lazybones18
Banned
Hunger Games closing in on $400mil
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Wkd Box Office Est. 0511-13 12 - Depp/Burton bask in shadow of Whedon's Avengers
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ReturnOfTheRAT
Member
Fox Searchlight is happy with their returns so far.
Transformers 4.
Edit: Oh shit, that's Paramount. Derp. Well, I guess Universal could try making King Kong 2: The Revenge of Peter Jackson!
Heh, yeah Best Exotic is doing pretty good. But all the big movies are bombing in Avengers wake.
Banjo Tango
Member
Is there a rough rule of thumb to determine whether or not a movie made its money back? I'm assuming you can't just ask "Did box office gross exceed production cost".
Hot Coldman
Banned
Transformers 4.
Edit: Oh shit, that's Paramount. Derp. Well, I guess Universal could try making King Kong 2: The Revenge of Peter Jackson!
Scott Pilgrim 2.
XiaNaphryz
LATIN, MATRIPEDICABUS, DO YOU SPEAK IT
Theaters take roughly 50% of the total take. It can be higher overseas - in China, for example, at one point theaters there took 80-85% of the take. I heard its gone down to around 60-75% now.
You also have to factor in marketing budget.
Bare minimum seems to be that your domestic box office takings should exceed the production cost, with the movie not bombing overseas. Alternatively, if worldwide box office exceeds 200% of the production cost, that also looks decent.
Don't cinemas in the US take a much lower % in the opening weeks, with percentages going up the longer a movie runs? That's why studios try to make blockbusters open as large as possible, while theaters get very happy with movies that have really long legs because they get to earn more as time goes by. At least that's what I read!
I think usually, doing 2x your production budget is considered doing okay. Obviously it depends on the movie and how the international rights were handheld, plus a ton of other factors.
XiaNaphryz
LATIN, MATRIPEDICABUS, DO YOU SPEAK IT
That's not a common practice these days anymore as far as I know. And what I mentioned is the roughest basic formula you can use to quickly see if something's break even or not - individual films get specific contracts that can range from theaters getting 40% - 60%, which is why the 50% average is usually used.
Manmademan
Member
edit: dp
Manmademan
Member
Yes. in the opening week they make virtually nothing at all. if a movie has insane legs (Titanic, Avatar) the situation reverses.
http://themovieblog.com/2007/economics-of-the-movie-theater-where-the-money-goes-and-why-it-costs-us-so-much/
Avengers 3rd Friday was $15.308M
This is basically in line with what I calculated yesterday (I had $15.2M). Depending on holds today and Sunday, the weekend total will probably be in the $53-56M range. Monday's hold will be a little better than normal since it is a Canadian holiday (which usually boosts the domestic take by about 10%). Avengers will pass Star Wars ep 4 on Monday.
This is basically in line with what I calculated yesterday (I had $15.2M). Depending on holds today and Sunday, the weekend total will probably be in the $53-56M range. Monday's hold will be a little better than normal since it is a Canadian holiday (which usually boosts the domestic take by about 10%). Avengers will pass Star Wars ep 4 on Monday.
So did this practice stop? If it did how did the deals change? Was it pushed by the studios or the theater owners? It's an interesting topic imo, and deserves a bit more attention.
twinturbo2
butthurt Heat fan
Taylor Kitsch having two massive bombs to his name within three months can't be good for his career.
br0ken_shad0w
Member
Transformers 4.
Edit: Oh shit, that's Paramount. Derp. Well, I guess Universal could try making King Kong 2: The Revenge of Peter Jackson!
Vin Diesel to star in every movie from here on out.
Well I for one am thankful.
Vin in JP4 confirmed!
PhoncipleBone
Banned
That is actually a lower opening weekend than John Carter had, and that opened in March. And I expect the weekend drops for Battleship to be worse as well. Carter dropped 55% second weekend. Battleship will probably tank faster.
And Battleship has barely outgrossed John Carter overseas. $215.3M to John Carter's $200.6. Carter cost a bit more, but Battleship is going to be the second giant bomb that starred Taylor Kitsch in a few months.
ViewtifulJC
Banned
But it's good for everyone else!
PhoncipleBone
Banned
Not the money people at Disney and Universal.
They aren't even getting 50% of that... not even including marketing.
Not as big as a Carter bomba, but still bomba.
Stumps posted one a while back. It is still dependent on contracts(Basically which movie and how many asses it will bring in), but studios started to give more towards the theaters due to the booming Home market. And away from the "80-90%".
PhoncipleBone
Banned
John Carter made $200M overseas as well. A drop in the bucket compared to what it needed to make.
Taylor Kitsch is never going to star in another big budget action movie again. Which, judging from his performance in John Carter, is probably a good thing. He's not a very compelling lead.
Kung Fu Jedi
Member
The old conventional wisdom for a film to make money it had to earn three times it's budget to break even. That's changed somewhat in this day and age because of different revenue streams, DVD/streaming sales, etc. But this was the rule of thumb a number of years back.
Also worth pointing out, that the rule of thumb was three times the production budget. Not 3 times whatever figure people guess was the production + marketing budget.
Insert "some men want to watch the world burn" joke.
I wonder if this was in response to cinema owners being angry that the lead time from theatre release to DVD had shrunk to 3-4 months on most films. Theatres used to have a year before movies were available on home video, which is why everything had better legs in the past.
Kung Fu Jedi
Member
Right. Production budget. The number doesn't factor in marketing at all.
Manmademan
Member
Hollywood accounting means you'd never get a "true" cost for marketing anyway. A lot of these media conglomerates run up the figures billing their own divisions for things like advertisting to avoid showing a taxable profit. The actual COST is probably a mystery.
AgentChris
Member
That John Carter dude is never going to be the lead actor of a blockbuster again.
PhoncipleBone
Banned
Or you might never make money according to the accountants. WB posted a LOSS on Harry Potter 5, and it made almost a billion dollars. Crazy.
http://www.deadline.com/2010/07/stu...ause-of-warner-bros-phony-baloney-accounting/
demosthenes
Member
ViewtifulJC
Banned
As an Accounting Major, this picture amuses me in many ways
Heh, he's no worse an actor than the horrible Sam Worthington. But Worthington will keep getting lead roles because of the success of Avatar and Clash of the Titans, while he's doomed now with these two huge bombs on his back. Sucks for the guy.
PhoncipleBone
Banned
I want to see a story called "Deadpool, CPA" now. Thanks.
twinturbo2
butthurt Heat fan
I kinda feel sorry for him.
Speedymanic
Banned
Should never have been made a leading actor. He was good in FNL but his character was a stupid drunk so it covered up his nonexistent acting skills.
Biggest-Geek-Ever
Member
Really rough weekend. Avengers is going to have a weekend $5m below what I expected, the openers all disappointed, and Hunger Games is the only other holdover with a good drop.
The market is quickly opening up for the June films.
The market is quickly opening up for the June films.
I'm shocked..., SHOCKED that Battleship managed to open to such a pathetic number. I've been rooting for this film to crash and burn since day one and even I'm stunned that it managed just $25m over three days.., truly dire.
To say that Battleship is a disaster is a gross understatement. This is the sort of apocalyptic, seismic event that cause studios to take their chairman into the parking lot and shoot them as a warning to others. Remember that Battleship is the most expensive film that Universal has EVER made.
Battleship's foreign gross is solid, nothing more, but it's US gross, which could very well be UNDER $50m when it finishes it's run, is just an embarrassment. With a likely worldwide gross of less than $300m this will be a huge money loser for Universal.
When the 'big 6' studios are owned by large corporations such massive bombs aren't fatal but they do make a sizeable dents on the bottom line of the company's finances. But when your new parent company is Comcast, ostensibly a TV company, that isn't exactly enamored with the film business things become a whole lot more dicey.
I'd expect there to be huge changes (either in their executives or in the way they develop/produce their 'event films' going forward) at Universal after this.
Universal is telling people that it cost that much to produce but studios NEVER tell the truth about the budgets of their films.
I'd say a conservative estimate of Battleship's budget is $275-300m easily. While the interiors were shot in New Orleans (IIRC) Berg went back to Hawaii (where they shot all the exteriors) for reshoots two or three times. And Hawaii ain't cheap for anything mang.
Fast and the Furious 6 next year. Despicable Me 2 as well....
*cough*
That's about it off the top of my head.
To say that Battleship is a disaster is a gross understatement. This is the sort of apocalyptic, seismic event that cause studios to take their chairman into the parking lot and shoot them as a warning to others. Remember that Battleship is the most expensive film that Universal has EVER made.
Battleship's foreign gross is solid, nothing more, but it's US gross, which could very well be UNDER $50m when it finishes it's run, is just an embarrassment. With a likely worldwide gross of less than $300m this will be a huge money loser for Universal.
When the 'big 6' studios are owned by large corporations such massive bombs aren't fatal but they do make a sizeable dents on the bottom line of the company's finances. But when your new parent company is Comcast, ostensibly a TV company, that isn't exactly enamored with the film business things become a whole lot more dicey.
I'd expect there to be huge changes (either in their executives or in the way they develop/produce their 'event films' going forward) at Universal after this.
Universal is telling people that it cost that much to produce but studios NEVER tell the truth about the budgets of their films.
I'd say a conservative estimate of Battleship's budget is $275-300m easily. While the interiors were shot in New Orleans (IIRC) Berg went back to Hawaii (where they shot all the exteriors) for reshoots two or three times. And Hawaii ain't cheap for anything mang.
Fast and the Furious 6 next year. Despicable Me 2 as well....
*cough*
That's about it off the top of my head.
Good Job Bob
Member
I called Battleshits being a flop a while ago.
Mass audiences aren't willing to swallow that creatively bankrupt piece of trash.
Mass audiences aren't willing to swallow that creatively bankrupt piece of trash.
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