“Are filmmakers today… dumber?”

Relax. Breathe. Put the pitchfork down.
This isn’t a hit job on creatives. This is a hit job on the conversation.

Because the truth is, whenever someone doesn’t like a movie, the default Boomer setting kicks in:

“Back in my day, movies had real stories.”
“Everything today is just CGI and noise.”
“Nobody knows how to write anymore.”

But here’s the uncomfortable plot twist:
Filmmakers today aren’t less intelligent — audiences are less patient.
And the industry has evolved so.

Let’s break this down without sugarcoating it (because sugarcoating is how we ended up with 14 Fast & Furious movies).

The Myth of Declining Intelligence

People romanticise the past like it was some magical artistic utopia. But newsflash:
Every decade has trash movies.
Truly, catastrophically bad ones.

The only difference?
We forgot the bad ones from the 70s, 80s, and 90s because nobody streams them.
But the good ones — The Godfather, Taxi Driver, Shawshank — became immortal.

This creates something psychologists call survivorship bias.
We compare the best of the past to the average of the present and then pretend it’s a fair comparison.

It’s like comparing Messi’s best goals to your cousin playing Sunday football and concluding humanity is getting worse at sports.

Hollywood Didn’t Get Dumber — It Got Scared

Modern filmmaking decisions are shaped less by intelligence and more by terror:

• Terror of box-office bombs
• Terror of angry fanbases
• Terror of cancel culture
• Terror of TikTok-brained attention spans
• Terror of shareholders who think story structure is a KPI

Studios used to take risks because the stakes were lower.
Now, a flop can vaporise hundreds of millions of dollars.

So what do executives do?

They choose safety.
Sequels. Prequels. Remakes. Cinematic Universes.
Nostalgia packaged in 4K.

It’s not that creators can’t think — it’s that studios don’t want them to.

Algorithms Now Write Movies (Almost Literally)

Here’s where things get weird.

Data now dictates storytelling:

• “Make the explosion happen before minute 12.”
• “Audience retention drops when characters talk too long.”
• “Add a quippy sidekick for relatability.”
• “End the scene with a meme moment.”

Basically, movies are now created with the artistic depth of a YouTube retention graph.

It’s not about intelligence.
It’s about optimisation.

Filmmakers aren’t idiots — they’re handcuffed by analytics.

Imagine telling Scorsese in the 70s:
“Hey Marty, the focus group says Travis Bickle should floss more for relatability.”

He would have stabbed someone with a dolly track.

Audiences Have the Attention Span of a Goldfish on Red Bull

Let’s be brutally honest.

People today can barely finish a 30-second reel without checking notifications.

And you expect studios to make slow-burn, character-driven epics that need actual attention?

We live in a world where:

• People watch movies while scrolling
• Subtitles are on for everything
• “If it doesn’t hook me in 7 seconds, I’m out”
• People search “Ending explained” before the ending even happens

It’s not that filmmakers are less intelligent.
It’s that audience behaviour has shifted so dramatically that traditional storytelling often doesn’t stand a chance.

We Still Get Brilliant Films — You Just Don’t Notice

Every single year, masterpieces are released.

But they don’t trend.
They don’t go viral.
They don’t get 500 million views on TikTok.

They just quietly exist. They are like intelligent introverts at a frat party. They are overshadowed by the cinematic equivalent of loud, drunk guys doing backflips into a pool.

Think of films like:

• Everything Everywhere All At Once
• Parasite
• Hereditary
• Moonlight
• Arrival
• Whiplash

These aren’t “dumb.”
They’re some of the smartest, boldest stories of the last 50 years.

The intelligence is there.
The visibility is not.

The Real Problem Is That Movies Now Compete With Everything

In the 70s and 80s, movies competed with:

• TV
• Books
• Maybe the mall

Today, movies compete with:

• Instagram
• TikTok
• YouTube
• Netflix
• Twitch
• Podcasts
• Dating apps
• Infinite scrolling
• Memes
• News cycles
• AI-generated dopamine hits

Filmmakers now have to fight an entire digital battlefield just to keep your eyeballs for two hours. No wonder plots get simpler. No wonder pacing gets faster.

The game changed.
And so did the rules.

So, Are Filmmakers Less Intelligent?

Short answer: No.
Long answer: Absolutely not.

What has declined is the freedom to take risks, not the intelligence to imagine them.

Today’s filmmakers are juggling constraints that directors 40 years ago couldn’t even imagine:

• algorithmic pressure
• global controversies
• massive budgets
• social media backlash
• declining theatre culture
• shrinking attention spans

The creativity is still there.
It’s just forced into narrower lanes.

The Real Question Isn’t About Filmmaker Intelligence

It’s this:

Are we still willing to reward ambitious storytelling?
Or are we too addicted to predictable dopamine hits?

Because if audiences only show up for easy entertainment, studios will only make easy entertainment.

And if audiences don’t support risky films, studios won’t fund risky films.

It’s not stupidity that kills creativity — it’s indifference.

So Maybe the Real Intelligence Test… Is Ours

Before blaming filmmakers, ask yourself:

• When was the last time you watched a movie without multitasking?
• When was the last time you chose an original film over a franchise?
• When was the last time you supported a smaller, smarter film?
• When was the last time you didn’t say, “Eh, I’ll wait for it to go online”?

Movies show culture.
If culture gets noisier, movies get louder.
If culture gets anxious, movies get safer.
If culture gets impatient, movies get simpler.

It’s not that filmmakers are less intelligent.

It’s that the world got stupidly complicated.

And filmmaking is just trying to survive it.