Poor Films Reason for Low Box Office #s?

GenJerDan hit it right on the head. With the amount of money being dumped into films by Hollywood no one is taking risks on original stories. It amazed me that the studio system remains unchanged when they see Indie films come along cost pennies compared to the money that Hollywood spends and taking home an amazing share of the box office. Sure Napoleon Dynamite didn't take in as much money as War of the Worlds, but for a film that only cost $400,000 to take $50 million. That's a pretty good return on investment.

Think about this. For every $100 million dollar film that Hollywood makes you could get 250 Napoleon Dynamite level independent films. I think that would be a lot better for Hollywood.
 
krestofre said:
Think about this. For every $100 million dollar film that Hollywood makes you could get 250 Napoleon Dynamite level independent films. I think that would be a lot better for Hollywood.
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Good point...BUT... 245 of those Indie films will be crap too, and no one will go to see them. Take the new (Bryan Singer) Superman as an example of a blockbuster - That WILL make money, and probably quite a lot, even if it is rubbish! So they can risk the $100,000,000 because they will get it back. Indie's have little or no guarantee of return.

Making a decent appealing film isn't easy, and you can't always tell how it will turn out from the script, hence Hollywood avoids the gamble and goes for the built-in audience pictures.

This is where a truely cinematic director is important - e.g. Spielberg. Although some of his films have been based on exsisting material with a built in audience, (JP, WOTW) he is so successful because he can generate quality, successful and original films, THAT PEOPLE WANT TO GO AND SEE. Directors like that don't need to be hired, they create their own work and chase projects that they believe in...well, most of the time. Peter Jackson may be a better example. Although his biggest productions- LOTR and Kong have exsisting audiences, he really seems to take the bull by the horns to make a film that he wants to see by controlling the money men. PJ is a far cleverer guy than he lets on, and is clearly quite cunning - has anyone seen the LOTR extra on the DVD where he tricks the New Line suit into having the Return of the King premiere in Wellington - smart guy! I also think that when he looks like such a mess at the oscars, it is no accident, but very carefully planned for publicity, and it worked!

Basically, we have to get off our arses and make films that people will run out to the cinema for. I know Lucas gets a lot of stick, but he has created more than a film with Star Wars, it is a culture, and a religion in the UK, with more "Jedis" than Jews and Buddists combined at the last census!! Stars Wars was fresh and exciting, and people flocked to see it and all the sequels and prequels.

Personally I don't care if a film is remake, a sequel, a prequel or even based on a computer game, if it is interesting and exciting, I'll pay to go and see it!

What makes a director or writer stand out is when they can originate that level of production over and over again.

Sorry for waffling crap!
 
Good point...BUT... 245 of those Indie films will be crap too, and no one will go to see them. Take the new (Bryan Singer) Superman as an example of a blockbuster - That WILL make money, and probably quite a lot, even if it is rubbish! So they can risk the $100,000,000 because they will get it back. Indie's have little or no guarantee of return.
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You're absolutely right. It's extremely arrogant of me to proclaim to fix Hollywood in a couple of paragraphs, and I was hoping that someone would call me on it. But, thankfully, you also see my point and further developed it. Thanks. :thumbsup:
 
Oh, it was a fair point! I often watch a $100m blockbuster (eg Van Helsing) and wonder how many hundred good films I could make for the same money!
 
i just think other countries do this like all the time so why do we have to blow 100 million?
 
superman costs 250 million, not 100 million. So it's still quite a gamble. remember how everybody thought the matrix sequels were the surest thing in Hollywood. They did well, but about 1/3 of what the studio had secretly hoped.

movies succeed and flop all the time.

what the studios forget, is that what we, the United States, do better than any other country in the world, is market. We can market the **** out of anything. The collective brainwasing that goes on in your typical marketing campaign is the number one reason for your average moviegoer going to a film. If Crash had the same marketing behind it that WOTW did, it would have made two, maybe even three times as much money. You don't have to remake **** or base a movie off a video game to make a lot of money. You just have to give the film a lot of ****ing money to advertise. I guarantee you give those guys 50 million dollars, and they'll figure out a way to get people in the audience, whether they're selling Superman or Hustle & Flow.
 
I'm not going to completely disagree with you, but I think that times are changing. I think that people are getting more wise to marketing and paying less attention to it. I currently (and sadly) work in a marketing environment and the general trend that I see is that marketing people are starting to get nervous because it's not working anymore. Word of mouth can kill the box office return of a bad film more quickly than ever before.

Also, take The Island for example (not saying it's a bad film, it was OK) but they marketed the crap out of that one and still, nothing. I think moving going audiences have a greater understanding of what they want to see and what they're willing to spend money on rather than just going by what the commercials say. And thus we come full circle back to the point that story is the most important. :)
 
The Island is a very interesting example. I actually thought that it was a pretty good film, that a lot of people would have been happy to pay to see... but they didn't.

Ewan Mcgregor was probably a mistake in the casting. He doesn't have the name to anchor such a large film. Scarlett Johnanson was great IMO, but needs a stronger leading man to back up.

It may have had a big marketing push, but from what I saw of it, it didn't really work or do the film justice. It is a hard film to sell, and Bay didn't help by trying to make it into an action film. I would have downscaled that production to say 30-40 million dollars, and focused on the thriller rather than the "action." I don't think it was ever going to be a success to justify that budget, however Michael Bay's past record would have distracted from that potential problem. All successful directors do it at some point, trying to make a blockbuster out of a non-blockbuster film.
 
the island bombed, you're right. but that's half my point. heavily marketed movies are going to bomb. just like movies with no publicity are going to break through. you never know. i personally thought the marketing campaign for the Island was terrible. They took away all the mystery. What I'm saying is give these movies a chance. Give them the dollars to make their core audience aware that they exist. In a world where the theatrical run itself is become more and more an advertising campaign for the dvd release, opening weekend, getting that exposure, is everything. Obviously your movie has to have some commercial appeal, but if it's a good movie and it's heavily marketed, people will turn out.
 
yea they show the entire movie in trailer most of the time now. example the new zorro trailer.
 
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