Will Smith Once Shared It Was Hard for Him to Make a Good Movie
Will Smith made it his mission to become one of Hollywood’s biggest action stars. He succeeded to the point where making a financially successful movie almost came effortlessly for him. However, a movie that drew in a lot of money in the box office didn’t always mean it was good.
Will Smith admitted that making good movies is the hard part about being a movie star
Once Smith started making it big in Hollywood, he always had his eye on superstardom. He put his desire for monumental Hollywood success out there for the universe to hear. At one point, he wanted to achieve his goal so badly that he concocted a formula he thought would be his recipe for success. Then he presented his strategy to his manager at the time James Lassiter.
“I said toJL, ‘I want to be the biggest movie star in the world,’ ”Smith once told The Hollywood Reporter. “And he said, ‘Okay. Well, let’s figure out what that means.’ And he went and got the top 10 movies of all time, the list of the top 10 movies of all time at the box office — top 10 box office successes — and we also looked at them, adjusted for inflation and views versus dollar value. Also, we looked at all the different variations.”
His strategy might’ve been effective. Many of his biggest hits followed the usual patterns of blockbusters. Smith’s films typically came out during the summer and were crowd-pleasers at their core. But although his strategy may have been successful in making big hits, they didn’t help Smith decipher which of those films would be good.
“I don’t find it difficult at all to make a hit movie,” Smith said on The Hollywood Reporter’s Awards Chatter. “I find it really freaking hard to make a good movie.”
Why Will Smith later changed his mind about being the biggest movie star in the world
Long after Smith achieved his goal, it seemed he’d have a change of heart. After a string of hits, Smith felt he sacrificed artistic integrity for the sake of box-office success. Although financially rewarding, Smith asserted his accomplishments left a lot to be desired creatively.
“I had so much success that I started to taste global blood and my focus shifted from my artistry to winning,” he once said according to E! News. “I wanted to win and be the biggest movie star, and what happened was there was a lag—around Wild Wild West time—I found myself promoting something because I wanted to win versus promoting something because I believed in it.”
His new approach to filmmaking was inspired by the changing landscape of cinema. Unlike in the old days, audiences could no longer be tricked into paying to see a mediocre or below average movie.
“That smoke and mirrors in marketing is over. People are going to know really quickly and globally whether a product keeps its promises,” Smith continued. “Back in the ’80s and ’90s you had a piece of crap movie you put a trailer with a lot of explosions and it was Wednesday before people knew your movie was s–t…But now what happens is 10 minutes into the movie, people are tweeting, ‘This is s***. Go see Vin Diesel.'”
“My career has been strictly being able to sell my products globally, and it’s now in the hand of fans,” he added. “I have to be in tune with their needs and not trick them into going to see Wild Wild West.”
Smith quipped that his thought process seems to be a new concept for Hollywood studio execs.
“It’s funny to go sit in a meeting in Hollywood now. It’s a new idea that we have to make good movies,” Smith said. “‘Hmm, I never thought of that.'”
