Rant Bring Back Harvey Weinstein

[politux]

Not for the raping and jerking off into potted plants but for the ability to spot the indie script that would become a sleeper hit.  In the 90s Miramax was king of the indie films.  

The company's first major success came when the Weinsteins teamed up with British producer Martin Lewis and acquired the U.S. rights to two concert films Lewis had produced of benefit shows for human rights organization Amnesty International. The Weinsteins worked with Lewis to distill the two films into one film for the US marketplace. The resulting film, the American version of The Secret Policeman's Other Ball was a successful release for Miramax in the summer of 1982. This release presaged a modus operandi that the company would undertake later in the 1980s of acquiring films from international filmmakers and reworking them to suit American sensibilities and audiences.

Among the company's other breakthrough films as distributors in the late 1980s and early 1990s were Scandal; Sex, Lies, and Videotape; Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!; The Crying Game; Pulp Fiction and Clerks. 

Movies these days are all based on comic books, Young Adult novels, or some other derivative shit.  When is the last time a studio took a chance on a script like Clerks?

[Howard Roark]

The risk takers are gone. Studios pour everything they have into one or two films a year that are safe - like a comic or remake. They lost their balls. Going big budget looking for the big payout with minimum risk. Your right about Weinstein, at least he had balls (which many actresses can attest to).