MovieChat Forums > Bachelorette (2012) Discussion > Does Hollywood only make movies for yupp...

Does Hollywood only make movies for yuppies now?

posted 12 years ago by roycant07
19 replies | jump to latest

Another movie about a group of friends from NYC or LA getting into trouble without major consequences? If any of us pulled half of this crap we'd be in jail.

Seriously, are only thirty something year old yuppies in Manhattan interesting to writers and directors?

The rest of the country is trying to make ends meet and I doubt half of them are trying to watch insufferable trust fund yuppies screw up a bachelorette party.

Mind you, the same tired cliches.

Please, no comments like, "then don't watch it then". You know the market is saturated with these types of comedies.

How are there only rich or upper middle class people in movies now? And insufferable rich people.

[–] Yukster_uk 12 years ago

I find it odd that "normal" and "average" characters in US comedies tend to live in mansions e.g. American Pie. Where's the evidence that all these characters are rich?

[–] roycant07 12 years ago

By rich, I mean that they tend to be upper middle class, young urban professionals. Even the families from American Pie type comedies are becoming an unrealistic picture.

They live in in homes most Americans only dream about. In Southern California owning anything other than an old bungalow is a pipe dream.

Most Americans live paycheck to paycheck in working class neighborhoods. They're worried about paying bills, paying for their kids college, whether they're going to get fired the next day, etc.

They're not insufferable pretentious snots who live and party in Manhattan with little worries.

It just doesn't make sense that Hollywood focuses so much attention on them.

If they do feature working class people, they usually make fun of them or portray them as lovable slacker/losers who chose that lifestyle. They're never portrayed as people who have done what they could and did everything right but are stuck in a rut.

The only time that comedy ever showed the real American life was in the 70s.

Characters like Cheech and Chong were not losers who chose that lifestyle but they also showed life in the barrios, and how people are just trying to hustle their way through recession America.

[–] kidjay83 12 years ago

I see where your coming from and make a good the thing is the days of social awareness are over people have become more materialistic. That's probably why you see more upper middle class newer generations get amused more easily. Then the ones from the past times change things even though it may not be right. It is what it is
"Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up"-Pablo Picasso

[–] bimsie99 12 years ago

Because people go to the movies to escape their realities,not to wallow in them.If I wanted to see people struggling to make ends meet,and having to bail their kids out of jail,and wondering if the car is gonna get you to work in the morning,Id just go next door with a tub of popcorn instead of the theatre.
"1)There is a God,and 2)Im not him."

[–] fleur_de_flaneur 12 years ago

Not every director in Hollywood went through film school, but probably most of them. That's not a safe education- you don't automatically earn money after that. So people coming from a working class background would mostly not be found in those schools.

The problem seems to be, or one of the major problems: script writers / directors are too lazy to do research. They make films about their own surroundings, their scene, their environment.

Woody Allen is a king example for that; his films mostly focus on well-off gentlemen and ladies, or middle-class people. He claims he wouldn't know enough about the struggling parts of the population to put them and their hard lives on screen. He's probably right, but isn't that a bit lazy, too? A film director is not a sociologist, but it would be nice if indeed things were more levelled.

[–] cbnspanky2 12 years ago

Who wants to watch a bunch of red necks doing bad things, we already have Honey Boo Boo.

"Call me if you ever feel to old to drive" - Me and You and Everyone We Know

[–] movie_fan59 12 years ago

"then don't watch it then" still applies.

Just what crap, other than drug use, would get these ladies into "trouble"? What laws did they violate?

There are other movies that don't involve "yuppies" (does anyone use that cliche in this century??) for you to go and see.

Jules Winnfield: "I'm sorry, did I break your concentration?"

[–] snarfsisgross 12 years ago

Does every movie have to have characters mired by devastating financial circumstances? For the most part - films/stories require a plot. Trying to survive in tough financial circumstances is certainly a potential plot and one used often in Hollywood.

However, there are plenty of other plots, including, the plot exhibited in this movie which is a group of friends attempting to fix their friends' wedding dress (literally), trying to atone for their past failures as friends, and trying to fix themselves. Definitely been done before, but I don't exactly see this as catering to the "yuppie" crowd. I think it's pretty identifiable to most Americans.

[–] roycant07 12 years ago

Yeah most Americans have friends who throw parties in Manhattan hotels, are engaged to bankers, and do coke like its going out if style. Really identifiable!

C'mon man, writers are lazy and write about their surroundings. These are basically stories about friends. And yes I used the word yuppie but these days these types are more of hybrid of yuppies and hipsters.

Get real.

[–] mawo333 12 years ago

Concerning the question "what did they do to get them into jail".

Possesion of drugs, trying to give drugs as payment (in the strip club),taking drugs (at least in germany the medics would test you, and the police would be there soon),
stealing a wallet, hitting people with a coffe can.
smoking pot in a club toilet.

Yes,one might get away with one of these things, but not all of them.

The whole plot has holes, and the jokes often were "legs up, joke is coming through" = very flat.

[–] 12 years ago

[deleted]

[–] moviegowwer 11 years ago

I had the same question when I saw this trailer. Skinny, bitchy, rich and affluent girls. The cliches do get old but Hollywood will keep making them as long as people keep going to see them.

[–] DaliParton 11 years ago

The cliches do get old but Hollywood will keep making them as long as people keep going to see them.

Indeed. The free market has spoken. If people weren't willing to pay to watch movies about these sorts of characters, hollywood would have stopped making them a decade or two ago.

[–] lunamuna 11 years ago

I totally agree with OP, I started to notice it more in recent years that the majority of mainstream comedies and romcoms involve characters from overwhelmingly UPPER middle class backgrounds, with well paying super interesting jobs living in their massive houses/penthouse apartments... It's not that I want more movies about what it's like to be destitute and struggling to make ends meet, but I wouldn't mind if Hollywood made more films that actually featured normal characters that I could relate to..