Forget 3-D —interactive media is the next wave of entertainment.
There are a lot of theories as to why the movie business isn't what it used to be. The financial crisis of 2008 significantly lessened private equity's desire to sink investments into films, independent and otherwise. A number of great indie and semi-indie distributors (Warner Independent, Picturehouse, THINKFilm) have gone out of business in recent years, leaving the ratio of independent films made to those bought at an all-time low. And most of the lucky films that do land a distribution deal get one- or two-week runs in a handful of cities scattered across the country and then go to die on VOD, as most independent distributors lack the finances to allot them even the most basic P&A budgets. Yet the problem, as evinced by across-the-board domestic box office ticket sales figures, has a far simpler answer: People simply aren't going to the movies as much as they used to.
Cinema was the dominant art form of the 20th century but, much as theater and classical music before fell out of favor with younger generations, so, too, is film beginning to go through a cultural outmoding. Thanks to Web 2.0, the Internet has shifted from utility status to something more akin to an entertainment form itself, and art forms don't get outmoded without reason—they get outmoded because they're replaced. Of course, the Internet isn't fully developed as an entertainment source yet; surfing Facebook is fun, but it's not the kind of experience that sitting back and watching a movie is. And while one can watch movies online with ease, one gets the feeling that it will take an art form endemic to the net's properties to change the way we consume entertainment.
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