Movies have gone through many changes from 1965. There are numerous reasons for this, but I will be discussing how globalization changed the film industry. The film industry is a business first and foremost so many decisions made by the film industry is influenced by making profits. “Movies will always be a part of an industry. At the end of the day, money makes the world go round, and its movies that draw crowds that bring in the big bucks.” (Andrew Lind) One example would be to have a movie in 1964 starring a foreign band (The Beatles) from Liverpool, England who were the most popular band at the time.

The Beatles made their first visit to the United States. On February 7, 1964, The Beatles land in New York Kennedy’s airport. They were greeted by thousands of screaming fans which was mostly comprised of female teenagers. A couple of days later, the band appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show and had an estimated 73 million American viewers. The band, who was also known as the Fab Four, started a hysteria in the United States which people called “Beatlemania.” Their first hit in the United States, “I Want to Hold Your Hand”, sold one million copies in days. Businesses profited off the hysteria by selling Beatles licensed products which grossed $50 million in America alone. The band couldn’t go anywhere without hordes of fans following them. With all this popularity, it makes sense for a “Beatles” movie at the time.

A Hard Day’s Night is a movie about The Beatles starring The Beatles. The movie is written by Alun Owen and directed by Richard Lester. The film had a low budget of $500,000 and was finished filming in under seven weeks. The movie first premiered in London on July 6, 1964, at the Pavilion Theatre and premiered on August 11, 1964, in New York. A Hard Day’s Night grossed over $20,000 the first week in the London which was a new record for that time. In six weeks, the movie brought in $5.8 million worldwide and set an industry record for return in investment.  The movie, A Hard Day’s Night, end up becoming a critical success earning two Academy Awards nominations. On August 12, 1964, The New York Times wrote that the movie, “has so much good humor going for it that it is awfully hard to resist.” There are also some mentions of how surprisingly good the movie is and is praised for its comedy style, theme, and technique. In a more recent review from Roger Ebert, he wrote “It is one of the great life-affirming landmarks of the movies.” Ebert mentioned it being smart, original, joyous, and filled with exhilaration.  “As entertaining and funny as the movie is, what made it so great were the scenes featuring the original soundtrack created for the movie. They were revolutionary and just plain fun to watch.” (Luke Abiko)

The clip above shows most of the humorous scenes. The funniest scene for me must be when Ringo Star helps a lady walk over a puddle by laying down his jacket for her. The third puddle being a hole on the ground, and she falls right in.  ”

Globalization added more complexities to American society. It also added more audiences for American movies, so many independent films were able to earn big profits. One of these movies is sex, lies, and videotape which is a movie about the complexities for sex, especially for the two main characters.

Steven Soderbergh’s sex, lies, and videotape is a sophisticated film is about four adults in their mid-30s and their sex lives. There’s Ann, the wife, John, the husband, Cynthia, the sister, and Graham, John’s friend. The main character is Graham who enjoys interviewing different women talking about their sexual experiences and records it. He’s impotent and “gets off” on the videotapes. Ann and Graham are similar because they don’t enjoy sex; Ann never had an orgasm and Graham can’t get an erection with anyone. John and Cynthia are very similar because they really enjoy sex. So much so that they don’t mind being unfaithful or ruining relationships to satisfy their sexual appetite. The question this film ask is, “what is the right way to think about sex?” In a 1989 movie review, Roger Ebert writes, “I have a friend who says golf is not only better than sex but lasts longer. The argument in “sex, lies, and videotape” is that conversation is also better than sex.”  The film won a few awards including an Audience Award at the Sundance Film Festival. At a budget of $1.2 million, it has earned over $36.7 million worldwide and $12 million were from International Box Office.

The clip above is a scene with Graham and Ann, the two main characters of the movie. Ann discovers Graham’s videotapes and questions Graham about it. Graham confesses that the videotapes are interviews from women talking about their sexual experiences. After hearing this, Ann gets uncomfortable and quickly leaves Graham’s house.

Thanks to globalization, many films from other countries were available to American audiences. American audiences were able to experience cultures and artistic style from other countries thorough film. In 1992, American cinema saw a rise in Hong Kong action films entering the country that was gaining popularity. One of them is Hard Boiled directed by John Woo which attracted a cult following in the U.S. This was John Woo’s last Hong Kong film before transitioning into Hollywood. It’s interesting that his other movies glamorized the gangsters but Hard Boiled is a movie that glamorized the police. Hard Boiled was one of the movies that came from Hong Kong that became successful here in the United States. The director, John Woo, and the star of the movie, Chow Yun-Fat, were also about to get directing and acting jobs here in the United States because of its success.

The film stars Chow Yun Fat who also stars in John Woo’s other action movies such as A Better Tomorrow and The Killers which also did well in the U.S. In Hard Boiled, Chow Yun Fat plays a tough cop named Tequila. With the help of an undercover agent, he takes down a sinister triad boss. There is an interview from John Woo about his influence for Hard Boiled. It interesting to hear why he made the film and how he wanted to make a movie like Dirty Harry. His American influence could be why this film is more popular for Americans instead of the Chinese.

Barry Hertz from theglobeandmail.com writes about the influences that John Woo movies had on American cinema especially Hard Boiled. “His fetishistic embrace of ultra-lush violence – not only its execution, but its bloody consequences on the human body – is written into the DNA of any modern shootout sequence. Quentin Tarantino, Robert Rodriguez, the Wachowski siblings, Michael Bay and, of course, Fate of the Furious director F. Gary Gray – all pray at the altar of Woo.”

The screenshot above is a scene where the main character, Chow Yun-Fat, and the undercover agent, Tony Leung Chiu-Wai get into an altercation after a shootout. When they discovered that both are working for the same cause, they decided to work together. Quentin Tarantino uses John Woo’s Mexican standoff confrontation on many of his movies as well.

Globalization also help to generate world breaking profits for films made in the United States. The film industry greatly benefited from this which caused many blockbusters to be able to have bigger budgets. This huge budget enabled many directors to shoot films that they envisioned with new technology that weren’t available before. James Cameron’s Avatar was one of the movies that benefited from globalization which earned around $2 billion from International Box Office.

Avatar has a great story, great characters, stunning visuals, and an innovative film style with advanced CGI. This movie is set in the year 2154 and sets place in a world called Pandora. Pandora is inhabited by the Na’vi who blue creatures with big eyes are and about 12 feet tall. The U.S. armed forces came to this world with one mission, to obtain a mineral Earth desperately needs. To venture onto Pandora, humans invented avatars. These avatars look like the Na’vi creatures, and they can see, taste, feel, and have all the same physical aptitudes as the Na’vi as well. They are controlled by humans, mainly scientists, who wanted to research the Pandora planet. The main character, Jake Sully, has been given a special avatar with a special mission from the U.S. military to infiltrate the Na’vi creatures and learn their ways. Using this knowledge, Jake with help the U.S. military find the sacred resource that they need from Pandora. That mission becomes compromised after he is saved by a female Na’vi named Neytiri and becomes accepted by the Na’vi as one of their own.

Avatar was released on December 10, 2009, and it is written, produced, and co-edited by James Cameron. It is an epic science fiction film with groundbreaking visual effects.  Avatar is highly praised by film critics and the audience alike. The film had 9 total Academy Award nominations and won 3 of them including Best Visual Effects. It is a blockbuster film with a budget of $237 million and it earned $2.8 billion making it the highest grossing film at the time. Roger Ebert writes, “Avatar is not simply a sensational entertainment, although it is that. It’s a technical breakthrough.” Roger Ebert mentions how Avatar employs a new generation of special effects and many people doubted James Cameron. The people working on Avatar did a good job making the Na’vi characters. Ebert argues how extraordinary Avatar was and that James Cameron silenced his doubters.

The videoclip above shows just how advanced and complicated it was to make this film. For Avatar, James Cameron used brand new technology and techniques that made Avatar above the rest with its special effects during its release. CGI computer effects in Avatar was mostly used when it came to the action scenes. Even though the Na’vi characters were CGI, the performances were from the actual actors and actresses. “The film used all sorts of modern technology including the animation used by a computer and some actors. The technology changes by the visuals and effects used for the films.” (Steele Wetterer)

Films changed since 1965 because of globalization. This helped big stars from other countries become popular in the United States, whether from England, China or anywhere else. Globalization also influenced American culture as American culture influenced other countries as well and this “shock” influenced the changes in the film industry. Globalization also brought in more profits for the U.S. film industry which influenced how films are being made and expanded budgets for many movies.