In a sprawling piece over at GQ, Mark Harris digs deep into the systemic problems with Hollywood’s studio system and the slow death of American mainstream cinema. From the whoring of films for profitability, devolving tastes and economic realities, Harris weaves into his truly informative essay plenty of levity and Solomon-like pinches of balanced perspective.

One of the most interesting passages I thought was regarding a recent trend towards less “adult” fare:

We can all acknowledge that the world of American movies is an infinitely richer place because of Pixar and that the very best comic-book movies, from Iron Man to The Dark Knight, are pretty terrific, but the degree to which children’s genres have colonized the entire movie industry goes beyond overkill. More often than not, these collectively infantilizing movies are breeding an audience—not to mention a generation of future filmmakers and studio executives—who will grow up believing that movies aimed at adults should be considered a peculiar and antique art. Like books. Or plays.

Although I felt Harris was incredibly on point with almost everything else he said in this essay, I remain somewhat on the fence about this argument. By “infantilizing” I read this to mean the source material is originally for children. To marginalize all children’s work as infantile however seems like an oversight — after all, most of the best beloved kids books and graphic novels work because they are universally well written stories, applicable equally to children and adults. A movie like Wall-E, for example, is going to teach a child a lot about good storytelling and I would never call that movie “infantile”.

Yes, there are plenty of immature movies based on kids material, but any more than there are based on cliched romantic comedy tropes or Adam Sandler scripts? I don’t know.

Anyhow, read the article. Then discuss. I am curious what people think about the topic.

Amusingly, West has decided to follow one person: Steven Holmes, who according to the Atlantic is a 19 year old random internet stranger from Coventry, England, who has absolutely zero connection with Kanye West.

The reaction on Holmes’ twitter page quickly shoots down any cool factor you might thing this creates — he is clearly not amused by the attention being followed by Kanye West on twitter has foisted upon him.

Which, although superficially will be dismissed as  just another funny, crazy thing insane Kanye West does amongst surely a hundred insane, crazy things he does every day, this one twitter friend is actually rather poignant.

I’m reminded of an interview Dave Chapelle did on Inside the Actors Studio where he rails on the Hollywood machine. He explains calmly that strong, independent, talented and perfectly intelligent individuals are chewed up and spit out by the cultural star makers every day and end up way worse for wear on the other side.

It’s easy for us to see TMZ or Gawker and conclude “what the hell is wrong with ” but Chappelle is as smart as dudes come in showbiz and Hollywood drove his ass to Africa for almost a year. We live in a culture where fame is the most valuable commodity — more than money or talent or brains. Whether fleeting or in the form of persistent notoriety, I’m pretty sure my generation and all below it are the first who prioritize being eventually famous for one reason or another (relatively speaking) as a life goal.

For some, this might even seem like a birth right.

But, as Steven Holmes shows us, even being followed by someone famous on twitter can be unbearably invasive and annoying. So I mean, yea, I still think Kanye West is batshit crazy. But you know — I’m not sure I didn’t make him that way.