By Paulie_The_Latino_SLant

A cinematic war has been declared. We are currently besieged by a blitzkrieg of Indie horror films made by YouTube content creators, that have shattered box office records. Creators turned directors that command armies of young fans turned movie goers. A demographic that Hollywood has not seen in years yet desperately needs. There is much discussion and heated debate online as to what is going on in the battle for cinema supremacy. So what is the future for Hollywood Studios in conquering the movie going army that is Gen Z? Actually seeing young people in line without their parents waiting to see a movie is worth the price of admission. The indie horror films, Backrooms and Obsession, currently commands a 75% to 80% demographic that is under the age of 35. That is not a typo, 75% to 80% of the demographic is under the age of 35.

This is staggering to think about as this generation has been brought up on anime, video games and You Tube. Streaming-hungry, Hollywood Studios hedged all their bets since Netflix released House of Cards in 2013. It was the binge model then it was different networks and studios having their own streaming platforms which now produce a harvest mostly forgettable content.

Which brings me back to YouTube as being the number one streamer in the world, it makes sense that a majority of these kids grew up on YouTube over the last dozen years. Out of that majority a few stood out to be creative. Future filmmakers created new and Interesting ways to tell stories to their audiences. I might not have personally liked the movies Obsession or Backrooms, but that doesn’t matter as new moving going audiences from YouTube have made their presence felt and I find this absolutely fascinating and a welcome surprise. The Future, hallelujah.

Now with every revolution, there’s always casualties of war and in this case it’s any movies that belong or have been connected to tired IP’s. From superheroes to Star Wars over the last recent years whether on streaming or the big screen, their numbers and importance have dwindled since 2018. Now let’s take the recent casualty of “The Mandalorian and Grogu” movie. This is the first film to be released in theaters from Lucasfilm/Star Wars in over seven years. It’s audiences only knew “Mando,” as a streaming television show on Disney+. While season was one and two were critically approved and audiences loved them, It did suffer from a very mixed third season to where it was hardly if ever talked about. It seems this movie is a couple of years late but one would say ultimately that those 75% to 80% of movie going audiences under 24, did not and will not go see this movie because of reasons I had just mentioned. But also too there’s no incentive when they know they grew up on said TV show where they know they can catch it on streaming later perhaps, perhaps not. Since these Children of the Revolution are YouTube digitally bound, I do think next year‘s Star Wars: Starfighter stands a much better chance to reach this audience. Just with the star names of Ryan Gosling to Mia Goth, whom both have a behavior connection with this audience of seeing their movies on the big screen first. Specifically Ryan Gosling recently global hit Project Hail Mary, which also had massive young audiences during its theatrical run. So if the stars align, and the film is above decent, it should do much better than the catastrophic box office numbers of the Mandalorian film. However, this goes back to what does Hollywood do with the children of this new movie revolution?

Well right now the big Studios are offering Obsession’s Director Curry Barker obscene sight unseen deals. Oh, and his second film has already wrapped.

That always seems to be the pattern here, from the 70s wave of young directors and 90s Tarantinos to this new generation of independent filmmakers. The studio complex swallows them up and sooner or later they do their bidding. This has been going on like I said since Francis Ford Coppola was brought on begrudgingly by the Studios to do the Godfather. I don’t see it changing that much. However, there’s a huge major difference, the means of distribution. These young directors and their audiences do not need the Hollywood studio complexes at all. One would say the only thing they would need is their distribution arms, and even then they’re able to make deals directly with distributor companies on their own. These directors and their children of the movie revolution do not need the studios at all, in fact it’s the other way around.

If there’s not some innovative, thinking happening at each studio lot, on how to authentically connect to this Gen Z audience, the studios will continue to suffer more. I do see a couple of streams of hope that started a few years ago. Take the movie American Fiction’s Cord Jefferson upon winning an Academy Award for best screenplay. During his acceptance speech he professed to the Hollywood big whigs in the audience,

“Instead of making one, $200 million dollar movie, try making twenty $10 million dollar movies or fifty $4 million dollar movies.”

That seems to be the going trend, not just in horror but in many different genres, we are seeing budgets now 20 million to 40 million films being greenlight. Lower budget films with star names making their money at the theaters and more on VOD sales. One example is A24’s The Drama, cost $28 million to make, starred Robert Pattinson and Zendaya. During the theatrical global run it earned $128 million and it’s currently still charting in the top 10 for VOD sales. The key with that project was their young stars who bring their audiences to the cinemas. So there is definitely hope there in seeing more films being produced from the studios at a much lesser cost.

The other rey of Hope I have is that Hollywood has always been able to reinvent itself, but it’s also going to have to contend with the monster that they created in streaming, This “echo system of entertainment,” as I have called it, can sometimes bite them back tenfold. It’s a fascinating time for movies, for cinema and to see audiences of many different ages return to the theaters in 2026. The revolution has birthed a renaissance that has not only seen success with these independent films and their army of young movie goers but also with Studio films mentioned above. So all is not lost, but the warning signs have been there and Hollywood needs to answer the call.