On Tue, 1 Sep 2009 18:56:59 -0700 (PDT), plausible prose man
<***@aol.com> wrote:
>On Sep 1, 7:38 pm, William George Ferguson <***@newsguy.com>
>wrote:
>> On Tue, 1 Sep 2009 09:58:58 -0700 (PDT), plausible prose man
>>
>> <***@aol.com> wrote:
>> >On Sep 1, 4:56 am, "Ken from Chicago" <***@comcast.net>
>> >wrote:
>> >> Curious how long it took DC to get 4 film adaptations of its DC universe
>> >> (overlooking the Vertigo adaptations) out in the past decade meanwhile
>> >> Marvel has had over a twice as many released.
>>
>> > Most of which were under-performing crap, if not outright flops.
>>
>> Half is not most.
>
> You know, close enough.
Me, I'm a fan of hypobole rather than hyperbole.
>
>> The two directly produced by Marvel instead of being
>> licensed to another studio (The Hulk and Iron Man) both did well (note, not
>> the Ang Lee Hulk)
>
> I'll give you Iron Man, but I think Hulk was still not quite what the
>studio was hoping, and I'm not "true scots" ing that by saying the
>studio hopes every movie is going to be Titanic.
I think The Incredible Hulk did exactly what Marvel was hoping for. Ang
Lee's Hulk had destroyed the (massive) goodwill present for a Hulk movie,
and Marvel was looking to rebuild that goodwill. They weren't looking for
a breakout hit (although, of course, as you indicate every studio would
like any movie release to be Titanic). They were looking for a movie that
held its ground, didn't tank, and left a pleasant taste in the mouth, the
first neccesary step to make a Hulk movie that would have a chance to break
out (because of the extremely negative reaction to the Ang Lee movie, they
knew going in that this had no chance to be a breakout, they just wanted to
get back to zero).
>> >> True not all the Marvel films
>> >> were great, but then, ahem, CATWOMAN ... yeah, 'nuff said.
>>
>> > I'll see your Catwoman, and raise you Ang Lee's Hulk (please don't
>> >make me, Ang Lee), Elektra, Ghost Rider, and Daredevil, and I might
>> >throw in X-men III and Wolverine.
>>
>> A Marvel movie report card (this isn't a quality assessment, it's a
>> monetary assessment)
>>
>> Fox X-Men (A)
>> Fox X-Men 2 (A)
>> Fox X-Men 3 (C)
>
>Here are the numbers from the IMDB, and we can weasel around and say
>no movie ever really loses money, given how inflated the budgets are,
>and then there's the merchandising and the overseas and the DVDs, but
>I'm fairly confident making back your budget is only a C
>(disappointment), doubling your budget is a B, (solid performer)
>triple or more is an A, (smash hit) not making back your budget is an
>F (career damaging). I probably could do something where sequels get
>graded more harshly, since they tend to cost more and bring in less,
>but I won't.
Here's my scoring
A - greatly exceeds studio expectations
B - meets or exceeds studio expectations
C - does okay, but not great
D - falls well below studio expectations
E - tanks
Studio expectations aren't as straightforward as (3 times budget/2 times
budget/budget/below budget. One movie could cost $100M and take in $120M
and be considered successful by the studio, while another could do the same
and be considered disappointing by the studio (I'm ignoring 'industry'
expectations because of the widespreasd practice of rival studios
deliberating making inflated 'expectations' for a movie so that it can be
considered a disappointment when it doesn't meet them)
I rated X-Men as 'A' because it exceeded what Fox thought it was going to
do by a goodly amount, to the point that they gave the go-ahead for a
sequel in its second week of release. X-Men 2 had pretty close to the same
percentage of domestic box office versus budget, and still exceeded Fox's
expectations, so another A. X3, came in with a higher domestic box office
than budget, and did well overseas but no homerun, so a C. Wolverine came
in well below expectations, so a D.
> I'm going to eyeball the math, too, since I'm pretty sure they do in
>Hollywood:
>
> (all figures from IMDB, first # budget, second US gross)
>
>X-men
>$75,000,000 (estimated)
>$157,299,717 (USA)
>(B)
>X-men 2
>$110,000,000
>$214,948,780
>(B)
>X-Men 3
>$210,000,000
>$234,360,014 (USA)
>(C)
>Wolverine:
>$150,000,000
>$179,840,414
>(C)
>
Another factor to look at, because it can figure heavily into a studios
final view on a film, depending on the film, is the foreign box office. As
an example, this year (so far). Numbers in parentheses on the worldwide
are the domestic totals for the films not in the top 10 on the domestic
list.
Domestic (US/Canada) Worldwide
Transformers 399.5M Harry Potter 6 896.4M
Harry Potter 6 294.5M Transformers 828.1M
Up 289.6M Ice Age:DotD 807.1M
The Hangover 270.5M Angels & Demons 484.4M (133.4M)
Star Trek 256.7M The Hangover 419.7M
Monster Vs. Aliens 198.4M Up 413.9M
Ice Age:DotD 193.8M Night at teh Museum 404.1M
Woverine 179.9M Star Trek 383.1M
Night at the Museum 176.5M Monsters Vs. aliens 379.9M
The Proposa 169.2M Terminator:Salvation 371.3M (125.3M)
The one that really jumps out is Ice Age, which is going to end up about
100M less than Up in the US, but about 400M more than Up worldwide.
Based just on the domestic numbers, I would give Up an A and Ice Age a B,
maybe even a C. Based on the worldwide numbers, Up is still an A and Ice
Age is an A+.
Angels & Demons would be no better than a C based on its domestic box
office, but is an A based on the worldwide numbers.
>Okay, so...
>> Fox X-Men: Wolverine (D)
>> Sony Spider-Man (A)
>> Sony Spider-Man 2 (A+)
>> Sony Spider-Man 3 (A)
I'm revising Wolverine up to a C
> Spiderman:
>$139,000,000
>$403,706,375
>(A)
Worldwide: 821.7M, still an A
>Spiderman 2:
>$200,000,000
>$373,585,825
>(B)
Worldwide: 783.8M, revising down to a B
>Spiderman 3
>$258,000,000
>$336,530,303
>(C+)
Worldwide: 890.9M, still an A and leaning toward A+
>(those last two are surprising, huh? I might have to take back what I
>said about "spiderman's a surefire hit me < surprised if spiderman 4
>doesn't earn back its budget, how about you?
Even with Hollywood accounting, its worldwide box office will be well in
excess of its listed budget, and is likely to double it.
>
>> Fox Fantastic Four (A)
>> Fox Fantastic Four 2 (B)
>
>Fantastic Four
>$100,000,000
>$154,695,569
> (C+)
FF did significantly better than Fox expected, thus the A
worldwide: 330.6M
>Fantastic Four 2
>$130,000,000
>$131,920,333 (USA)
>(C)
I'll agree with you and revise downward here to a C
worldwide: 289.0M
(notably, both FF movies had higher foreign box office than domestic,
though not massively so)
>> Fox Daredevil (B)
>
>Daredevil
>$78,000,000
>$102,543,518 (USA)
>C+
I'm staying with B
worldwide: 179,2M
>> Fox Elektra (D)
>
> Elektra
>$43,000,000
>$24,407,944
>F
Staying with D, E (my F equivalent) is reserved for the Real bombs
>> Universal The Hulk (D)
>$137,000,000
>$132,122,995
>C-
D, the key here is that Hulk didn't bomb, but greatly failed to meet
expectations.
worldwide: 245.4M
>> Sony Ghost Rider (E)
>$110,000,000
>$115,802,596
>C
I'll revise up to D, because it wasn't a complete bomb at the box office,
but it didn't nearly do what Sony/Columbia was hoping for (they were hoping
for a franchise)
worldwide: 228.7M
>> Lionsgate Punisher (D)
>$33,000,000
>$33,682,273
>C
Still D, still under expectations
worldwide: 58.7M
>> Lionsgate Punisher 2 (E)
>$22,000,000
>$7,948,159
>F
worldwide: 9.9M. Pretty much says it all.
>> Marvel Iron Man (A+)
>$140,000,000
>$318,298,180
>B+
worldwide: 585.1
This was Marvel's first in-house movie. For it to come out so far on the
plus side of the ledger was a huge statement. It greatly exceeded Marvel's
expectations and was well into Marvel's hopes.
>> Marvel The Incredible Hulk (B)
>$150,000,000
>$134,518,390
>C-
worldwide: 263.4M
Both The Incredible Hulk and Punisher: War Zone were 'redeem the character'
movies rather than 'make a breakout hit' movies. Hulk accomplished its
purpose by getting primarily positive feedback, while not bleeding money.
Punisher failed because it did bleed money, while getting some positive
feedback.
> Huh, I don't know, maybe...it's hard to say if Fox was expecting X-
>men would open big, and then crater hard once every X-men fan had seen
>it once or twice.
If they weren't expecting it to do 48% of its box office in the first week,
then they haven't been paying attention to box office trends for the last
10 years.
> Anyway, I think that's more or less my point made, even if you want
>to quibble about this or that. Much like the film industry itself, you
>might rescue a lot when you bring in the issue of toys and overseas
>gross and DVD sales, and of course there's always "creative
>accounting," if you took a net profit % on Spiderman, I bet you'd be
>surprised how little money that amounts to.
Depends on whose 'net profit' you're looking at, Sony will tell you that
it hasn't returned a profit yet (just like Titanic, Return of the King, and
PotC:At World's End haven't turned a profit yet), but when a movie costs
140M according to Hollywood accounting, and makes over 800M worldwide,
somebody is making money. (and, I'm not trying to factor in ancillaries)
>> >> Still, Disney
>> >> banks Marvel and gives Marvel the independence to shop out deals--while
>> >> taking a "reasonable" cut in the profits--that might be the best of both
>> >> worlds.
>>
>> > It's also what Disney is going to have to accept, at least for awhile
>> >or until they want to buy back the licenses, since Spiderman 4 and
>> >Iron Man 2 and the Fantastic Four and Thor are with different studios.
>>
>> Sony/Columbia has the Spider franchise as long as they keep making the
>> films.
>
> I see they have three more movies contracted, although I wonder if,
>since I'm guessing Superman 3 numbers for Spiderman 4, they'll sell
>that license back to Disney or Marvel/
They have a perpetual license, as long as they keep making Spidey films, it
keeps being renewed automatically.
>> Fox has the X-Franchise and the FF franchise as long as they keep
>> making the films. Iron Man and Thor are produced in-house directly by
>> Marvel (as was the Hulk remake),and could transition easily to affiliated
>> Disney studios, or at least make use of their facilities. They do,
>> however, fall under a distribution deal with Paramount for a total of 5
>> more films (besides tIM2 and Thor, there are Iron Man III, Captain America,
>> and The Avengers)
>
>Okay.
>
>
>> >> Also it might wake up TPTB at WB/DC to step up their game in getting film
>> >> adaptations out the door. Latest word is there's yet another delay in GREEN
>> >> LANTERN and has anyone mentioned the Green Arrow or Flash movies anymore?
>>
>> > Me < suprised if we never actually see Thor or the FF reboot.
>>
>> We will see the FF reboot,
>
> Unless we don't. It certainly wouldn't be the first time someone
>didn't get their property out of development.
>>because Fox will make it to ensure holding on to
>> the license.
Studios can be just as stupid and make bad decisions as much as anyone
else, but they are very much dogs in the manger with the properties they
hold rights to, and Fox is almost as rabid about it as Disney. If not
making a movie means they lose the rights, they'll make the movie.
>> Marvel is making Thor directly,
>> so I don't see the Disney
>> deal impacting that.
>
> I'm seeing Marvel Studios obtains funding from Merril Lynch, which
>may not have so much money to lend, in the wake of the various credit
>crisises.. Oh, huh...huh. Wow, following the pieces, the sale looks
>pretty obvious in retrospect.
>
>> Marvel's strategy, with the Paramount distributed films is to build an
>> Avengers franchise, by releasing the individual movies (and tying them
>> together with cameos, primarily with Tony Stark and Nick Fury) to build to
>> the release of an Avengers movie
>>
>> Any odds that the Avengers movie comes out before the JLA movie?
>
> I'm quite skeptical either movie will ever come out, but then that's
>my default feeling on superhero movies.
Possibly a viable default feeling on any given movie, actually.
(except the real trainwrecks, you know they'll come out)
--
I have a theory, it could be bunnies