Veteran director Ridley Scott didn’t mince words when asked to describe the state of modern filmmaking. In fact, he needed just four letters: “s**t.”
The ornery 87-year-old — the force behind iconic movies like “Alien,” “Black Hawk Down,” and “Gladiator” — brought down the hammer of justice during a public Q and A with his son Luke in London this week.
‘I think a lot of films today are saved and made more expensive by digital effects, because what they haven’t got is a great thing on paper first. Get it on paper.’
“Well, right now I’m finding mediocrity, we’re drowning in mediocrity,” he responded when asked about his own moviegoing habits, according to Yahoo.
Smurfy’s law
Pretentious? Maybe, but it becomes more understandable if you consider the recent crop of multiplex mistakes foisted on the public, suggested the Guardian. The newspaper cited the recent “Smurfs” movie as well as the widely criticized live-action “Snow White” remake — which used “CGI dwarves [that] looked like semi-melted CGI gonks” — as evidence for the prosecution.
Director Ridley Scott on the set of the movie ‘Alien,’ 1979. Photo by Stanley Bielecki Movie Collection/Getty Images
During the sit-down at the British Film Institute Southbank, Scott said that this mediocrity prevails despite more movies being made than ever.
“The quantity of movies that are made today, literally globally, millions. There’s not thousands, there’s millions, and most of it is s**t,” he declared.
Numbers game
The “Blade Runner” director then shared the math behind that determination.
“Eighty to 60% eh, 40% is the rest, and 25% of that 40 is not bad, and 10% is pretty good, and the top 5% is great,” he explained, as if writing on a chalkboard. “I’m not sure about the portion of what I’ve just said, but in the 1940s, when there were perhaps 300 movies made, 70% of them were similar, for example.”
Harrison Ford and Ridley Scott on the set of ‘Blade Runner.’ Photo by Sunset Boulevard/Corbis via Getty Images
Man in the mirror
Still, there is at least one talented director still working today, affirmed Sir Scott.
“So what I do, and it’s a horrible thing, but I’ve started to watch my own movies, and actually they’re really good. And also, they don’t age.”
Scott continued his rave review, admitting that he was shocked by the quality of his own work.
“I watched ‘Black Hawk [Down]’ the other night, and I thought, ‘How the hell did I do that?’ But I think that occasionally there’s a good one that will happen, it’s like a relief that there’s somebody out there who’s doing a good movie.”
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Photo by Matt Winkelmeyer/Getty Images
Scott then turned to a trend currently irritating moviegoers of all ages: directors attempting to save bad scripts with excessive CGI.
“I think a lot of films today are saved and made more expensive by digital effects, because what they haven’t got is a great thing on paper first. Get it on paper,” he said.
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‘Hood’ rich
Not everyone is ready to embrace this curmudgeonly view — even coming from a legend like Scott.
While Scott makes “a few” good points, his rant is “really rich coming from the director of ‘Robin Hood,’” entertainment writer Natasha Biase told Align.
“He must have amnesia about some of his own movies,” the writer added.
As for Hollywood, it seems to have forgotten how to get butts in seats.
A decrease in movie quality seems to be at least part of the reason about half the amount of tickets were sold in 2024 compared to 2004.
Scott told the audience that his favorite meal is yogurt and blueberries, because he “got over food years ago.”
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