IT USED TO BE that every American filmmaker was an independent. In its wide-open beginnings, the movie business was a cutthroat, winner-take-all environment where hardened men dreaming of monopoly did not hesitate to harass competitors, smash up equipment, and even fire off a few rounds of ammunition to deter rivals from finishing their productions. Eventually, the ragtag confederations that composed the first studios congealed into an industry, and such cutthroat entrepeneurialism settled down to a matter of outsmarting and outpromoting your opposition, not shooting rifles off over their heads. The frontier days were gone, and the movie business became a bureaucracy like any other.

The concept of independence is a powerful one in this country, however. Like potentates before them, indulging their court artists' whims (lest in depression over their serfdom they become irritatingly unproductive), the materialistic moneymen who run Hollywood have always understood the P.R. benefits of at least allowing the appearance of autonomy. But throughout the 1970s and '80s, the notion of artistic freedom--in movies of all things!--seemed to concern the actual audience, not just the artists themselves. Directors became celebrities in their own right, something that could be claimed by perhaps half a dozen of their predecessors in the decades before; festivals sprang up across the nation aimed to celebrate a "newfound" genre: the American independent film.

Hollywood had dealt with this kind of challenge before: Hadn't it snapped up John Cassavetes after his provocative debut, Shadows, for a couple of straight films, even tried to lure Truffaut and Godard out West when they became such critical darlings? (Ironically, only Antonioni came and nearly bankrupted MGM in the process.) It was to be expected that Hollywood would digest this new genre even before it was identifiable as such, buying up or spinning off boutique distribution companies for smaller, "independent" films (Disney's Miramax, Fox's Searchlight, Paramount Classics), and trawling through Sundance and Telluride for the next hot young thing to sign to a three-picture deal. The trick for the studios, and one they've played near flawlessly every time, has been grabbing up low-budget directors whose films, however praised, reveal them to be in the heart of mainstream American filmmaking, with just the right touch of self-conscious rawness for spice.

Consider the latest trio of tyros who have gained the keys to the kingdom after being praised for their independently financed efforts. At first blush it's an impressive roster of offbeat talents, but Hollywood hasn't dominated world cinema for almost a century by letting just anybody make a movie. Kevin Smith, soon to begin filming the new Fletch movie, certainly has a fine ear for funny, foul-mouthed dialogue, but his supposed insights into sexual relations in Chasing Amy or religion in Dogma reveal him to be little more than an overreaching gagman, and flatly uncinematic in style. The camerawork of Paul Thomas Anderson may be among the most flashily enjoyable today, but the ideas it's put to expressing are trite, timid platitudes--whether the wretched punishments meted to the deluded porn stars of Boogie Nights or the forced attempts at empathy with his anguished creations in the glibly ponderous Magnolia. Despite the surprise that greeted the announcement he'll be directing the next Adam Sandler film, Anderson is a perfect match for the maniacally-juvenile-but-nice-guy- at-heart comedian.

But when it comes to overextension and cowardly conservatism, neither Smith nor Anderson can hold a candle to Darren Aronofsky, the designated savior of Warner Brothers' flagship franchise who is hard at work on the script for Batman: Year One even as you read this. Aronofsky's Requiem for a Dream is all frenzy and no argument, a relentlessly showy indictment of addiction whose admirers are correct: The movie should be shown in classrooms across the nation, since it's as stilted and hammering in its preachiness as all the other boring, derisible films that students are forced to sit through.

Each of the three directors has been lauded as a fresh new voice in moviemaking and each, upon closer inspection, is merely more of the same, only willing so far to work on the cheap. That the greater, more uncompromising originality of a Jim Jarmusch or Charles Burnett (one of our finest directors, currently paying the bills by doing TV movies) doesn't receive the same open-armed welcome as these supposedly subversive artists should only remind you that Hollywood, as ever, has proven itself smarter and more observant than its commentators. Rather than condemn the industry, the situation could be seen as win-win: The heavy, paternalistic hand of the studios on the young filmmakers' shoulders might lead them to their finest work, steering them away from pretension and overindulgence. Whether a comedy-mystery with a disguise-donning detective, an Adam Sandler vehicle, and a crimefighter in a cape represent the best, most independent visions that American film has to offer is another question entirely.