVD sales. Historically a lot of low and mid budget movies relied on DVD sales to recoup costs even if theater releases didn’t get you as much money as you expected. With the safety net gone, studios don’t want to take the risk. They make big budget movies with massive marketing budgets that rely on known IP and established fan ba…

It’s because nobody has made Steam for Movies. Let me have a movie collection that I can buy movies $1-$5 per movie and never lose it and I promise you I will buy a lot more movies. Just like people buy hundreds of steam games

Re: 'Backrooms' Stuns with $81M Debut

#33

The what? Horror something? ....started on 4chan? Yeah, immediate aboutface here. And reading wiki articles about it that throw around words like "creepypasta" like that's widely understood? Liminal spaces I get. Reminds of Severance . And anyways, how is this worth going to a theater for? A24 has done well. Is 81M considered breaching 'mainstream'? Because these niche horror things being portrayed as part of the gre…

A darkened theater with a glowing screen is precisely the sort of liminal space that is the topic of the movie. $20 to fall through the skin of the world for a couple hours? Seems like a no-brainer to me, given how rare and precious any liminal feeling at all is these days. And, if I go support this, maybe they’ll finally make a House of Leaves movie. One can dream.

Re: 'Backrooms' Stuns with $81M Debut

#34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Matt Damon talked about this somewhere. The risk aversion stems from the move away from DVD sales. Historically a lot of low and mid budget movies relied on DVD sales to recoup costs even if theater releases didn’t get you as much money as you expected. With the safety net gone, studios don’t want to take the risk. They make big budget movies with massive marketing budgets that rely on known IP and established fan ba…

It’s because nobody has made Steam for Movies. Let me have a movie collection that I can buy movies $1-$5 per movie and never lose it and I promise you I will buy a lot more movies. Just like people buy hundreds of steam games

The iTunes movie store launched 20 years ago. It’s far from perfect but it is essentially steam for movies. Sadly it’s been de-emphasised over time. But it is still there and was pretty good for a while.

Re: 'Backrooms' Stuns with $81M Debut

#36
No spoilers below:

The movie was great but it's not a stand-alone movie, it is a small piece of the full story so don't go in thinking that everything will be explained and tied up in a neat little bow.

The movie takes place in Kane Pixel (the movie director's) youtube series: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLVAh-MgDVqvDUEq6qDXqO...

It makes a lot more sense if you watch the full youtube series first.

Re: 'Backrooms' Stuns with $81M Debut

#39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Matt Damon talked about this somewhere. The risk aversion stems from the move away from DVD sales. Historically a lot of low and mid budget movies relied on DVD sales to recoup costs even if theater releases didn’t get you as much money as you expected. With the safety net gone, studios don’t want to take the risk. They make big budget movies with massive marketing budgets that rely on known IP and established fan ba…

It’s because nobody has made Steam for Movies. Let me have a movie collection that I can buy movies $1-$5 per movie and never lose it and I promise you I will buy a lot more movies. Just like people buy hundreds of steam games

[deleted]

Re: 'Backrooms' Stuns with $81M Debut

#40

No spoilers below: The movie was great but it's not a stand-alone movie, it is a small piece of the full story so don't go in thinking that everything will be explained and tied up in a neat little bow. The movie takes place in Kane Pixel (the movie director's) youtube series: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLVAh-MgDVqvDUEq6qDXqO... It makes a lot more sense if you watch the full youtube series first.

I am aware of the existence of the web series but have never seen any of it, and I felt it was a great standalone experience. The lack of explanation I think worked really well.
Post reply on HN