When I go to watch a movie, I want an experience. A basic plot is for a TV show, but a movie, a movie should capture an audience, it should shape minds and the best ones should be able to change the way that people see the world. These films that define generations are drama movies. 

When many people think of the word “drama,” especially in our generation, most think of the typical high school drama which is inescapable in our daily lives. However, actual drama is something different altogether. 

Drama movies are plot-driven, they have high stakes, they have conflict and they are interesting. Drama movies tell the stories that have helped shape our world. Some are based off of true stories like the “Big Short,” a movie that helped much of the world understand the 2008 Financial Crisis in an interesting and beautifully written fashion, or movies like “Vice,” a film that detailed Dick Cheney’s rise to power and the atrocities committed in Iraq (events that much of the world never knew about). 

Drama movies have the capability to inspire a group of people like no other genre. Films such as “Hidden Figures,” a movie which shined a light on the contributions of African American women in helping the United States win the “Space Race.” Movies such as this help inspire demographics that have been historically oppressed to pursue opportunities that they may have thought were out of reach. These films provide role models, they help set an ideal. 

Dramas allow the audience to view something outside of their own lives. This, along with everything else, sets it apart from all other genres. 

Coming-of-Age movies are just boring, whitewashed, Hollywood stereotypes that are just derivative of the lives that we already live. None of them are original or interesting as they all tell the same story. There are only so many ways people can “come of age,” and sometimes, I just want to escape from my own life, not be immersed in it even more. Some people may want to watch a coming-of-age movie because they could relate to it or the characters, but we are able to find deeper and more emotional connections to characters in dramas who are going through something different than we are. Drama movies allow us to see how the emotions we feel apply to an array of situations and open our minds to a world beyond the teenage drama which we live in.

Drama movies make us more interesting people. They inspire us to reach for the stars, they expand our minds and help move society forward. They are not only intriguing, but they are interesting. I for one, don’t want to feel “17 Again,” I want to see a film that makes me look at the world with a new perspective, not just reinforces the one I already have.