The Patriot Post® · Hollywood's Half-Trillion-Dollar Imbroglio

The entertainment/movie sector has taken quite a financial hit these past few years. The Walt Disney Company alone lost $120 billion in market value in 2022.

According to The Epoch Times: “Entertainment losses last year surpassed those in other sectors, such as banking, which saw a 14.5 percent drop, and telecommunications, which witnessed an 11.2 percent decline in revenue. Major studios, streaming services, cable providers, broadcasters, and other media groups, lost a combined $542 billion in market value in 2022.”

That’s a 40% drop in market value overall.

To some extent, inflation does have a lot to do with it. Americans are tightening their belts and not spending as much on streaming platforms. Nor are they returning to the theaters (though COVID also contributed to this happenstance). In the 1930s during the Great Depression, people would still go to the movies in spite of struggling financially. Back then, movies were a great way to escape the hard reality of their lives. Movies gave people hope for a better future. It was worth spending that nickel.

Today’s Hollywood is unable to attract the average consumer because it simply isn’t making much content that is worth watching. Why? The general answer is that Hollywood no longer understands its audience. It wants to be the moral influencer instead of the product.

Hollywood is infected with anti-American bias. Part of this is because many in Hollywood are leftists who don’t think America is a good country. They believe that America is an evil country that has to constantly be paying for the sins of the past. There are only so many times different demographics (straight white men, nuclear families, religious people) can be told they are deplorable and loathsome before they stop watching the tripe entirely.

Another aspect affecting movie quality is foreign influence. China specifically has a financial and geopolitical stake in American films and has succeeded in stifling quality movies before they could be made. China does not have America’s best interests at heart. TikTok is a perfect example. The Chinese version of the social media platform uses an algorithm to make academic or artistic achievements go viral. It is targeted to improve the aspirations of Chinese youth who use the platform. America’s version tempts its users down the paths of poor lifestyle choices and superficial dances and has greatly contributed to the mental health crisis among our youth. If China has done this with a social media app, what it is controlling in the film industry is equally destructive and demoralizing.

Hollywood’s whole infrastructure has become a vehicle for the radical Left’s agenda. It pushes culturally destructive tropes like abortion, gender ideology, radical feminism, anti-family messages, and critical race theory in the hopes of convincing a nation. Ironically, these tropes often prove the opposite of Hollywood’s message. The Marilyn Monroe remake “Blonde” shows an abortion and the trauma that caused. “Tár” serves as an interesting projection of what leftists think a conservative is. Ultimately, the American people are tired of being force-fed an ideology that they don’t agree with — an ideology that clearly isn’t making its acolytes happy as evidenced by the broken lives of many Hollywood celebs.

Hollywood is also guilty of beating the metaphorical dead horse when it comes to overdoing tropes until the genre is dried up. One great example of this are the Marvel movies. People loved seeing all the superheroes in that universe, but after the 40th film, people are ready for new stories. Many moviegoers are also fed up with the explicit sexual content and gore in movies. It seems filmmakers are also using only one character archetype: the antihero. God forbid they write about a hero — who believes in that anyway? American audiences are craving variety, creativity, wholesomeness, and hope. None of which Hollywood seems capable of creating.

Perhaps going down in flames is the goal. The demise of film — the great American art form — could be considered a victory to our geopolitical enemies, or a moral victory for the radical elites who don’t realize they’ve cut off their nose to spite their face.

Whatever the cause, these issues are all coming home to roost. Hollywood A-listers yell and scream at common Americans for not liking their movies while forgetting that the movies they are making are a product for the common man. Hollywood is out of touch, compromised, and losing money hand over fist.