Three years ago, ‘The Whale’ is an awards-season contender that could conceivably make $50M or so.
I wrote a longish piece about the impact of Avatar on the culture this week that made the following fairly basic argument: Avatar’s cultural impact can’t be measured in memes or cosplay or lines quoted but by how it altered the business landscape, and the way it altered the business landscape is by not only pushing studios even harder into the tentpole business (buoyed by 3D and large format surcharges) but also by convincing audiences that the only reason to go to the theater was for a big experience.
This does not strike me as particularly controversial, even if it is dissatisfying for the types who want to play Billy Eichner and scream “name a character in the highest...