If We Ran Hollywood

So here's what we'd do if we ran Hollywood: We'd never budget a film at more than $100 million. And if a director went over that budget, we'd make him or her contribute a dollar amount equal to those overages to a special fund to finance other, more frugal directors' films — ones that cost, say, $15 million or less to make. It may not stop guys like Paul Verhoeven and Michael Bay from overspending, but at least we'd get some smaller, probably more interesting movies out of the bargain (the sort of pictures the studios have all but given up on these days — and the sort that are most worth watching).

Of course, all this belt-tightening is going to be tough on movie stars, but boo-hoo to them. The studios have been paying A-list actors ever more outlandish salaries — both Toms (Cruise and Hanks) are now earning upwards of $20 million per picture — hoping that their names on the marquee will guarantee a hit. But that assumption makes as much sense as Roberto Benigni's Oscar speech. The fact is, big stars bomb all the time (Val Kilmer and Sharon Stone have made careers out of it) while movies without any recognizable names can just as easily draw big lines. Ever hear of Jason Biggs, Shannon Elizabeth, or Chris Klein? We hadn't either, but when Universal put them in an edgy teen-sex romp called American Pie, the studio ended up No. 1 on opening weekend (at a cost of only $11 million).

So if we ran Hollywood, stars would have to learn to scrape by on a maximum paycheck of $10 million a picture. Start clipping coupons, Mr. Travolta.

Another thing we'd change: the ratings system. While the original idea may have made sense — a code to alert parents of on-screen naughtiness — over the years the Motion Picture Association of America has mutated into a powerful and loopily arbitrary star chamber that forces filmmakers to dumb down adult material while permitting all manner of juvenile mayhem. Not even deceased cinema giants are safe anymore: Thanks to the MPAA — which threatened to slap a dreaded NC-17 on Stanley Kubrick's Eyes Wide Shut unless Warner toned down the movie's orgy scene — America is the only nation in the Western world where Kubrick's final film can't be shown the way he finished it.

If we were running Hollywood, we'd tell the ratings board to ... well, we'd tell them to do something to themselves that would get an NC-17 if you put it in a movie.

Finally, after we'd done all of the above and a few other things — like banning musical numbers from the Oscars (except for songs from the South Park film) — we'd roll up our sleeves and get to work on the truly important stuff: spending millions redecorating our lavish corner offices, ordering some more cushy corporate jets, and putting a down payment on a Texas-size ranch in Montana.

It's a dirty job, babe, but somebody's gotta do it.

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