The Big Picture: Broken Biz

[shadowstriker86]

here's a solution: infect the entire city of hollywood/burbank with montezumas revenge (massive diarrhea that doesnt stop), quarantine them in their homes while new people get hired in and make sure those people arent money grubbing whores. problem solved!

 

[Gordon_4_v1legacy]

I agree with Bob when it comes to the term Blockbuster...
I remember the old days when a film had to gross 10 time what it took to make it; NOW if your film brings in 3 time they toss you that tittle regardless if it was good or not.

IE: Avatar 600+ G's COST divided by 1.8 B GROSS = 2 and change maybe 3.
Blair Witch 60 G's COST divided by 600+ M GROSS = 10 and more.

Yet BOTH are given the title of BLOCKBUSTER... Doesn't seem fair, does it?

I'll admit my numbers are coming from Wikipedia and Box Office Mojo, but even before I looked them up I could tell you pulled Avatar's figures out of thin air.

First off, Avatar made 2.7 Billion gross, it was Titanic that made 1.8 Billion. Second, the most common figure I can track down for Avatar's cost was 245-250 Million: a very expensive movie to be sure, but no fucking studio in the world would greenlight something with a 600 Million budget unless the script came from God himself.

so lets use the higher of the two figures: $250,000,000 and divide its total worldwide gross of $2,782,275,172 by that budget. The answer is roughly speaking, 11.

Or for a more attractive number, simply minus the budget from the gross take:

$2,532,275,172

Holy fuck, that's a lot of hookers and blow.

And by the way, Blair Witch Project only made $250,000,000 (rounded up) worldwide. Still, for a production budget of only $60,000 its fucking good returns, making the budget back 4000 times.

But by definition, Avatar is still the blockbuster. It did bigger numbers, it had a bigger scope, and a bigger audience. It is one of the best examples of the 'Epic Movie' since The Lord of the Rings and Ben Hur.

Call it cliche, it is. Call it preechy, well you may vary but its not shy about its message. Call James Cameron an arsehole, cos he is and better men than I have said worse about him.

But, no one quite does Sci-Fi action like James does, and I hope he's around for more years to come, cos I wanna see that Battle Angel Alita movie.


Citations:

Avatar:
http://boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=avatar.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avatar_%282009_film%29#Production

Blair Witch Project:
http://boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=blairwitchproject.htm


More on topic, it is very interestingly in line with Bob's view that I cannot track down a reliable costing for Avatar. Tellingly so.

 

[Odd Water]

I'd watch Twinkie the Kid 3D before I'd watch Adam Sandler in Candyland.

 

[walsfeo]

I agree that the Candyland movie sounds like a bad idea, but will it be any worse than other recent movies with Adam Sandler? Probably not. And Clue was a very fun movie.

 

[Ashley Blalock]

Oddly enough io9 had a story a bit like Bob's this week http://io9.com/5881236/the-way-we-measure-box-office-success-is-completely-broken

Their story pretty much boils down to Hollywood uses the box office numbers because if they used tickets sold instead you would see how badly Hollywood lags behind other forms of entertainment.

Ah and you've got to love how they spin those numbers. With Transformer 3 they love to go look at our world wide total because this must be a film everyone was excited about. Ignore our domestic box office because even with the 3D surcharge it made $50 million less than the second movie in the domestic market.

Honestly at this point I think the only thing that might fix Hollywood is for enough failure to almost bankrupt the big companies. I can still find good films from outside of the US but the movies that make me say wow seem be coming from places other than Hollywood. Sure we get something like the Hobbit once in a while but how many films like Green Lantern to get a Dark Knight?

 

[Oskamunda]

I was actually really surprised the there was no mention of the broken Hollywood business model contributing directly to piracy and therefore government censorship...but then again, the episode is only about give minutes long each week, so...FUTURE INSTALLMENT??

 

[japtar10101]

I thought "independent" meant a self-funded, self-produced product whose investment comes purely from the studio's own pockets or donations, provided the studio isn't a producer or a distributor itself. As an example, Minecraft is self-produced, and therefore an independent game. Bastion is NOT an independent game, as it was produced by Warner Bros.

Anyway, I do agree the way Hollywood measures their sales are broken. I see the same "independent" label disappearing on video games, too, and it'll be a sad day when that comes.

By the by, will you do a review of "Indie Game: The Movie" when it's released? I'd love to know what your opinions are about that movie. And yes, it's a self-funded, self-produced movie between 2 film makers.

 

[Endocrom]

Say what you will, I would most likely watch a Battle Beasts movie/tv series.

 

[alik44]

"Product placement movie" starring andy dick.

yep i think that's the worst one i can think of

 

[Gordon_4_v1legacy]

snip!

I'll admit that I got the take-in wrong but the price tag I posted for Avatar was based on the TOTAL cost of the movie, not just the production cost.

Production = 250M+
Marketing & promotions = 150M+
Distribution = 200M+

***BTW***

Distribution was set high because certain countries (China) demanded a high price to make up for the "losses" of their locally made movies; What a B.S. reason!

"Who's gonna watch OUR movies when Avatar's in town?!"

That's what I say!

Okay, so what were the marketing and distribution costs of the other action summer blockbusters like Transformers, Thor, Iron Man, Captain America etc? Surely even if they were less budgeted than Avatar, advertising tends to cost about the same. A 30 second ad in primetime on US television costs the same for toilet paper and condoms as it would a movie. Even factoring in that, Avatar still made 2 billion dollars in profit as a film. Transformers gets a little unfair since even if the movies hadn't been the huge film going successes they were, a lot of that could be recouped by toy sales: Avatar didn't have that advantage....mainly because its toys were shit and a bad idea.

 

[88chaz88]

I WANT THE PUMPKIN FACES BACK!
Yes I know its been half a year but I miss them and I can't wait till October again.

(It's also because I'm not always sure what emotion you're expressing with the faces but the pumpkins were both super-awesome-cute and easy to decipher... and were somehow comforting during your rage moments.)

 

[Something Amyss]

I'm not as big on movies as a guy who calls himself "moviebob," but I remember when "Indie" moved from just being short for "independent" in music circles to becoming another marketable genre that was dominated by the big labels. "Indie" should never have been a genre to begin with, but something with its origins in actual independent groups should not be a mainstream, major label deal.

In other words, I saw parallels here.

*Sigh* Stupid Hollywood. When will they learn that basing a movie on something that already exists is not the way to go? ...And yet, some people will still go to see a movie based on "Battleship"... *Double Sigh*

But...But I really want to see the part where someone proclaims "You sunk my battleship!"

 

[Canadamus Prime]

Yeah, I learned we need to go burn Hollywood to the ground. ...sorry I'm currently suffering from Diet Pepsi withdrawal and lack of sleep. What were we talking about?