Leonardo DiCaprio says the current studio system in Hollywood is blocking the way of creative storytelling and believes it is responsible for the switch of the filmmakers towards the streaming medium.
During an interview with Esquire magazine, the 43-year-old actor said such a trend is unhealthy for cinema.
"I don't want to act as if I've been around since f***ing silent cinema, but I see this as a huge shift in the way movies are going to get done, what gets financing. The studio system has tons of content, libraries of things that they can make movies of, but in a lot of ways they are hemorrhaging.
"They've become -- much like in the twenties -- these corporate empires that have taken over the artistic vein of movie making. We're now in an era when there's a flush of cash into streaming," DiCaprio said.
The actor, who is partnering with Hollywood star Brad Pitt for director Quentin Tarantino's "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, said the excess of content has also led to a "lot of garbage out there".
"Now I do see a lot of chances being taken for story lines, certainly documentaries, certainly giving some artists opportunities to make out-of-the-box story lines that I don't think 10 years ago would have been possible. But these types of films that Quentin is doing are also becoming endangered species," he added.
DiCaprio said the film aficionados and critics should continue to celebrate the filmmakers who are still holding the fort for creative and risk-taking cinema.
"I'm not saying celebrate this movie, but let's celebrate filmmakers who are still holding on to the craft of making movies, and let's hope that in that transition into whatever this is going to be, this type of filmmaking will still exist. There are some dark ages coming up."