I heard once the reason for McDonalds success. Heaven knows it has nothing to do with the quality of their food; I think most people I've talked to agree that there are better places to get a hamburger than the land of the "Golden Arches." The reason for their success is consistency and expectation. Everyone knows what their going to get at McDonalds, and that usually doesn't differ with each time.
It's the same with movies and books, too. This last Halloween season, Emilee and I sat down and watched all of the Harry Potter movies from The Sorcerer's Stone to The Order of the Phoenix. Watching the movies back to back gave glimpses into the story choice that J.K. Rowling made as she wrote her series.
Rowling loved to make good use of red herrings. This begins with Snape in the first movie, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone. As the plot and story unfolds, the story makes the viewer along with Harry think that Snape is the culprit--the villian who longs to end Harry's life. Through the first time we meet him in the Commons area and Harry feels his scar burn at the same time--Quirrel, of course is standing just beside Snape with his back turned--to the disappearance of Snape on the night of Halloween and his resulting wound, and the bewitched broomstick in the Quidditch match with Hermione and Ron discovering that Snape is not breaking his eye contact with Harry and he's muttering enchantments under his breath--all of these lead the viewer and reader to believe that Snape is the villian. Of course, as one watched the movie from the beginning on second viewing, knowing the intended outcome, Rowling gave subtle clues all along--meeting Quirrell in the pub, Quirell always being where Snape is so that the mix-up becomes obvious. Hagrid becomes a red herring, of sorts, in the second book, as we discover why he was kicked out of the Hogworts long ago when he went to school with a certain Tom Riddle. In the third movie, it is a flipped red-herring--the person we think is a bad guy is actually a good guy--Siris Black. Of course, the subtle hints are there also, little hints like Ron's mother clenching the rat to Ron as he departs on the train. The fourth book has the sinister Moody who ends up not actually not being Moody. The amazing thing to me is that even though Rowling reveals that Snape is a red herring at the end of the first book, he continues to be one in the subsequent volumes. We never really know whether to trust him or not until the very end of the final volume of the series.
Anyway, what does this have to do with McDonalds and consistency? In addition to Harry Potter, Emilee and I also watched the fourth Indiana Jones movie. Before watching it, I watched the first and third, skipping the second. I've only seen that one twice--when I was a kid and when I was in college. The second time I thought to myself, "Maybe it's not as bad as I remember it being." It was. Well if was, of course. The elements that had made the first movie such a success were missing from the second movie. No exposition in the university classroom, none of the old characters except Indy himself. Of course, the worst thing in the second movie is there was no religious relic, no symbol to substantiate the Judeo-Christian tradition, which is what I think people in western culture liked about the first movie. Then, The Last Crusade came out, and everything they got wrong with the second movie they got right with the third. Indeed, Indy found the ark of the covenant in the first movie, now he sought holy grail--the cup Christ drank from on the night before his crucifixion. Also, I remember being extremely excited that they brought out the main characters in Crusade that were in Raiders--and even the same university classroom. I think that's what people want in a sequel. They want to return to that world that they loved in the first film. This happens in Harry Potter. We start out at the Dursley's, we usually have ride on a broomstick, and we always see our beloved characters--even when the characters don't have much purpose in the story anymore--for example Hagrid in the later stories. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull did this somewhat. It brought back Marian. A very nice move, but then it failed to bring Indy's father, or any of the other charactrs. But the biggest problem it had was it went to the alien creature--well they weren't aliens technically, but creatures from some other dimension. These creature's powers almost seemed to trump the Judeo-Christian relics of the first and third movies.
It's the same with movies and books, too. This last Halloween season, Emilee and I sat down and watched all of the Harry Potter movies from The Sorcerer's Stone to The Order of the Phoenix. Watching the movies back to back gave glimpses into the story choice that J.K. Rowling made as she wrote her series.
Rowling loved to make good use of red herrings. This begins with Snape in the first movie, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone. As the plot and story unfolds, the story makes the viewer along with Harry think that Snape is the culprit--the villian who longs to end Harry's life. Through the first time we meet him in the Commons area and Harry feels his scar burn at the same time--Quirrel, of course is standing just beside Snape with his back turned--to the disappearance of Snape on the night of Halloween and his resulting wound, and the bewitched broomstick in the Quidditch match with Hermione and Ron discovering that Snape is not breaking his eye contact with Harry and he's muttering enchantments under his breath--all of these lead the viewer and reader to believe that Snape is the villian. Of course, as one watched the movie from the beginning on second viewing, knowing the intended outcome, Rowling gave subtle clues all along--meeting Quirrell in the pub, Quirell always being where Snape is so that the mix-up becomes obvious. Hagrid becomes a red herring, of sorts, in the second book, as we discover why he was kicked out of the Hogworts long ago when he went to school with a certain Tom Riddle. In the third movie, it is a flipped red-herring--the person we think is a bad guy is actually a good guy--Siris Black. Of course, the subtle hints are there also, little hints like Ron's mother clenching the rat to Ron as he departs on the train. The fourth book has the sinister Moody who ends up not actually not being Moody. The amazing thing to me is that even though Rowling reveals that Snape is a red herring at the end of the first book, he continues to be one in the subsequent volumes. We never really know whether to trust him or not until the very end of the final volume of the series.
Anyway, what does this have to do with McDonalds and consistency? In addition to Harry Potter, Emilee and I also watched the fourth Indiana Jones movie. Before watching it, I watched the first and third, skipping the second. I've only seen that one twice--when I was a kid and when I was in college. The second time I thought to myself, "Maybe it's not as bad as I remember it being." It was. Well if was, of course. The elements that had made the first movie such a success were missing from the second movie. No exposition in the university classroom, none of the old characters except Indy himself. Of course, the worst thing in the second movie is there was no religious relic, no symbol to substantiate the Judeo-Christian tradition, which is what I think people in western culture liked about the first movie. Then, The Last Crusade came out, and everything they got wrong with the second movie they got right with the third. Indeed, Indy found the ark of the covenant in the first movie, now he sought holy grail--the cup Christ drank from on the night before his crucifixion. Also, I remember being extremely excited that they brought out the main characters in Crusade that were in Raiders--and even the same university classroom. I think that's what people want in a sequel. They want to return to that world that they loved in the first film. This happens in Harry Potter. We start out at the Dursley's, we usually have ride on a broomstick, and we always see our beloved characters--even when the characters don't have much purpose in the story anymore--for example Hagrid in the later stories. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull did this somewhat. It brought back Marian. A very nice move, but then it failed to bring Indy's father, or any of the other charactrs. But the biggest problem it had was it went to the alien creature--well they weren't aliens technically, but creatures from some other dimension. These creature's powers almost seemed to trump the Judeo-Christian relics of the first and third movies.
This brings me to possibly the most successful--at least the longest running series--of all time--James Bond. There is only one movie in which George Lazenby plays in--Her Majesty's Service. The reason he was only in one becomes apparent on the watching of the movie. Like Temple of Doom, Majesty abandons the established formula. In previous Bond films, Bond always received a mission from M went after the tyrannical, often insane, villian, met a few beautiful women along the way, and through cool gadgets was able to defeat the bad guy. This is the reason for the success of the Bond movies. In Majesty, Bond actually resigns from "her Majesty's secret service, goes on an aimless journey, meets a girl, falls in love, gets married, and then the girl is murdered at the hands of Bond's arch-enemy--Blofelt. This isn't how Bond movies are supposed to go. He's supposed to beat the bad guy at the end. But, despite all of these problems, I remember the one that disgruntled me the most was one time in the movie when Bond is bored and he decides to pick up a Penthouse magazine. Why in the world would Bond pick up such a book. He can go get the real thing--why in the world would he waste him time looking at photograph. Completely out of character, and it did not fit the high-class nature of Bond either.
So what's my point in all of this. Consistency and formula. I think a lot of movies establish a successful formula, their consistent with it, and that's why people keep going to see it. Even if it is the same story over and over again, if people love it well enough, they will keep seeing it.
