Netflix and the Great Audience Divide
So I watched Charlie Kaufman‘s I’m Thinking Of Ending Things, although that, in a way, could be seen as a review. Just that, just the acknowledgement of having seen it. Few people have a strong, definitive emotion having just finished I’m Thinking Of Ending Things, however most people come out of that film thinking one thing: Did anyone ask for this?
Well, Kaufman does have a fanbase of dedicated viewers who will undoubtedly tune in to whatever he decides to do next; Kaufstans, if you will. However the average Netflix user is not a Kaufstan, far from it; I simply refuse to believe that any Kaufstan watched I’m Thinking Of Ending Things in a onesie.
As the streaming service grows in prominence, Netflix has carved out a niche for a very particular type of film; the films that the other studios don’t want to risk making. Alfonso Cuaron, Noah Baumbach, David Ayer, we have seen some of the most talented filmmakers working today move over to Netflix… and David Ayer. Hell, even Zack Snyder has popped over to Netflix for his latest, Army of the Dead, a zombie film which I’m assuming is going to be as bombastic as all of his other work.
Virtually no one liked Michael Bay’s Netflix flick 6 Underground. Bay is a long-standing supporter of the cinematic experience, often an advocate of surround sound and 3D screenings, which is reflected in his loud, saturated style of filmmaking. 6 Underground was a film which was greatly diminished by not playing in theaters. However, on the opposite end of the spectrum, Noah Baumbach’s Netflix flick Marriage Story is a film which is enhanced by the conventions of Netflix. Baumbach’s film is a quiet, intimate story of muted colours and a boxy aspect ratio. Watching Marriage Story on your computer, at your desk, a chocolate bar in your hand, wearing your freshly washed onesie and no one else in the house to witness you cry, is the perfect way to watch it.
Netflix is trying to play Top Trumps (a card game, for the uninitiated) with other studios. Warner Bros. may have Clint Eastwood and Todd Phillips in their arsenal but in terms of directors, Netflix beats everyone. What other studio can boast that it has worked with the likes of Cary Joji Fukanaga, David Michod, Angelina Jolie, Mike Flanagan, Bong Joon-ho, Paul Greengrass, The Coen Brothers and even Orson-fucking-Welles?
It seems as if Netflix is trying to amass a heap of directors by offering them the opportunity to make the films that other studios didn’t want to, regardless of what it is. Paramount Pictures, for example, sold the rights to Martin Scorsese’s The Irishman to Netflix after the budget soared beyond the point where Paramount thought it would be profitable. Similarly, Paramount Pictures sold the rights to the “Dadsiest” of Dad movies Triple Frontier, which also faced production issues. Netflix has given these directors the resources to make the films that they want to make. The only problem is that arguably no one is watching them.
According to Business Insider, less than 20% of US viewers of The Irishman made it to the end of the film within its first day on the streamer. Imagine watching a film in a cinema and seeing 80% of the audience walk out midway. Things get worse for Vince Gilligan’s El Camino, which by comparison only managed to retain 11% of its US viewers in its opening day, a surprising piece of information considering the fact that El Camino is part of one of the most successful and culturally beloved media franchises of the last century, Breaking Bad. You forgot about El Camino, didn’t you? So did I, and I watched the damned thing to the end.
This leads back to I’m Thinking Of Ending Things, which is a Charlie Kaufman film through-and-through; muted colour palettes, meandering monologues about the inevitability of death, a quiet and sexually repressed out of shape blonde man as the protagonist. Truly, this is the kind of film that Kaufman wanted to make. Both its fans and its detractors will agree that the film is awkward, slow, confusing and at times unbearable to watch. I’m Thinking Of Ending Things is not the film which a person with a chocolate bar, dressed in their favourite onesie, wants to watch. Naturally, Rotten Tomatoes has the film split between a high critics rating and a low audience rating, the gold standard of films that alienate its viewers.
Netflix is reaching a point where their expanse on crew members and the authorial voice of which a director holds may surpass its expectations of what a reasonable audience wants to see. Sure, Netflix is always going to make some throwaway entertainment designed for as broad of an audience as possible; why else would The Kissing Booth be turned into a trilogy? However, their more serious, director driven fair has a tough time of balancing artistic expression and audience retention. Netflix need to keep their audience in mind when giving free reign to a director because, at the end of the day, they need an audience that will commit to (fully) watching these movies after all. – Kayven Kaplan