The Decline of Original Live-Action Children’s Films in Modern Cinema.

[Dr.Kisaragi Dr.Kisaragi]

From the 40s to 2000s, live-action children’s and family films like Matilda, Madeline, The Goonies, The Little Rascals, Home Alone, The Sandlot, Annie, and Oliver Twist often featured child protagonists driving the story. These films combined adventure, humor, and heart in ways that appealed to both children and adults.

In contrast, modern live-action family films are increasingly dominated by reboots, sequels, franchise entries, or CGI-heavy productions, and original child-led stories seem rarer.

What economic, cultural, or creative factors might explain this decline in original live-action children’s cinema? Are there contemporary films that successfully capture the spirit of these classics, or has the genre fundamentally shifted?

Yesh I miss those kind of flims.

 

[Tonberry]

I don't want to sound cynical, but this is one of those instances where it automatically turns me cynical because I completely agree with you.
I think there's a reocurring trend that sometimes loops back where people/execs think kids are explicitly brainless idiots, so there are certain time periods where they don't feel like making stuff specifically geared towards them, which is just a colossal shame.

There's a part in my brain also that suggests that superheroes (which would fall under franchise entries as you said) sort of bridged a demographic gap in a new way that kind of let people of most ages to share in one big thing. It's happened before with things like Lord of the Rings or Pirates of the Carribean (not to mention Star Wars), but those were self-contained universes that didn't take 15 years to realize (except for Star Wars but it's different still).

Then the other reason might be that, as with so much nowadays due to ballooning production costs, executives are afraid of putting a lot of money where they're not sure if it'll work. That imaginary friends movie made by John Krasinski was apparently a massive flop, but definitely qualifies for "original live-action childrens' film" so I'm not sure what the solution might be.
Computer-animated movies are getting a sort of resurgence because Spiderverse showed that it's worth it to actually make movies with a lot of artistic freedom, but I wonder if that makes them more expensive to make too, they certainly look the part.

 

[Ezri_Muldoon]

The problem is two fold. and I will try to make this as A-political as possible.

The current generation of mainstream writers, the one who demand that all union projects have at least a staff of 10 writers per project (That includes adaptations. So that's 10 people re-writing a solo written screenplay by committee) during the WGA strikes of 2023 want to create art that have proven...
Divisive when shown to audiences. You can use the "culture war" buzzword, or blame heightened consumer mistrust during a time of financial hardship.
A lot of projects have resulted in a net loss over the last decade

Production companies are hesitant to greenlight anything new because of this and due to the current ludicrous costs of even a medicore production.
In the mid 2000nds the default budged awarded a film was 50 Million. Today it's 100 million and thats for a project that doesn't require visual effect shots.
A VFX film is upwards of 250 Million, not counting marketing, revenue split with distributors & cinemas revenue per ticket.
James Gunn Superman film as an example didn't turn a profit during its entire international theatrical release, it went on to produce a profit after it's home media & streaming release, of only an estimated 100 million according to Forbes... No official numbers have been made public.

Yes, out of reported 616 million in revenue, only 17% of that is a rumoured net profit, the remaining 83% of that total only paid back the production & marketing costs.

We have a industry filled with writers who want to make things that may not have universal appeal.
During a global rescission, where thanks to Marvel pop culture has finally gone mainstream.

It's safter to hand over legacy, proven Intellectual properties to these new writers, who then in turn twist the intellectual properties into their own projects after their original pitches couldn't acquire funding.

This is the vicious cycle currently plaguing Hollywood, and it won't go away until either the writers or the audience capitulates.
This is regardless of whether we're referring to children's action media or any other medium. It's a systemic problem.

 

[Dr.Kisaragi Dr.Kisaragi]

The problem is two fold. and I will try to make this as A-political as possible.

The current generation of mainstream writers, the one who demand that all union projects have at least a staff of 10 writers per project (That includes adaptations. So that's 10 people re-writing a solo written screenplay by committee) during the WGA strikes of 2023 want to create art that have proven...
Divisive when shown to audiences. You can use the "culture war" buzzword, or blame heightened consumer mistrust during a time of financial hardship.
A lot of projects have resulted in a net loss over the last decade

Production companies are hesitant to greenlight anything new because of this and due to the current ludicrous costs of even a medicore production.
In the mid 2000nds the default budged awarded a film was 50 Million. Today it's 100 million and thats for a project that doesn't require visual effect shots.
A VFX film is upwards of 250 Million, not counting marketing, revenue split with distributors & cinemas revenue per ticket.
James Gunn Superman film as an example didn't turn a profit during its entire international theatrical release, it went on to produce a profit after it's home media & streaming release, of only an estimated 100 million according to Forbes... No official numbers have been made public.

Yes, out of reported 616 million in revenue, only 17% of that is a rumoured net profit, the only paid back the production & marketing costs.

We have a industry filled with writers who want to make things that may not have universal appeal.
During a global rescission, where thanks to Marvel pop culture has finally gone mainstream.

It's safter to hand over legacy, proven Intellectual properties to these new writers, who then in turn twist the intellectual properties into their own projects after their original pitches couldn't acquire funding.

This is the vicious cycle currently plaguing Hollywood, and it won't go away until either the writers or the audience capitulates.
This is regardless of whether we're referring to children's action media or any other medium. It's a systemic problem.

Yeah I can see your point here studio rather chose safety because the net value will be right amount than risk with no money back and especially people rarely at cinema

That been said the writers this aren't that good some of the movie are quite bad especially a Millennial joke I mean seriously they can just make a dialogue than arent cringe

Yeah I rather Hollywood don't touch those kids oh man the culture wars I don't want so see a political message on a kid's adventure

Thank you for taking your time to write I learn something.

 

[Ezri_Muldoon]

Thank you for taking your time to write I learn something.

Either the paying consumer audience starts to support the up and coming generation writers, lending them legitimacy and ensuring new original productions become financially viable again.
Or the writers adapt to the audiance and start producing works that are less devisive.
That's a a-political as I can put it. There's a high chance that this thread gets derailed as it is.

Unfortunately some ones subjective opinion of a product doesn't matter, only whether it makes money.
And currently the only things that are making money are legacy intellectual properties- and even those are struggling to produce a profit.
Yes that's a generalisation, no person angrily commenting with a subjective retort your pedantic exception doesn't magically chance the industries current objective trajectory of lower profits per production.

The third option would be for studios to pay actors, actresses, executives, Marketing teams, producers, production crews & writers less, ushering in a new generation of original work that remains profitable due to implementing conservative budgets.
Looking at the numbers of Unions protesting over the last decade, this is the road that will never be taken.

This is the vicious cycle currently plaguing Hollywood, and it won't go away until either the writers or the audience capitulates.

And personally I see the entertainment industry collapsing before this happens.

 

[Waffles's iconWaffles]

Part of me wonders if this is because there's simply no suitable actors/actresses to lead these projects.

It seems that every child performer out there is already committed to something, buried under layers upon layers of brand deals or chained to long-term contracts with streaming services, which may make any studio honestly wanting to do a single, wholesome project back off because it'd be too costly to lock them up for even a single film... And these days in which the average viewer has the attention span of a goldfish, not having that recognizable name somewhere on the poster or advertisment may make them scroll right past -- it's all-too-easy nowadays.

It's just a theory, but I don't think I know of a single one that's currently a "free agent".

 

[Tonberry]

It seems that every child performer out there is already committed to something, buried under layers upon layers of brand deals or chained to long-term contracts with streaming services, which may make any studio honestly wanting to do a single, wholesome project back off because it'd be too costly to lock them up for even a single film...

That's just franchise hell in a nutshell (Hey, that rhymed!).
The current batch of celebrity-tier child actors are becoming adults now, probably won't take long until a new batch pops up. Whether they'll grow up alongside/attached a legacy product or something original is another matter, though.

The only recent big unknown child actor castings I've heard about are the main kids for HBO's Harry Potter (which also counts as a legacy product of course), and I can't imagine that they're going to have an easy time as A, it's a cursed IP by now, and B, just about everyone who still care about Harry Potter agree that a new adaptation is unnecessary.
I hope those kids won't have it too rough. It would break my heart.

Then again, I'm a 30 year old man, it's not like I'm on the lookout for films under this umbrella term anymore. I'd rather make my own stories for younger people than consume them.

 

[BrawlMan]

Definitely sucks, because those kids should always have something fun and meaningful. Doesn't matter if it's live action movies or t v. Animated films and superhero films are nice as always and all, but there has to be variety.