What do you get when you take a beloved movie, make a sequel using mostly different actors and release it straight-to-video? Most people would say you get crap like American Psycho 2, American Pie: Band Camp or Ace Ventura Jr. But not Netflix. No, Netflix wants you to think they’ve got a real game changer on their hands.
Netflix has just struck a deal with The Weinstein Company to premiere a sequel to Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon – the Oscar-winning wuxia fable from acclaimed filmmaker Ang Lee – on their instant streaming service this summer. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon II: The Green Legend was not directed by Ang Lee, and although Michelle Yeoh is returning and she’s bringing fight choreographer Yuen-Woo Ping with her, it was written by John Fusco – whose screenplay for The Forbidden Kingdom led to a really terrible wuxia movie – and it co-stars straight-to-video unwanted sequel luminary Jason Scott Lee (Dracula III: Legacy, Timecop: The Berlin Decision, The Prophecy: Forsaken).
Ordinarily this is not the kind of sequel that would end up in theaters anyway, but thanks to hit series like “House of Cards” and “Orange is the New Black,” the Netflix brand adds just a tiny hint of prestige to a story that would otherwise be interpreted as, “The Crouching Tiger sequel isn’t good enough for a major theatrical release.”
But what’s that you say? Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon II: The Green Legend will also play in IMAX theaters? Wow, what a prestigious and fancy way of saying “only a limited theatrical run.”
Sure, everyone loves the IMAX brand, but it’s not a symbol of quality. Unless a film is actually photographed in the IMAX format – which very, very few actually are – it’s just another way to screen a movie, and it has nothing to say about how good that movie actually is. For every The Dark Knight and Gravity to screen in IMAX, there are plenty of stinkers like Hercules, Jack the Giant Slayer, The Lone Ranger, Need for Speed and I, Frankenstein.
Deadline broke this story, and they’re asking if it’s “Hollywood’s Nightmare” because… well, that’s a good headline. Time may tell of course, and for all we know this Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon sequel may even turn out to be a pretty good movie (Yuen Woo-ping is directing, and he’s no slouch), but for now this is a pretty darned lame attempt to turn a negative into a positive.
If Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon II: The Green Legend was announced as going “Straight to DVD” instead of “Straight to Netflix,” everyone would agree it was a terrible sign. But functionally it’s exactly the same thing. Either way, The Weinstein Company apparently saw what they had and said to themselves, “The only audience this movie has wouldn’t even bother to leave their house to see it.”
So let’s not pretend this is a big deal. There’s a lot of crap on Netflix and there’s a lot of crap in IMAX theaters. This is just another sequel no one actually asked for (without the original director’s involvement, anyway) that’s going straight-to-video. There is absolutely no reason to expect this to turn out any better than S. Darko.
And even if it does well on Netflix, that’s like shooting fish in a barrel. It’s reminiscent of the VHS boom of the 1980s, when distributors like Troma could make a mint because simply putting a copy of Troma’s War on the shelf gave it just as much legitimacy as The Road Warrior, because that’s all the video store had available and you might as well watch something. If Netflix reports that Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon II: The Green Legend is a hit, it’ll just go right alongside such other “Popular on Netflix” titles like The Colony and the remake of Invaders from Mars. And we all remember what a big deal those movies were, right?
William Bibbiani is the editor of CraveOnline’s Film Channel and the host of The B-Movies Podcast and The Blue Movies Podcast. Follow him on Twitter at @WilliamBibbiani.
