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Matt Damon Says Netflix Wants Movies to Restate the ‘Plot Three or Four Times in the Dialogue’ Because Viewers are on ‘Their Phones While They’re Watching’ (variety.com)
submitted 9 months ago by to c/television@piefed.social
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[–] 202 points 9 months ago (24 children)

Make movies that are engaging enough to keep people from checking their feeds while they wait for something to happen.

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  • [–] 13 points 9 months ago

    My wife said that the Wire was hard to follow and boring, but she also checked her phone every 5 minutes and was carrying on a conversation there with her friends. She also impulsively pulled out facebook and scrolled a bit. I pointed all this out but Its still the shows fault somehow.

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  • [–] 40 points 9 months ago* (4 children)

    Part of it is the movie, but a large part is that short form video trains your brain to need frequent dopamine fixes. A 5 second video does that, while a 90 minute movie might not give it until the climax.

    It's not much different than a smoker taking a break during a movie.

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  • [–] 39 points 9 months ago (1 child)

    If someone starts a movie and immediately pulls their phone out or starts cleaning, that’s on them.

    And movies absolutely should not be made to cater to addiction. Nothing should, except for something explicitly designed to help people recover from addiction.

    When movies have a good idea and are given the proper attention to make them well, regular people won’t be checking the time or reading blogs when they become bored. The problem is that studios say that, good idea or not, proper attention to the craft or not, we’re making this many movies this year. We’re lucky if a few of those movies are something future generations would consider good.

    Matt Damon is suggesting that movies be made even worse than they already are.

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  • [–] 5 points 9 months ago (3 children)

    That’s the problem they don’t want to discuss. Writing has gotten seriously shitty.

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  • [–] 3 points 9 months ago (2 children)

    If you watch shitty movies, yes. There are still plenty of good movies being made.

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  • [–] 2 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (1 child)

    I've watched through ‘Severance’, which is very popular afaict. It's chock full of protracted shots padding the runtime. Either the directors (mostly Ben Stiller) think they're new Kubricks, or the directive was to make the show longer. Idk what Netflix gets from a longer show, when a season is dumped all at once anyway — presumably more space for ads, which are apparently there now. I wouldn't feel much guilty about checking the phone in between any meaningful action.

    The only new film that really gripped me in the past few years was ‘The Substance’, which felt like oldschool Cronenberg stuff. Ironically it's comparatively long, and doesn't even have much dialogue.

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  • [–] 0 points 9 months ago*

    First and foremost, you're complaining about pacing, not writing. Second, that's your opinion and that's fine. Personally, I don't think every single second needs to move the plot forward. I'm perfectly fine with sections of it being transicions or world building or other stuff.

    Your opinion's fine though. Just go watch something else. However, you not liking something doesn't mean that it's necessarily bad, nor good.

    If the substance really is the only film that gripped you in the past few years, then you either are terrible at picking movies or you just don't really like cinema all that much.

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  • [–] 1 point 9 months ago (9 children)

    Oh fucking please.. that has nothing to do with it.

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  • [–] 5 points 9 months ago (8 children)

    lol yea, toootally nothing to do with it. That's why nobody ever talks about great movies, and movies toooootally aren't getting longer nad longer... yep, totally not a quality to attention thing.

    Not like there are legendary movies that are several hours long that people still watch... Yep, quality has nothing to do with how long people stay engaged with movies!

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  • [–] 4 points 9 months ago (1 child)

    Do the people who have their phones out in films nowadays watch those old movies without looking at their phones, hmm?

    Your snark makes you sound like an arsehole.

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  • [–] 1 point 9 months ago (3 children)

    The fact that classics exist has literally nothing to do with this discussion. Also, no, movies aren't getting longer. Source.

    There are plenty of great films still being made every year. If you don't watch or like them, that's a you problem.

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  • [–] 0 points 9 months ago (2 children)

    Nowhere did I say they no longer make good movies.

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