The Age of Sequels ? Why not ?

Movie Makers have always seen the potential of sequels, and sequels of sequels. And rightfully so, even a decade back, there have been a good number of movies (or should I say, movie franchises) which have made use of this.

Case in point :
The Friday the 13th series, the Godfather series and who can forget the Star Wars franchise.

But it is only in recent times that movie studios have come to make full use of the sequel mania. Every major Hollywood studio is into making sequels, trilogies and whatnot. Disney, Newline, Revolution, everybody is making them. Why, the Terminator franchise, supposedly the most successful movie franchise till date is gearing up to make a Fourth installment of the Human Vs Computer War.

Even the Indian film industry has woken up to the money machine that the making of movie series are. Granted, you can count on your one hand the number of sequels/trilogies/series ever attempted, but there is definitely an effort, feeble as it may be. One reason for this state of affairs may be the budget, or may be the lack of it. Making a movie series, or the very least, a sequel means serious money, and though budgets for Indian movies are getting higher and higher, they are nowhere near than the typical Hollywood product.

A prime example of this would be the recently hyped to sky high and released "Dhoom 2". The first installment "Dhoom" was itself neither original nor groundbreaking. But it had some things going for it, namely a somewhat taut storyline, good casting, great music and slick editing. While this was the case, one would expect the sequel to be even better, especially as it boasted of a much bigger budget, better music and a fantastic star lineup of A-list actors, bollywood's best. But unfortunately, the movie sucked big time, riddles with so many plot holes that you would think it is a sieve. And some of the characters had no place in the story, wafer thin as it was. The only thing that the movie had going for it was the rocking soundtrack, everything else was just eye-candy, nothing more. And to make matters worse, the makers are planning a third movie in the series.

What I am trying to say is that when everybody and their second cousin is making sequels and trilogies, not everyone is cut out for it. While Hollywood has gotten pretty good at this art, the Indian film industry has a long way to go. Doubly so as in the case of most mainstream Indian movies, they are simply a mish-mash of a pool of Hollywood films or in some cases, a straight copy-paste product. Making sequels/trilogies or a movie series is more than big budgets, big stars and bigger SFX sequences. It is a labor in art, where only a very minuscule percentage come out on top. It would be a favor to us all, and to the grand institution that is cinema, if movie makers realize this before they even think of embarking upon one.

yours truly, Ar'Nath