I just saw Million Dollar Baby on cable.  I didn't see it when it was out in theaters, because I'd heard it was a tearjerker and I'm not a huge fan of those, or women's boxing in general.  As I expected, the movie was melodramatic and heavy-handed in places.  But that's just my personal opinion.  I fully understand why other people might feel completely different.

What really struck me was how incredibly well-made this movie was.  It was in the style of an older film, so it was very slow-paced by today's standards.  Nevertheless, there wasn't a single wasted frame.  Every second of screentime was spent developing the characters, advancing the plot... basically telling a story.

I assume it won every award that exists.  But what really bothers me is that this level of direction shouldn't be the MAXIMUM you can expect in a modern movie; it should be the MINIMUM.  Don't get me wrong; I don't begrudge any YouTube poster who fails to produce a coherent product -- more power to them for trying their best.  But any film that costs tens or hundreds of millions of dollars should be made with at least this level of care.

I know it might not sound like much to some high rollers, but I think of a hundred million dollars as quite a lot of money.  That's not just enough to start a business; it's enough to start an entire INDUSTRY.  It should be completely impossible to look at anything that costs that much and think:  "Oh my God.  What a gigantic, unmitigated steaming pile of crap that was!" 

But that's what I think of by far the vast majority of what Hollywood produces today.  How is that possible?

That movie was great...