Stop the presses. An actual good, interesting movie debuted at #1 this summer. “District 9” seemed to come out of nowhere about two months ago, sans an attention-getting ad campaign or a major in-advance teaser trailer. Let this be a model for marketing people in Hollywood- a late-inning full court press isn’t the worst strategy. Audiences were probably intrigued by the cryptic ads selling the aliens, but there’s something to be said about the continued drawing power of Peter Jackson, who no doubt many people probably think directed this. In the mainstream film world, only three directors roughly bring in audiences, and that’s Steven Spielberg, Jackson and now in his later years, Martin Scorsese. James Cameron could be one of those guys depending on what form the last leg of “Avatar” marketing is. Is the fifth member of that troupe Quentin Tarantino? We find out next weekend.
Almost customarily, “G.I. Joe: The Rise Of The Cobra” fell off majorly, almost 60% from its so-so opening weekend. It’s already at $100 million, so you can play an extrapolation game — if a movie debuts with the $22 million “Joe” took in during this frame, and its bleeding 50%-60% per week, does it make it to $50 million? Paramount probably needs a $150 million gross for it to be considered a theatrical success, so we’ll see. It was bested by “District 9” handily this weekend despite having a thousand more screens, but “District 9” is a geek project, and those tend to fall off majorly after that first weekend, meaning the more regular-moviegoer audience for Stephen Sommers’ anti-critic toyfest might find it worth revisiting in week four or five. Or it dies a quick death and gets shuffled off to DVD, buried while word-of-mouth gives legs to the stacked competition in the next few weeks. The latter is pretty common, we’ll bet on that.
Debuting at #3 was one of New Line’s last castaways, “The Time Traveler’s Wife.” It’s not a major pull, but that’s pretty good considering the movie’s been sitting on the shelf for a very long time. Eric Bana’s exposure this summer certainly helped matters, but WB did a good job marketing this leftover with it opening strong enough to knock the wind out of “Julie and Julia.” The would-be cooking blockbuster sported a decent hold, but with only $12 million in week two, does it have enough juice to sustain a solid late-season run? At #5 was “G-Force,” which is starting to settle into an inexplicable “Paul Blart”-like run, dropping off little by little as it crosses the $100 million mark on Monday with gas still in the tank.
Debuting at #6 was a death twitch from Paramount Vantage in the form of “The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard.” You can sell these comedy ensemble films, but you need to have a solid A-or-B Lister in the cast. Jeremy Piven is strictly a TV actor, and an ad campaign where you devote character banners to the likes of Charles Napier probably isn’t going to boost business too strongly. Also debuting was Hayao Miyazaki’s “Ponyo,” which was only given a modest release by Disney and landed at #9- not a sterling debut, but hopefully the beginning of a consistent expansion. Dying a hard death was “Funny People,” collapsing out of the top ten in only week three with a 60% audience loss even worse than last weekend. It barely missed out on the #10 spot, held down by “500 Days Of Summer,” the year’s highest grossing indie with $18 million in its coffers, and with 1000 theaters under its belt, wider mainstream exposure could make this a sleeper hit that lasts into the fall.
The season’s major loser has to be Summit Entertainment. They pathetically opened “Bandslam” this weekend to #13 in over 2000 theaters with $2.3 million, completely failing to sell the movie in any tangible way. This is the fourth straight film they’ve mismanaged this summer, and the widest release, considering “The Brothers Bloom” and “The Hurt Locker” both never even sniffed 600 theaters. While “Bloom” was an out and out failure, at least “Locker” made it to $10 million this weekend, but its weekend grosses are already below a mil, and it is tapped. What’s more is that all four films (including wide release “Next Day Air”), none of which will reach $20 million, are fairly commercial enterprises, not obscure arthouse larks. “Bloom” was the closest to being a tough sell, even then it was a heist film with two Oscar winners. Don’t weep for them, they still have the next “Twilight” coming up, but christ, no studio marketing company has employed as many numbnuts as they have this season.
In blockbuster news, outside of the top ten, “The Hangover” reached $265 million and will crawl to $270, while “Transformers” is still at $396 million and might need some extra Paramount support. Fox helped limp “Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs” to $190, while “The Proposal” is stunningly approaching $160 million. Opening in indie theaters was the Ashton Kutcher drama “Spread,” which did a pathetic $117k in 91 locations (that’s a per-screen average of $1.2k per screen), while the weekend’s best debut was “It Might Get Loud,” the rock doc with a per-screen average of $14k per on seven screens for a $101k take.
1. District 9- $37 million
2. G.I. Jane- $22.5 million ($99 mil)
3. The Temporally Displaced Husband- $19.2 million
4. Julie & Julia- $12.4 million ($44 mil.)
5. G-Force- $6.9 million ($99 mil)
6. The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard- $5.4 million
7. Harry Potter With A Vengeance- $5.2 million ($284 mil.)
8. The Ugly Truth- $4.5 million ($78 mil.)
9. Ponyo- $3.5 million
10. 500 Days Of Summer- $3 million ($18 mil.)
The promotion, or secrecy, of Avatar is a little similar to District 9. Sure everyone's heard of Avatar now, and there's hype building for it but no one has seen much. They definitely can't be accused of giving away major plot points already. And there's "only" 4 months left. Nice move Cameron.
Studios don´t think that Martin Scorsese´s name brings people to the cinema. His name was downplayed in "The Departed" marketing campain.
http://www.moviemarketingmadness.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/mmm_146_the_departed.pdf
Whatever the form Avatar's marketing takes, it's interesting that, while it's one of (the?) most expensive films of all time, it seems to be going with a marketing strategy very similar to that of District 9. We're all very aware of it because it's so expensive, it's a James Cameron film and we're the online film enthusiast set, but so far marketing has only been directly focused on the the geek contingent, as was the case with District 9. With zero mainstream marketing so far, Fox seem to be hoping that the film will be just as much of an 'out of nowhere' phenomenon, albeit on a much larger scale. Whatever the case, it's amazing that an approach usually reserved for smaller films is being taken for a massively expensive tentpole release.
Just noticed that an anon made the same point already. D'oh! But yeah, it's a good approach they're taking that is totally unlike Fox (shows how Cameron's influence over the marketing is working) and that I wish more big films would take.
suprised you haven't said anything about that huge 4 page article the NY times did on the Weinsteins today.
Pretty cool seeing as though District somehow only cost 30 mil to make. Profit already!
Oh, Cirkus, if only it were that easy…
I wonder what District 9 would have cost had it been a U.S. production with domestic actors, and even without a headlining name as the star. I think it would still cost over $70 million to make. It's pretty cool what they did with $30 million.
But even at less than 2hrs it felt a little long.
And about the directors that are box-office draws, I definitely think James Cameron should be included if not near the top. I can see what you mean if you meant it in the sense that the director's name is almost bigger (or as important as) than the movie itself.
But, though we know you said "film directors", Michael Bay should probably be there too. And Tyler Perry?…this can get ugly fast.
As much money as Michael Bay's movies make, I doubt people who really like his movies say, "I've gotta see that new Michael Bay movie!" If he ever did, say, a big mainstream comedy, marketing it as 'A Michael Bay Movie' wouldn't really bring them in.
And good point about Tyler Perry and, I guess, Judd Apatow by proxy. Those guys don't really stretch themselves too much, however, so you could really look at their movies as being part of their own distinct genre brand. I think you could slap Spielberg, Jackson, Scorsese or James Cameron's name on ANYTHING and it would sell tickets. Tarantino may be in that league too- "Inglorious Basterds" looks like a real test of his "brand."
"Its" dude.
Did you say The Hurt Locker has stalled out? It hasn't been released in my city yet, so does this mean it's not going to continue to expand? I need to see this film!
Cirkus, it wouldn't be unusual, but I don't see Summit expanding this one any more. They really should have started with a first weekend much like Ponyo's 900 theaters, because the buzz peaked way too early.
has a conversation with a studio person the other day and i won't mention which out of fairness to the person, but they basically told me that their mini-major film didn't expand into as many theaters as they had initially hoped because of pirating which apparently effected their plans.
The Hurt Locker is unfortunately one of the most pirated films of 2009 and has been online since Feb, so my guess is it sadly won't expand much further.
Pirating apparently hurt "Che" pretty badly too according to various Soderbergh interviews (I think that's what part of made him sound so disillusioned a few weeks back).
I dunno about the whole pirating issue- are there really so many people making fast money off pirating a four hour Che biopic?
People pirated Wolverine and got the word out that it was one of the worst things EVER and it still made a pretty fucking HUGE score. For me, that's the only argument I need that piracy doesn't affect anything.
Actually, a friend of mine saw hurt locker pirated on the net, and has been holding it over my head ever since. I really wanted to see it in an actual theater. Sucks.
It's less about pirates making money and more about demand and how theater chain owners are projecting openings.
It's also about how much the studio thinks they should cut their losses when something leaks.
Lastly, i don't think you can compare the leak of mega-bucks, megaplex picture like Wolverine to Che.
Shave $10-15 million off Wolverine and it doesn't make a huge difference. Shave even half of that from an indie film and you're in major trouble.
Plus a unfinished workprint of Wolverine leaked, The Hurt Locker, Che, et all, leaked in full. There's no mystery when it hits theaters as to how the special effects are going to turn out.
That's assuming $10-$15 million worth of moviegoers were affected by the Wolverine leak, or any leak, in any way. The damn thing still did close to $190 million despite completely toxic word of mouth- it was bad in a completely universal way, not bad in a Transformers you-might-enjoy-this-if-you-are-a-bad-person way.
I know Soderbergh complained about the leak, and I think he was justified, because he was discussing Latin America countries that don't necessarily receive many movies, and would go piracy-nuts over one that was so aimed at them. But "The Hurt Locker" was a semi-wide American release that was poorly marketed and shut out of most markets in the first place. Opening in only two theaters at the start and expanding from there was already a dumb move regardless of expansion, and pointing to piracy is only covering the asses of the studio's release people who don't know what they're doing.
Plus, viewing the workprint and the final version of Wolverine only cemented what I think most people knew- there was little to no difference between each version. Both sucked an incredible amount of shit in similar ways.
I don't condone piracy, but I am FIRMLY not on the piracy-kills-the-industry train.
That being said, this has been an interesting summer as far as debating how much piracy does or does not hurt the industry. It's an impossible thing to prove. I totally get where you're coming from, I just don't agree.
We do agree that Wolverine = 12 abortions though, so there's that.
"Opening in only two theaters at the start and expanding from there was already a dumb move regardless of expansion,"
then you're basically calling all limited releases stupid because most of them start out in NY/LA and roll out from there.
There's a reason for that. There's not the money or market to put it out nationally in thousands of theaters.
We're actually talking to a studio rep soon and doing an education piece soon, cause publications generally malign indie releases because they don't understand the marketing roll-out for smaller films.
I would agree with you on small release patterns if this wasn't Summit, and it wasn't The Hurt Locker, a movie that not only showed breakout potential, but also was very obviously anticipated by many who haven't gotten to see it. Of course, that's purely anecdotal, but this is one of the rare indie movies I've heard of in recent memory that was heavily praised because it WAS commercial. If Summit's out of cash post-Twilight then they really are a bunch of fucking boobs.
The Hurt Locker needed an opening weekend in a crowded summer with a theater count in the hundreds in order to sustain. Adding tens of theaters, or even merely 100, per weekend, won't keep your movie afloat if it really does have "hit" potential (which is another argument- did Hurt Locker have "hit" potential? I vote yes)
The first weekend buzz was very very strong. You don't capitalize on that with a two theater release, you drop it in at least 100 and expand from that point on. If you're Lorna's Silence, you're content with five extra theaters a week. Summit's coming off Twilight and Knowing. What a terrible fucking summer.
Right, again, maybe Pirating still means nothing to you, but that thing was everywhere by March. Everywhere.
Well, ok, I call bullshit on that. "Everywhere?" Yeah, ok. The local bodega was just alight with kids talkin' up their "White Ribbon" bootlegs also.
I'm sure Piracy would have had some effect on the potential earnings of the film. But the world of mouth was fantastic for this film. And it was readily available on torrent websites, but it was not "Everywhere" because there wasn't much known about this film at the time. A slow to very slow expansion of a film doesn't help potential audiences either when in Week 3 or 4 of a release they see it'll take another few weeks to reach their city. It makes that pirated copy very tempting. (Same for Che). Wolverine was just a fiasco though.
We compare it to Che and Wolverine, which are likely at two ends of the spectrum in terms of domestic audiences. Another fair comparison is "Taken" (with Liam Neeson). A pirated version was "Everywhere" online in the Fall of 2008 (because it had already been released in Europe for some time I think and was maybe nearing a dvd release) and the film opened in domestic theatres in January 2009 on its way to $145 million domestic. Yes, it did open wide and was backed by a studio with cash, but the word of mouth for this film was pretty good too (though not critically loved).
The Piracy hurt, I'm sure, but after Twilight they should have taken a little bit more risk to push The Hurt Locker through. Right now, it seems like it's looking more like the past Iraq films or "another Iraq film audiences CAN'T see" (whether they want to or not, just like the past ones).
Trying to compare word of mouth on Hurt Locker or Wolverine is… you can't do it.
One had huge awareness, no matter how shitty it was roasted by critics and no matter how bad word of mouth was.
Wolverine is a huge film that obviously many in America went to see. The Hurt Locker is still a tiny film and moreover a NICHE film that even if broadly marketed wouldn't have connected with nearly as many people.
Not sure why this isn't obvious. To cinephiles it's a great picture. To the rest of America, it's still probably just an Iraq War film.
"A slow to very slow expansion of a film doesn't help potential audiences either when in Week 3 or 4 of a release they see it'll take another few weeks to reach their city."
You'll have to talk to every indie studio in the U.S. who thinks the exact opposite and stand behind a slow build release plan to build word of mouth.
I really can't wait for our education piece to hit cause a lot of people don't seem to understand indie film marketing or understand that there's just not as big an audience out there as you think.
Also:
Taken $145 million B.O. on $25 budget
District 9 – $40+ million on $30 budget
Two foreign made action/thrillers for wide audiences made for little that go on to relevant success. Compared to some of the bloated budgets of Hollywood produced films.
While The Hurt Locker probably never had the legs for this kind of box office, it sucks not to see it reach $30 million or so in ticket sales.
I agree about The Hurt Locker being a niche film. Wolverine and The Hurt Locker are two different beasts.
As for the release of independent films, I can understand where your argument and the studio are coming from. It make perfect sense for me that the money, and audience, just isn't there for quick and likely reckless (even if not that large) expansion. It just seemed like this one could have broken through quicker and moreso than other independent films.
That education piece would really be nice. Some details or a breakdown of just where short term (Box office) and long term earnings (dvds, tv, etc.) from a film come from, and how these deals are broken down.
Hopefully the education piece sheds light on why major studios use slower build releases for Awards season prestige films like Benjamin Button and other similar high profile, high budget awards contenders. Same reasons as the independent studios?
Looking forward to this piece, when can we expect it.
Yeah, again can't compare the appeal of action and sci-fi films like Taken and District 9 with Hurt Locker, but i'm sure you're aware.
We're speaking to a big indie studio soon so hopefully we can educate a little more, because it gets to be a bit tiring to here /Films of the world talking about Moon or whatever film not breaking big (and many blogs simply parroting the same sentiment with zero understand of niche film markets, appeal, tracking, etc.)
Meanwhile, you know Post Grad or soemthing small from Fox Searchlight (their favorite studio in the entire wide world) doesn't do gangbusters and they don't give a shit because nothing blows up in the picture.
The double standard irks me, at least, personally.
re; studios and Oscar films.
Here's the real answer if you don't want to read the whole piece: there's just not as big an audience out there to support a wide release as you think.
You have to take off your cinephile hat and view from the perspective of a business and they're highly more aware and attuned to how much $$$ they can take in for something than the average joe or even average film blog reader who goes, "Meh, more people should see this film! It has gigantic appeal."
Uhh, actually it doesn't and dumb and dumber wins at the box-office each weekend generally prove this (yes, there are happy exceptions like District 9, which appeals to the niche and the broad, but generally G.I. Joe is what the country really wants pretty much all the time).
I can see that it's getting tough, maybe more so in a down economy, in the after shock of the writers strike(?), etc. And yeah, film blog/site readers, certainly aren't the most important gauge of potential for a film's success.
It's tough as a movie fan when enjoying all the movies you can, especially those without explosions, increasingly means waiting for Blockbuster to get the dvd. But even dvds seem like they aren't secure revenue streams for studios (independent or major).
"It's tough as a movie fan when enjoying all the movies you can, especially those without explosions, increasingly means waiting for Blockbuster to get the dvd."
It is, but you'd think film sites wouldn't have such a myopic view and would actually have SOME kind of understanding of what it takes to market and distribute a low-level/smaller indie film.
It's a bit baffling to me that most of them simply bitch and have what appears to be zero comprehension level.
I mean, the Oscar films have been limited release for some time, before the economic downturn.
I mean, do you really think the studios are trying to HIDE films from audiences?
They want to make their investment back to you know.
Sure, they must botch it occasionally because all business aren't perfect, but it's easy to be a cinephile and lament the fact that Moon didn't get very wide, but when you get the #s back you realize, "hey, it was in 25 markets and Wyoming just didn't give a fuck."
That's the dose of reality most arm chair critics don't see or realize.