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zombiewhacker
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
1475 Posts |
 Posted - 08/22/2007 : 7:32:34 PM
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Conventional wisdom suggests that Premonition, the latest in an achingly long line of Sandra Bullock misfires, was a box office flop. A $47M box office gross for one of Hollywood's top stars would normally induce Tinseltown studio execs to wail, rend their garments, and grind their teeth. Even when one factors in the international market, Premonition's total gross tops out at a relatively paltry $74 million. Double the disappointment.
(Recall that when Something to Talk About posted similar numbers a decade ago, many industry wags confidently announced that Julia Roberts' career was in full crash-and-burn mode.)
But, ah, it's a lot trickier than that.
Premonition reportedly cost only $20M to make. That's chump change in a town where the top movie star salary alone sometimes figures in the $20M range. Bullock apparently eschewed a high salary perk, probably in exchange for gross participation.
So if the usual Hollywood calculus holds true to form, we can safely assume that advertising and distribution for the film was somewhere in the $10M-$20M range. Sony/Columbia's total investment in the entire project, then, was probably in the ballpark of $30M, certainly not more than $40M... which would therefore mean that Premonition needed to gross only $80M in order to break even, and higher if it expected to generate any meaningful profit. Obviously, in its theatrical release, Bullock's supernatural pic fails that lithmus test.
B-U-T... that's where DVD comes in. According to BoxOfficeMojo, Premonition has grossed $26M in DVD rentals alone after nearly five weeks of release, and even that figure does not take into account DVD sales. When all is said and done, Premonition will go down as a smart, profitable move for the studio and for Bullock, even though the film bears the unflattering (and not entirely inaccurate) reputation of being a movie very few people saw and even fewer liked.
This would seem to signify part of a continuing trend that I thought had died out when the $250M blockbuster became de rigeur for the industry; namely, that weaker-performing films can still prove profitable thanks to ancillary markets. (Call it the Transporter syndrome.)
Now if the movie in question is some small, arthouse darling of the film critics or a deserving cult thriller that never reached a wide enough audience the first time around (I'm thinking of 28 Days Later and Shaun of the Dead for starters), this is a good thing.
On the other hand, if it means a movie franchise that should have died on arrival is instead granted a second life, with Bad Sequels 2, 3, and 4 soon on the way, well, that's obviously a bad thing. Being a child of the 70s and 80s, this never surprised me in the past. (Jason, anyone?) But I am amazed that in today's ultra-competitive, uber-budgeted film arena there are still movies that can continue to squeak past to profitability, and ultimately, breed.
Think very careful the next time you reach for that Uwe Boll movie at Blockbusters.
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Edited by - zombiewhacker on 08/24/2007 6:39:11 PM
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Flangepart
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
2329 Posts |
Posted - 08/24/2007 : 5:01:12 PM
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Hummm....why am I thinking of Bialystock and Bloom?
Marvin the Paranoid Android to Buzz Lightyear "Too infinity and beyond-i've been there, its rubbish!"
"Hoody Hoo, i waste 'em with my cross bow!" Bob Herzog- KODT
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