I think this Bill Martell top says it all:

http://www.scriptsecrets.net/tips/tip215.htm

I say the studios should go back to hiring executives who have been on the creative side of the business in the past. Rather than hiring painfully non-creative suits to decide what will and what won't succeed.

Film is a business, yes. But it's not for the audience. Studios need decision-makers who can make decisions with heart, not head. Then we'll see a resurgence of passionate films that actually make money at B.O.

Martell does Rock. Still and all having been a writer and producer for 20 years IMO a) Hollywood is full of some VERY smart folks…and B) No one sets out to tell bad stories. Bad career move!

I just finished David Mamet's book "Bambi vs. Godzilla". In there he points out a lot of reasons why in his opinion movies get so bad sometimes. The testing-process for example is one of those things that can turn a good script into a bad flick. When the audience is no longer a group of entertainment-seekers but all of a sudden a crowd of judges that swaps their subjective hats for their not perfectly fitting objective hats, and so forth...

Somebody set out to make Transformers, Terminator Salvation, Friday The 13th, Matrix Reloaded, etc. None of these movies are accidents. People actually wanted to make them how they are.

So yes, many filmmakers actually want to make bad movies.

PS: I agree with The High Dweller. Ever notice that well over 90% of football commentators and analysts are retired football players? They know the game.

The sad thing is that Hollywood is *only* out to make money. Bad movies make as much money as good movies, so any film that makes profit makes Hollywood happy, regardless of artistic integrity. This is why Saw 19 and Resident Evil 72 are allowed to exist. And that's bullshit.

I believe it all comes down to the first point: not everyone understands story. As an extension of that, the more people invovled in creative decision making in a film, the greater the chance of including those w/ story blind spots.

Thing is, there are movies that are bad, and movies I simply do not like. Someone above mentioned Transformers. By most metrics, it was a "good" movie: huge box office receipts, DVD sales/rental, franchise potential and so on. Would I like it? Probably not.

So what caused that to be a success? Maybe it does have a strong story -- strong in that it was one simply told, with a clear protagonist and objective, and executed in an exciting way. Exciting, in that there's a shit load of explosions and CGI and Megan Fox booty shots. But quieter films can also be exciting for the emotions they invoke in the audience.

"I believe it all comes down to the first point: not everyone understands story."

I think most amateur screenwriters and hopefully all professionals understand enough about story to tell when a movie is total shit. So the mere existence of any movie that is total shit...that is completely unacceptable to me, and I cannot see why this doesn't anger more people as enthusiastically as it does to me.

Bad movies PISS ME OFF!

Ryan, why do bad movies piss you off? A waste of your time and money, sure. But are $12-15 and 100 minutes really that big of a deal?

Thing is, no one really sets out to make a bad movie. And it takes just as much work to make a movie that turns out to be shit as it does one that's outstanding. Lots of people many, many hours to try to capture something good out of lines on a paper, shot lists, lighting setups and subtlety of performance.

Yes, lots of them fail. Miserably. Actors can polish the shit of bad writing. Editing can sometimes work around shitty acting or direction. But the story still has to be solid, or no amount of tweaks, tricks and workarounds will matter.