How to make a decent movie. Some thing Hollywood has forgotten.

A movie needs a protagonist (protagonist, $2 word meaning hero or heroine).  Female or male protagonists work just fine.  The protagonist must be likeable; we viewers cannot get excited about a scumbag protagonist.  The protagonist needs to accomplish something and the movie needs to show him working on it, what ever it is.  We viewers need to know just what it is that the protagonist is trying to do.  Best literary example I can think of is Tolkien.  Right in chapter 2 Gandalf tells Frodo (and us) about the ring, its deadly power, the dark lord searching for it, and the need to destroy it.  From then on for the rest of the three book trilogy we know what is going on.  The protagonist has to do things; we cannot care much about a protagonist who merely serves as a punching bag thru out the movie. 

   Then the movie needs a background, Narnia, Middlearth, the Wild West, gangland Chicago, the Washington DC swamp, Sherwood Forest, the Western Front, Imperial Rome, and the Crusades, somewhere. The background needs to be convincing, with few noticeable anachronisms.  I an a history major and long time history buff and I am OK with some bending of the history to make a better movie.

    The movie should build to a climax, where the protagonist goes up against his opposing forces and/or the villain and either wins or looses.  Speaking as a viewer, I like protagonists that win, defeating their enemy. I can tolerate a protagonist who looses if I see him/her put forth truly heroic effort in the final battle. 

   Then the movie needs good actors who speak up clearly, and a good sound man, one who makes the entire dialog audible.  I am getting old, but I have no trouble hearing the TV newsies, and the entire dialog in my old favorites.  Somewhere around Charlie Wilson’s War the sound man lost it and much of the amusing dialog was inaudible.  That sound man has been messing up movies ever since.  One thing a sound man needs to know.   He must mute the score and the sound track when the actors are speaking.

   And a movie needs a good camera man.  One who puts the camera on a tripod and doesn’t wave it around in the air.  And one who turns the lights on before filming.  Black on black scenes are simply annoying to the audience.