I think what you’re talking about can happen in Hollywood movies and/or Independent movies. You really don’t have to have a cheap budget to be pretentious or make a movie that’s designed just for a certain audience. Independent Cinema is the new Hollywood. Look at movies like Lost in Translation, Saw, Blair Witch Project, etc and how much they grossed. And those three movies were played both in arthouse theaters and mainstream theaters, because they were such a success and because they weren’t very different than something that Hollywood might put out. So what i’m trying to say is, big budget Hollywood movies can often times imitate art house/grindhouse type films (Kill Bill for example), while Independent films can often be similiar to Hollywood movies (Garden State, like you said). Soooooooo, I think it just all depends on what exactly goes on in the director’s mind while he/she is making that film. And i’d much rather make a really cool (Hollywood type movie or arthouse flick) for a couple million dollars and have it gross a hundred million, then make a really cool over budgeted film that doesn’t give me half the profits.
