.

The quite successful supernatural horror film Obsession turns on the protagonist Bear gaining a wish by way of a magical and apparently mass produced gag gift, the One Wish Willow but the wish-granting twig is not in my opinion that aspect of the film that is at odds the most with our objective reality and the element that fits that category is syptomatic of an issue across Hollywood.

Bear, the girl he has an unrequited crush on, Nikki, and their friends, Ian and Sarah, in addition to comprising a bar hopping trivia team, all work in the musical instrument and sheet music shop of Sarah’s father. They are young college-aged persons with their lives currently unmoored by deep responsibilities and serious careers, ideal characters that could have an affinity with horror’s prime demographic, the under-30 movie goer. And yet there is an element in the film that is utterly unrealistic — apparently not one of them is a roommate arrangement.

Nikki lives in a house, we see Bear drop her off there in the film’s first act, a small but nice standalone structure, with no mention of anyone expecting her home. Bear has a house that he apparently inherited from his grandmother. These four young adults, holding down minimum wage retail jobs, have credit cards, can afford to go bar hopping, and all live alone with the privacy and seclusion that works so well in a horror movie.

I have worked a number of dead end, low wage, retail jobs, and not one of them afforded me the ability to live alone. When I did live alone for a short while working that sort of minimum wage job it took two of them and even then, every penny mattered. I certainly did not have the resources for repeated nights out visiting multiple bars. (Even if I had been the sort of person for whom that would have been attractive.) The idea that three of them, discounting Sarah because her family owned the business, would even get full time employment and not something more realistic like a work week under 30 hours is stretching credulity to the breaking point.

This highlights a systemic issue in Hollywood, fewer and fewer of the creatives have had personal lived experience outside of upper-middleclass lives that afforded easy access to college, and all that opportunity affords. I recall in the later seasons of Buffy the Vampire Slayer after her mother had passed away, Buffy needed to get a job at a fast-food burger joint in order to take care of her and her sister. Again, even if her mother had somehow managed to purchase a California house outright with no mortgage, it would be impossible for Buffy to support herself, maintain the home, and raise her sister on the meager wages afforded by such a menial job.

This extends beyond low wage jobs that are below the poverty line. The lack of military personnel also affects the quality of storytelling in the film and television industry. Sure, they bring in consultants and such when they are making a war movie but all too often the writers, producers, and directors work from a state of ignorance when they attempt to have military characters that are not specifically working in battlefield condition. It is that sort of blindness to how things really work that allows J.J. Abrams to have someone go to a military-style academy and graduate not as an ensign but as captain despite having no actual command experience.  or for Joss Whedon to have elite special forces that blindly accept a briefing with no questions asked about the particulars. Those sorts of unit are comprised of some of the smartest people in the military. Far from perfect, granted, and prey to any other human failing, but they are not dumb just accept what is presented types.

The stratification of the people and the limited backgrounds that they represent are a far more damaging force to film and television than any ‘nepo-baby’ troubles.