Does Hollywood's Future depend on Hollywood's Past? PART ONE

Recently, the Federal Trade Commission issued a report accusing the entertainment industry of peddling violence to children. Now our presidential hopefuls George W. Bush and especially Al Gore have been making noise about how Hollywood has to clean up its act or face intrusive government regulation.

While it perturbs me that politicians would take millions of dollars in campaign donations from Hollywood and then turn around and criticize them (criticism mixed with a wink, methinks, a wink that says "keep that money coming and I'll keep talking out of both sides of my mouth."), there is no doubt that Gore, who has been especially outspoken recently, is correct in his criticism, if not his solution. If there is one thing that defines America, it is our movies, and for the past decade, I have been quite disturbed at the picture we have been painting of ourselves.

But do we need government oversight of our entertainment? As a people, we are constantly torn between two very different political ideas - would we rather be safe or free? The more power we put in the hands of government, local and federal, the more freedom we give up. This is a very dangerous road, one that we should not go down. What would be better, and what Hollywood once had, is self-regulation. The Hays Office, famous for its zealous prudentry, at least represented an attempt at self-regulation.

The problem, as I see it, is that, after 80 to 90 years of innovation and growth, Hollywood now panders to the least common denominator. Comedy has devolved into the crudest sex jokes, action into violence, plot into manipulation and dialogue into catch phrases.

The popularity of home video and cable television has been both a blessing and a curse. While it is now easy to see almost any film you wish and watch it in the privacy of your own home, it has also lowered expectations of how good those films have to be. To make the effort to go out of the house and spend close to nine dollars to see a film, that film must appear to be very good. But we are much more lenient with what kind of film we will pass the time with in our own homes, and Hollywood has responded to that over the past decade. Movies that tank at the box office do not go away like movies before the video revolution - they hang around forever on cable and in video rental places, I know firsthand, from my years working in a video store, that many people will rent almost any film, as long as it is new on the shelves.

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