In one of the few movies I went to a theater to see, Darkest Hour was phenomenal. And I was shocked that the Academy awarded Gary Oldman the Oscar for Best Actor. He actually earned it. And Oldman, a British citizen, spent most of his time thanking America for everything she had given him, his career, his family, etc. And the Hollywood great ones were silent.
Now there is a possibility that Hollywood may start looking at making movies for people who may actually watch them.
Making Movies in the Trump Era for the Audience Hollywood IgnoredIt amazes me that an industry, faced with massive competition from direct to home video sources (e.g.Amazon.com Prime, Hulu, etc) needs to be reminded they should put out things that sell. I used to go to 2-3 movies a month, now it's 2-3 a year. It's not worth it. And until some people in Hollywood start loosing their shirts and houses, it may never get through.
Producer Dallas Sonnier fled Los Angeles to create ‘populist entertainment’; Vince Vaughn as an unemployed mechanic who kills drug dealers to protect his wife from a forced abortion
These cousins of his are schoolteachers, HVAC installers, construction workers—just the kind of audience he thinks Hollywood has unwisely left behind.
“If I text them the name of, let’s say, Timothée Chalamet, they don’t know who the hell he is,” Mr. Sonnier says. “They haven’t seen ‘Lady Bird,’ and they certainly haven’t seen ‘Call Me By Your Name.’ But if I text them Vince Vaughn, Kurt Russell, Don Johnson ? They go f—ing crazy!”
His October release, “Brawl in Cell Block 99,” passed the test. Mr. Vaughn portrayed an out-of-work mechanic who killed Mexican drug dealers to protect his wife from a forced abortion. It had a tiny theatrical release with little media coverage, but its DVDs were a hit at Walmart as soon as they hit the shelves.
Mr. Sonnier’s company, Cinestate , which made “Brawl,” is backed by an anonymous Texas oil heiress, he says, to produce “populist entertainment.”
The 38-year-old former talent manager, who got his start working with actor and director Greta Gerwig, now finds himself navigating culture, commerce and politics in trying to answer a question facing Hollywood: Where does entertainment go in the Trump era?
The industry has responded to that question largely by using platforms such as the Academy Awards to rail against the Trump administration. That has alienated many moviegoers, and today those are the people Mr. Sonnier has in mind.
“If we can make a movie that does not treat them as losers, or ask how dare they vote a certain way, or pander to them, naturally they’re going to respond in a positive way,” says Mr. Sonnier, who says he wrote in a candidate for the 2016 presidential election because he didn’t support Hillary Clinton and had lost respect for Donald Trump following the “Access Hollywood” tape’s release.
Since fleeing Los Angeles in 2015 for Texas, where he grew up, Mr. Sonnier has cast himself as the producer willing to do features that others in Hollywood consider politically radioactive. In the past year, he has wrapped production on “Dragged Across Concrete,” starring Mel Gibson as a cop accused of beating a suspect, filmed a drama about militia members, and bought a script about a school shooting in which a female student wrests control of a gun and fights back...
...Hollywood has occasionally targeted conservative moviegoers, releasing faith-based movies in specific neighborhoods or producing patriotic blockbusters such as “American Sniper.” The difference is that Mr. Sonnier is betting a whole company on a strategy of finding consumers he says are “outside the coasts,” marrying ideology with opportunism...
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