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Netflix buys Lupita, Rihanna, Issa, and DuVernay Twitter-inspired film.

W

Wanda/Wander

Member
I'm happy for this, because the idea is basically...let's gather the most talented people in Hollywood. Like that should be a no brainier- the only reason that this is treated as a revelation is because the talent all happen to be black women.

Hopefully this movie's inevitable success will finally get Hollywood to acknowledge the fact they are completely ignoring women of color.
 
K

Koozek

Member
Speaking of Twitter stories, what happened with that story a stripper told on Twitter about that crazy night she experienced? Didn't they want to make a movie out of that too?
 
GTP_Daverytimes

GTP_Daverytimes

Member
EdibleKnife said:
landscape-1492798097-elle-riri-lupita-scams.jpg
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I have to say that's an awesome picture.
 
T

torre_avenue

Banned
It's honestly kinda sad Lupita's getting her next major live-action role off the back of a meme.

Why isn't she getting cast more? She's an Oscar-winning actress, for heaven's sake!
 
D

Deepwater

Member
Brakke said:
Finally, Rihanna follows up her groundbreaking performance in Battleship.
Click to expand...

People just like seeing their fave do things, no matter how bad they end up being.

Honestly, they could have kept this. It's like one of those things that are great in concept but bound to be trash in execution. Can Ava even do a thriller? Can Issa Rae write a thriller?

People just put them out there because those are the black faces we now see in film media without any regard if this kind of film warranted their direction. And no hate to either of them, but I'd rather see some unknown talent take a crack at it.
 
T

torre_avenue

Banned
Deepwater said:
People just like seeing their fave do things, no matter how bad they end up being.

Honestly, they could have kept this. It's like one of those things that are great in concept but bound to be trash in execution. Can Ava even do a thriller? Can Issa Rae write a thriller?

People just put them out there because those are the black faces we now see in film media without any regard if this kind of film warranted their direction. And no hate to either of them, but I'd rather see some unknown talent take a crack at it.
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For Netflix and everyone involved, it's a win-win. Netflix get an idea with in-built popularity that gets pop culture buzzing, 4 talented black women get the chance to make something unique and original without being in the studio environment that would have made this movie impossible, and all 4 women get a chance to do something out of their wheelhouse with a decent amount of money backing their movie.

It might be trash, or it might be an entertaining heist-scam movie or it'll just be a gender-swapped John Tucker Must Die. Either way, it sounds really unique and interesting, and I'll be there day 1 for it.
 
R

royalan

Member
torre_avenue said:
It's honestly kinda sad Lupita's getting her next major live-action role off the back of a meme.

Why isn't she getting cast more? She's an Oscar-winning actress, for heaven's sake!
Click to expand...

Don't devalue the movie because of its origins. There's top-level talent backing this, and word is Netflix was very aggressive in securing this movie, they have a vested interest in this being good, especially after the shit they got in Cannes.

Of course I wanna see my Lupita in big budget movies every year; her talent demands it. But this movie is going to be big. Ava? Lupita? Rihanna? ISSA RAE!? Oh, black people gonna show up and show OUT for this film. They might as well not bother with a marketing department: Black Twitter got it.
 
F

Freeza Under The Shower

Member
Brakke said:
Finally, Rihanna follows up her groundbreaking performance in Battleship.
Click to expand...

She was actually the best part about that movie. Yes, I'm absolutely serious about that, she was literally the only performance I gave a crap about while watching it, probably because that was her first - I think - acting role in a movie. When your movie has 'the new guy' outperforming the veterans, your movie is probably really bad, which is exactly what Battleship was. But that's not her fault. (it's everybody's fault)
 
M

MugiwaraCole

Member
hodayathink said:
If I came up with this idea, on the one hand I'd be super excited at the fact that my idea was going to become a Hollywood movie. On the other hand, I'd be pissed that I'm definitely not getting paid a cent, and probably not going to get credited at all for it either.
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Black twitter's unofficial motto at this point is "why isn't twitter paying us?"

We come up with whole marketing plans and are the catalyst for a ton of action, and we just be joking when we do it.
 
H

hodayathink

Member
royalan said:
Don't devalue the movie because of its origins. There's top-level talent backing this, and word is Netflix was very aggressive in securing this movie, they have a vested interest in this being good, especially after the shit they got in Cannes.

Of course I wanna see my Lupita in big budget movies every year; her talent demands it. But this movie is going to be big. Ava? Lupita? Rihanna? ISSA RAE!? Oh, black people gonna show up and show OUT for this film. They might as well not bother with a marketing department: Black Twitter got it.
Click to expand...

My only issue with this is that Netflix, to this point, either doesn't know how or doesn't care about making successful theatrical movies. It's the primary cause for all the issues they're facing at Cannes in the first place. To use a comparison, when Amazon makes a movie, they give it a legit theatrical release, expand if it's successful, and then debut it on their streaming service months later. Manchester By the Sea was bought by Amazon (from Sundance IIRC) and won an Oscar because they chose to still follow the old Hollywood distribution model. Netflix gives zero shits about said model, they debut their movies either at the same time, or very close to, their theatrical releases, which is why their movies won't be at Cannes anymore, and why the only time they actually released a movie that had Oscar buzz (Beasts of No Nation) it got completely shut out. So Black Twitter may want to show up to to support this movie, but outside of the Netflix subscription that they likely already have, I don't see them ever really getting the chance to.
 
S

Slayven

Member
Battleship was alright, not pay for a ticket or Bluray, but 5 dollar dvd or on TNT alright

hodayathink said:
My only issue with this is that Netflix, to this point, either doesn't know how or doesn't care about making successful theatrical movies. It's the primary cause for all the issues they're facing at Cannes in the first place. To use a comparison, when Amazon makes a movie, they give it a legit theatrical release, expand if it's successful, and then debut it on their streaming service months later. Manchester By the Sea was bought by Amazon (from Sundance IIRC) and won an Oscar because they chose to still follow the old Hollywood distribution model. Netflix gives zero shits about said model, they debut their movies either at the same time, or very close to, their theatrical releases, which is why their movies won't be at Cannes anymore, and why the only time they actually released a movie that had Oscar buzz (Beasts of No Nation) it got completely shut out. So Black Twitter may want to show up to to support this movie, but outside of the Netflix subscription that they likely already have, I don't see them ever really getting the chance to.
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That just speaks more to the old men yelling at a cloud of hollywood and award shows
 
N

Numb

Member
MugiwaraCole said:
Black twitter's unofficial motto at this point is "why isn't twitter paying us?"

We come up with whole marketing plans and are the catalyst for a ton of action, and we just be joking when we do it.
Click to expand...
Black twitter gets distracted too easily with celebs coming out with bad hair to make fun of or admiring another celeb's cakes
 
D

Despera

Banned
torre_avenue said:
It's honestly kinda sad Lupita's getting her next major live-action role off the back of a meme.

Why isn't she getting cast more? She's an Oscar-winning actress, for heaven's sake!
Click to expand...
Look at it from a positive angle and consider this a chance for her to expand her portfolio.
 
R

royalan

Member
hodayathink said:
My only issue with this is that Netflix, to this point, either doesn't know how or doesn't care about making successful theatrical movies. It's the primary cause for all the issues they're facing at Cannes in the first place. To use a comparison, when Amazon makes a movie, they give it a legit theatrical release, expand if it's successful, and then debut it on their streaming service months later. Manchester By the Sea was bought by Amazon (from Sundance IIRC) and won an Oscar because they chose to still follow the old Hollywood distribution model. Netflix gives zero shits about said model, they debut their movies either at the same time, or very close to, their theatrical releases, which is why their movies won't be at Cannes anymore, and why the only time they actually released a movie that had Oscar buzz (Beasts of No Nation) it got completely shut out. So Black Twitter may want to show up to to support this movie, but outside of the Netflix subscription that they likely already have, I don't see them ever really getting the chance to.
Click to expand...

Frankly, I don't know why Netflix should care about any of this.

Netflix started out going against the grain of how people watch movies and TV. I don't see them caring about Old Hollywood's butthurt feelings now, and they shouldn't.

If Netflix goes all-in on this film, and it's a success, so what?
 
O

old manatee

Banned
I still don't get why people act like Lupita can't find work or something. She was in 12 Years a Slave and won an Oscar, Non-Stop, she's eventually going to be in 3 Star Wars movies plus a TV series and video game, The Jungle Book, Queen of Katwe, Black Panther, this new Netflix movie. Oh, what a horrible career!
 
B

Bronx-Man

Banned
The Exploder said:
I still don't get why people act like Lupita can't find work or something. She was in 12 Years a Slave and won an Oscar, Non-Stop, she's eventually going to be in 3 Star Wars movies plus a TV series and video game, The Jungle Book, Queen of Katwe, Black Panther, this new Netflix movie. Oh, what a horrible career!
Click to expand...
I think it's more of how Lupita can barely seem find roles where y'know, her actual face can be seen.
 
T

torre_avenue

Banned
The Exploder said:
I still don't get why people act like Lupita can't find work or something. She was in 12 Years a Slave and won an Oscar, Non-Stop, she's eventually going to be in 3 Star Wars movies plus a TV series and video game, The Jungle Book, Queen of Katwe, Black Panther, this new Netflix movie. Oh, what a horrible career!
Click to expand...
Let's compare her and Margot Robbie, since both broke out in 2013 in Academy Award winning films.

Since 2013, Robbie has lined up roles in 10 films, 9 of which are live action. She's starred in 2 big budget blockbusters, and is getting her own spin-off with the Harley Quinn / Birds of Prey / Gotham City Sirens film. Comparatively, since 2013, Lupita has lined up 6 movie roles, 3 of which are her voicing an animated character. Her role in "Non-Stop" has her listed 7th on that film's IMDb page, "Queen of Katwe" was an indie flick, and we don't know how big her role in "Black Panther" is. But my point is, since their debuts, Robbie has been making a lot more moves and has a lot more deals in place than Nyong'o.

Now, it can either be because Lupita's management is not doing her justice or that Nyong'o doesn't have the business sense of Robbie or it could be that the opportunities Robbie is getting offered are not going to Lupita for one reason or another. Lupita's won an Oscar and has been nominated for a Tony, but Robbie's the one that's getting a hell of a lot more leading woman roles. Something's just not adding up. Maybe it is because Nyong'o just wants to take attention away from her exposure in "12 Years A Slave". Maybe she just doesn't want to be a traditional Hollywood starlet.
 
O

old manatee

Banned
Slayven said:
That just says the type of roles she likes, even then a that was a year ago.
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So it's not entirely by accident that you don't see Lupita Nyong'o's body or her lovely face in the two giant movies she starred in right after 12 Years A Slave. In The Jungle Book, she's a voice. In Star Wars: The Force Awakens, she's an alien, altered entirely by CGI. I wondered if that was because of Hollywood's limited starring roles for women who look like her. Nyong'o said no.

"I think subconsciously I was excited by work ... that was not about my body," she says. In fact, she says, playing a thousand year old creature in Star Wars was something of a relief. "It wasn't about my skin or my body or its economy, whether we're talking about slavery or we're talking about fashion or about celebrity," she says. "When Star Wars came about, it excited me because I got to get back to acting in a way that was free of that body, and I got to inhabit a different body."
Click to expand...

also:

That's also why Lupita Nyong'o has returned to her roots as a stage actress. At Yale, she served as an understudy for Eclipsed, a play set among captured women during the second civil war in Liberia. It never left her. She used her fame to bring Eclipsed to Broadway, and stars in it as well.
Click to expand...


Her career has been incredible so far, and by her own account she has been steering the ship.
 
H

hodayathink

Member
royalan said:
Frankly, I don't know why Netflix should care about any of this.

Netflix started out going against the grain of how people watch movies and TV. I don't see them caring about Old Hollywood's butthurt feelings now, and they shouldn't.

If Netflix goes all-in on this film, and it's a success, so what?
Click to expand...

My question is what defines success? Given Netflix don't really share any metrics outside of "this was the most watched thing we did so far", what does any of it actually mean in terms of getting more movies with this type of talent getting made.

In other words, if the end goal is supposed to be getting more movies with minority talent made, I'm wondering how this will help get there. Netflix's dubious definition of success means that Hollywood can generally ignore it, so I guess the hope would be that Netflix sees the success and decides to make more movies in its vein? Though, to be honest, I'm just kinda thinking out loud here. The movie getting made in the first place is a good thing, and the rest of it is stuff that doesn't need to concern me anyway.
 
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