Hollywood's Running Out of Ideas

Is it just me or do we seem to be hurtling toward a critical mass of re-hashed ideas dominating the silver screen? How many books/TV shows/previous movies are going to be spun and re-spun and regurgitated before we all, as an audience, regurgitate? It seems the list keeps growing: Chronicles of Narnia, Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Frost/Nixon, Iron Man, Spiderwick Chronicles, and The Reader just last year alone. Then we have Star Trek, The Transformers, and Dukes of Hazzard. I swear, I think the upsurge of indy-style flicks might be my only saving grace--though movies about awkward teenagers may reach their own critical mass pretty soon.

Don't get me wrong; I absolutely love some of these movies, and I don't necessarily think there's anything wrong with taking something and re-appropriating it in a different form. But I do take umbrage when EVERYTHING coming out is a complete knock-off of something else.

Last night I went to Angels & Demons (see, I don't mind re-appropriation!), but I think every single one of the previews for the movie I saw was ripped from some other source. There was My Sister's Keeper, which is of course a Jodi Picoult novel. There was My Life in Ruins, which by involving the following three elements: Nia Vardalos, Greece, and awkward romance, manages to feel like the exact same movie as My Big, Fat, Greek Wedding. Then there was another movie, whose title I couldn't be bothered to remember, involving Johnny Depp as yet another criminal we can't help but love.

And the one that really ticked me off was The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3. This upcoming release involves Denzel Washington as the reluctant do-gooder who gets sucked into saving the world (or at least lower Manhattan) from an impending terrorist threat (terrorist played by John Travolta). John Turturro and Luis Guzman are also starring, and I'm almost willing to bet they will play two of the spunky, but endearing hostages. Anybody else sick of the reluctant hero saving the world from a terrorist attack? I'm bored already. All we need now is another man-against-nature movie about the Armageddon, and I might swear myself off movies all together.