Execs to blame for DVD sales

Re “DVD Slump Scares Industry,” May 19: I laughed out loud when Patrick Goldstein compared Hollywood executives to great athletes: “If they lose their confidence, they can’t do their job well.”

It doesn’t take genius or confidence to greenlight a movie like “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull,” when you have Spielberg and Harrison Ford attached to a film with a built-in audience. You could sneeze on 120 pages and shoot it -- which, come to think of it, looks about like they did.

And therein lie the answer and solution to the problem of lagging DVD sales. If the studio heads want people investing their hard-earned cash into collecting a home library, they need to churn out product that qualifies as a keepsake. These “swagger-type” executives Goldstein mentions have zero confidence in original stories. Over 50% of what they purchase and an even larger percentage of what they actually produce is based on pre-existing properties.

Only when executives start betting on unique and unpredictable stories will they turn around their DVD fortunes, and maybe the business in general. Until then, athletes like Kobe Bryant, Tiger Woods and Tom Brady will continue to be the only ones putting the “show” in the business of entertainment.

John Phillips

Huntington Beach