Do We Really Want a Film About Peeps?

Fans of Easter candy are in for a real treat. A Peeps film is finally getting the big screen treatment it deserves. Sources have reported that Small Soldiers writer Adam Rifkin recently optioned the film and TV rights for everyone’s favorite—or least favorite—holiday candy.

This comes around the same time Disney executives announced plans to craft a feature based on their legendary amusement park ride, “It’s a Small World.” While the storyline is still being hammered out, the plot is sure to be stuck in your head for days.

In an industry overflowing with remakes, spinoffs, adaptations, and now candy, many are asking if Hollywood has lost its creative mojo. Are production studios running low on ideas or just blood sugar? The answer is neither. Filmmakers aren’t merely scraping the bottom of the barrel for original scripts; they’re simply giving us what we want, even if we don’t know we want it.

Hollywood has always understood what psychologists call the mere-exposure effect, a pattern by which individuals choose objects or ideas based solely on their familiarity with them. Robert Zajonc, in a number of experiments performed in the 1960s, found that patients who were previously exposed to a particular stimuli were more likely to rate that stimuli favorably in the future.

Producers leverage this principle to increase revenue. And it works. Six of the top ten highest grossing domestic films of all time are either sequels or spin-offs. It also helps to explain why the latest Transformers film pulled in more at the box-office than its superior (and original) stepbrother, Pacific Rim.

While the mere-exposure effect doesn’t always predict a hit movie—the “overexposure effect” should also be considered—it does teach us an important truth about both the film industry and our world as a whole: humans have the intrinsic propensity to value the familiar over the creative or new. The familiar provides us with some form of personal comfort and security. Whether we admit it or not, we’ve been asking for a Peeps film. In fact, the mere-exposure effect not only helps explain box office patterns, but it also lends itself to issues like politics, theology, and economics.

How does we break through this phenomenon? How can we usher creativity and uniqueness into the spotlight?

By familiarizing ourselves with new angles of thought. By watching an indie film. By tastefully conversing with someone who votes differently than us. By seeking to understand how other denominations reach their city.

This does not mean one must abandon their convictions. Being previously exposed to a film genre or statement of beliefs does not necessarily imply its weakness. Introducing oneself to a new ideas and art forms will either serve to correct your familiarity or validate it. When done responsibly, breaking the mere-exposure effect can refine your convictions and personal taste—in film as well as other areas—while building a bridge with those who disagree with you.

After all, one can only eat Peeps for so long.