[izaidi]

A lot of bad sequels make orders of magnitude more money than critically acclaimed films, but the films that make the most money are rarely bad. The highest grossing films of the last three years have been Avatar, The Dark Knight, and Toy Story 3, which were all critical darlings to various degrees. People really want great movies but are willing to settle for mediocre ones that have some of the things they're looking for (e.g., exceptional visuals, or characters in which they're already invested).

[jessriedel]

I think it would be more accurate to say they are rarely horrible. But what does that prove? The highest selling cars rarely have less than 100hp, but that doesn't mean the public really wants to buy the car with the most power yet, by mistake, keeps buying reliable cars with high resale value.

Even if it were difficult to make a good movie (which I dispute, more or less), that doesn't explain why once the good movie is made the public would still avoid it in favor of "Clash of the Titans". The reviews are widely available.

How exactly should we determine what the public really wants than by what they go out and purchase? I just don't get what you and Eliezer are arguing from.

[foljs]

<b>but the films that make the most money are rarely bad. The highest grossing films of the last three years have been Avatar, The Dark Knight, and Toy Story 3</b>

Which, even if praised by whoring critics, are all quite bad , formulaic, shit.

They aren't gonna be near (random selection of quality stuff): Citizen Kane, On the Waterfront, Arsenic and Old Lace, Apocalypse Now, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Vertigo et al in any cinephiles list...