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With Godzilla Minus One having been released in Japan on November 3rd, we can see how to US release compares to the Japanese release.

Do Japanese Godzilla films generally do well outside of Japan?

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
Non-Disney films like Fast X, The Flash, Bkue Beetle, Black Adam, Mission Impossible, and The Creator all bombed, too. It’s not just a Disney problem but a cinema problem. If not for Super Mario Bros and Barbenheimer, box office would be back at pandemic lows.

In Fast-X's case, it's not that the movie didn't make a lot of money - $700m is very high - it's more that the simply mind-bogglingly absurd budget of $340m (WTF???) meant any return it got wouldn't be good enough ($1.2b minimum to break even). And Mission Impossible was a victim of Barbenheimer. Had those movies not opened the week after M:I, it m:ight have been a different story for that film (and we wouldn't be getting a knee-jerk pivot from Paramount with a different title on the next one, so we have a Part One with no follow-up).

The Creator is a sad one. Only cost $80, but brought in just over $100. It makes me worried that, as it wasn't an established IP, it will drive Hollywood further into the arms of slapping any IP onto anything for brand recognition.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
I’m more curious how Aquaman 2 will do.

A billion or $100m.

It'll either do great, or be DC's third major bomb in a row. Or fourth. Are we counting Black Adam?

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
Non-Disney films like Fast X, The Flash, Bkue Beetle, Black Adam, Mission Impossible, and The Creator all bombed, too. It’s not just a Disney problem but a cinema problem. If not for Super Mario Bros and Barbenheimer, box office would be back at pandemic lows.

Do Fast X, Mission Impossible and The Creator count as bombs? First made almost $300 million more then budget ( 567/291), the second near 400 million more then its budget (714/340) and the latter $20 million more then its budget (104/80). Maybe Box Office disappointments, as they might’ve been projected to make more and it didn’t pan out, but neither stunk it up as bad as DC’s roster or The Marvels.

Also just looking at the list of movies in 2023, Hollywood budgets are insane. Can’t be sustainable. But what the feth do I know, I sell motorcycle parts.

Fast X and M:I have their excuses, but Super Mario went home and porked the prom queen. Pre-pandemic, a little thing like Barbenheimer would not have slain M:I any more than one $billion franchise would prevent another. Now, the box office is almost a zero sum game, where the success of Barbenheimer comes at the cost of M:I, Haunted Mansion, Elemental or whatever the animated chum they threw to the shark that month, and I think there was another film that suffered. This year is a graveyard for attempted blockbusters.

Agreed about The Creator. I really wanted it to succeed for the same reasons.

Also agreed on Aquaman. I’m really looking forward to that opening weekend to see whether it sinks or swims.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 nels1031 wrote:

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
Non-Disney films like Fast X, The Flash, Bkue Beetle, Black Adam, Mission Impossible, and The Creator all bombed, too. It’s not just a Disney problem but a cinema problem. If not for Super Mario Bros and Barbenheimer, box office would be back at pandemic lows.

Do Fast X, Mission Impossible and The Creator count as bombs? First made almost $300 million more then budget ( 567/291), the second near 400 million more then its budget (714/340) and the latter $20 million more then its budget (104/80). Maybe Box Office disappointments, as they might’ve been projected to make more and it didn’t pan out, but neither stunk it up as bad as DC’s roster or The Marvels.

Also just looking at the list of movies in 2023, Hollywood budgets are insane. Can’t be sustainable. But what the feth do I know, I sell motorcycle parts.

The studios seem to be reacting like they’re bombs. Also, if they made most of their money overseas, then they’re a lot less profitable than if the bulk of that was domestic. But yeah, at least they didn’t crater like Marvel and DC.

What were Disney doing releasing Haunted Mansion in July?

 nels1031 wrote:
Do Fast X, Mission Impossible and The Creator count as bombs?

Unsuccessful? Yes, at least in comparisons to their budgets (especially Fast X). Bombs? Probably not. They didn't open poorly and then collapse hopelessly like a string of recent comic book films.

I doubt we're going to get Fast X 2 and 3 like Vin hinted at, but I do think we're going to get Fast X 2 with a reduced budget (and I hope they finish the series with the next one). I mean, a $250m budget is an absurd amount, and that would be nearly $100m less than what Fast X cost, so I could see them slashing $140m off the last one and trying to do it for $200m (which is still insane!). They did Fast 7 on $190m. They can do that again.

I wonder if the churn of blcokbusters doesn't help. We wanted to see The Marvels but after a week of two of being too busy, when we wanted to book it was down to just two showings a day, neither at good times for us. I'll guess I'll wait for the stream on D+, but I would have liked to have seen it on the big screen.

 nels1031 wrote:

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
Non-Disney films like Fast X, The Flash, Bkue Beetle, Black Adam, Mission Impossible, and The Creator all bombed, too. It’s not just a Disney problem but a cinema problem. If not for Super Mario Bros and Barbenheimer, box office would be back at pandemic lows.

Do Fast X, Mission Impossible and The Creator count as bombs? First made almost $300 million more then budget ( 567/291), the second near 400 million more then its budget (714/340) and the latter $20 million more then its budget (104/80). Maybe Box Office disappointments, as they might’ve been projected to make more and it didn’t pan out, but neither stunk it up as bad as DC’s roster or The Marvels.

Also just looking at the list of movies in 2023, Hollywood budgets are insane. Can’t be sustainable. But what the duck do I know, I sell motorcycle parts.

They definitely count as bombs- they weren’t profitable. For a film to make a profit it usually has to make more than double its production budget, sometimes 3 times the production budget. The figure vary but a fair rule of thumb is that the marketing budget is usually around equal to the production budget for smaller to medium budgeted films (under $100m production budget) and sonewhere between 50-75% of the production budget for larger productions. Then the theatres take a cut, usually something in the region of 50% of the ticket price goes to the theatre, so the producers of a film can expect to only take half the box office gross (this generally varies between domestic and foreign box office).

For the examples you have to break even the box office would need to be in the region of $900m for Mission Impossible, making it around $300m short; $1.02B for Fast, it was also around $300m short; and The Creator needed $240m so fell short by $135m or so.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
Non-Disney films like Fast X, The Flash, Bkue Beetle, Black Adam, Mission Impossible, and The Creator all bombed, too. It’s not just a Disney problem but a cinema problem. If not for Super Mario Bros and Barbenheimer, box office would be back at pandemic lows.

What do all of those movies have in common?

They're not well written.

Surprisingly, as Disney keep discovering, you can't just shovel slop to your audience Nd have them lap it up endlessly.

Aash wrote:
They definitely count as bombs- they weren’t profitable.

Not profitable =/= bomb. Bomb has a specific connotation. Just not making a profit doesn't really constitute a "bomb".

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
What were Disney doing releasing Haunted Mansion in July?

I assume they had zero faith in it and just wanted to get its theatrical run over with in the hopes it could find an audience on streaming.

 Lord Damocles wrote:


Surprisingly, as Disney keep discovering, you can't just shovel slop to your audience Nd have them lap it up endlessly.

Star Wars has entered the chat.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
I’m more curious how Aquaman 2 will do. It’s a sequel to a $billion+ grosser that’s part of shared universe, like The Marvels. However, I haven’t seen the same kind of hate-boner for it that I have for The Flash and The Marvels. Feels like anything could happen.

There's a morbid curiosity to what happened with Amber Heard in this but I suspect it will perform fairly well overall. I'm very curious on this one myself. I considered the original the best bad movie of the year and really enjoyed it, but it walked a razor thin line of dumb fun that could go very wrong very easily.

I’m wondering if it’s partly an advertising issue; I used to know what was coming out at the cinema mostly from watching trailers at the cinema. Once you stop going regularly (2020/21, looking at you) you get out of the cycle. The only reason I knew that The Creator was a thing was because of a YouTube ad, but those rarely seem to be for films.

And no, Google, I don’t want to buy a Pixel 8 with best take, so please, please, stop showing me that damn ad!

 Jadenim wrote:
I’m wondering if it’s partly an advertising issue; I used to know what was coming out at the cinema mostly from watching trailers at the cinema. Once you stop going regularly (2020/21, looking at you) you get out of the cycle. The only reason I knew that The Creator was a thing was because of a YouTube ad, but those rarely seem to be for films.

And no, Google, I don’t want to buy a Pixel 8 with best take, so please, please, stop showing me that damn ad!

I think its more than that.

Not only aren't you going to the cinema, but a lot of people are no longer watching just 4 TV channels. They aren't even watching them beyond the news or a specific show; instead they are streaming. Streaming from services that don't want to advertise the next Disney film because either they are advertising their own stuff to keep you on their service and/or because you've paid to get ad-free.


So I figure that's having an impact too - films are having to advertise along with everything else and have potentially lost that captive market of direct advertising; meanwhile your direct advertising vector of your streaming service is more concerned with keeping streamer bums on seats and thus advertising itself.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

Aash wrote:
They definitely count as bombs- they weren’t profitable.

Not profitable =/= bomb. Bomb has a specific connotation. Just not making a profit doesn't really constitute a "bomb".

I agree the term isn’t well defined, but for me, if a film falls short of breaking even by its entire production budget (as is the case for these three films) then I’m inclined to think that would constitute a bomb, or a flop or whatever your preferred term.

 LunarSol wrote:

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
I’m more curious how Aquaman 2 will do. It’s a sequel to a $billion+ grosser that’s part of shared universe, like The Marvels. However, I haven’t seen the same kind of hate-boner for it that I have for The Flash and The Marvels. Feels like anything could happen.

There's a morbid curiosity to what happened with Amber Heard in this but I suspect it will perform fairly well overall. I'm very curious on this one myself. I considered the original the best bad movie of the year and really enjoyed it, but it walked a razor thin line of dumb fun that could go very wrong very easily.

China helped out the original's box office quite a bit. Not sure that's gonna happen again, but we'll see.

I think Wan's instincts were right on with the first film. It's Aquaman...starting Jason Momoa. So just make it big, dumb fun with bright colors and lots of spectacle. It looks like the same formula for this one, but who knows? Audiences have been very difficult to figure out.

There was apparently only 1 movie this year with a budget of 200 mil + that was profitable. That was GotG Vol 3.

Not only did all the other big budget movies fail to be profitable, but as has been pointed out even the low budget ones have been hit.

I agree with the assessment that this isn't a disney/marvel problem. Movies in general are having big problems this year.

 LunarSol wrote:

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
I’m more curious how Aquaman 2 will do. It’s a sequel to a $billion+ grosser that’s part of shared universe, like The Marvels. However, I haven’t seen the same kind of hate-boner for it that I have for The Flash and The Marvels. Feels like anything could happen.

There's a morbid curiosity to what happened with Amber Heard in this but I suspect it will perform fairly well overall. I'm very curious on this one myself. I considered the original the best bad movie of the year and really enjoyed it, but it walked a razor thin line of dumb fun that could go very wrong very easily.

AQUAMAN AND THE LOST KINGDOM Long-Range Box Office Tracking Points To $32M - $42M Debut - ComicBookMovie.com

Box Office Pro has shared its long-range forecast for Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom, and it doesn't look like James Wan's DC Comics sequel will be making much of a splash when it arrives in theaters next month.

According to early predictions, Aquaman 2 looks set for a $32 million - $42 million opening weekend at the domestic box office. This would be lower than The Marvels' debut ($47M), which obviously doesn't bode well for the movie's theatrical run.

I am also inclined to think it is a theatre problem related to larger market forces.

Consumers are still spending in the US despite inflation, but they are not spending on movie theatre tickets. Consumer spending maybe shifting away from experiences and back to staples/products with a life span. This shift will impact cinema ticket sales as they fall on the experience side of the equation.

Well will it mean the big companies who dominate filmmaking will have to pander completely to China for blockbusters as they are now the big cinema market. Already criticism of China is absent, will big budget big studio filmmaking have to embrace the many other restrictions as well?

 Easy E wrote:
I am also inclined to think it is a theatre problem related to larger market forces.

Consumers are still spending in the US despite inflation, but they are not spending on movie theatre tickets. Consumer spending maybe shifting away from experiences and back to staples/products with a life span. This shift will impact cinema ticket sales as they fall on the experience side of the equation.

There's also streaming to consider.
I've got Netflix, Amazon, & D+.
Anymore if I see what looks like to be just a mediocre movie? If it's going to be on one of those 3 platforms & I've got any interest? I'll just wait patiently.

For example: Disney's Haunted Mansion this summer. I didn't think it looked good enough to spend the $ or work it into the schedule to see it in the theatre. (I was correct)
But since I'm already paying for D+ for the various SW/MCU stuff? Sure. I'll give Haunted Mansion a watch some evening while building/painting Wharhammer....
And that's exactly what I did. On Halloween.

I don't know how Disney counts my monthly subscription fee as far as determining if something was successful. Especially if I watch the thing months after it debuted. But they've got to be making less than if I'd seen it while it was in the theater.
And I know my local theaters making less.

The_Real_Chris wrote:
Well will it mean the big companies who dominate filmmaking will have to pander completely to China for blockbusters as they are now the big cinema market. Already criticism of China is absent, will big budget big studio filmmaking have to embrace the many other restrictions as well?

The era of China is over. China has pivoted to promoting their own cinema in theaters, playing fewer US productions and keeping a bigger chunk of ticket sales. Even the fewer American movies that are allowed in theaters there have been less successful than similar films from 2018 and earlier. Chinese films now dominate Chinese box office.

I can’t help but wonder if US theaters would be doing better if ticket prices had stabilized 5 years ago.

If the studios were smart it would mean making movies smarter.

That 200+ mil budget isn't necessary. Spend more time in pre production planning the movie right and you have more time for better special effects and less reshoots.

The creators budget shows you exactly what you can acomplish with a solid plan of production.

If...

They won't be. Entirely stupid lessons will be "learned" from this.

 Lance845 wrote:
If the studios were smart it would mean making movies smarter.

That 200+ mil budget isn't necessary. Spend more time in pre production planning the movie right and you have more time for better special effects and less reshoots.

The creators budget shows you exactly what you can acomplish with a solid plan of production.

If...

They won't be. Entirely stupid lessons will be "learned" from this.

The problem is for every dumb brainless utterly stupid plot film that fails because of its utterly stupid plotting and writing; you've then got a Michael Bay Transformers film that manages to turn a big profit. It's got the exact same terrible writing; its got the exact same abuse of the source material and yet its made vast amounts of money.

 Overread wrote:

 Lance845 wrote:
If the studios were smart it would mean making movies smarter.

That 200+ mil budget isn't necessary. Spend more time in pre production planning the movie right and you have more time for better special effects and less reshoots.

The creators budget shows you exactly what you can acomplish with a solid plan of production.

If...

They won't be. Entirely stupid lessons will be "learned" from this.

The problem is for every dumb brainless utterly stupid plot film that fails because of its utterly stupid plotting and writing; you've then got a Michael Bay Transformers film that manages to turn a big profit. It's got the exact same terrible writing; its got the exact same abuse of the source material and yet its made vast amounts of money.

Yeah, but even those michael bay garbage movies could be made for less and make even more. It's pure risk assessment. If you want to fund a movie fund it early when costs are low and ensure it's planned. Don't sign off on shooting without a plan for shooting the whole thing. If the movie costs half as much as it would otherwise it makes even more when it hits big and you lose less or still turn a profit when it does poorly.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:

The_Real_Chris wrote:
Well will it mean the big companies who dominate filmmaking will have to pander completely to China for blockbusters as they are now the big cinema market. Already criticism of China is absent, will big budget big studio filmmaking have to embrace the many other restrictions as well?

The era of China is over. China has pivoted to promoting their own cinema in theaters, playing fewer US productions and keeping a bigger chunk of ticket sales. Even the fewer American movies that are allowed in theaters there have been less successful than similar films from 2018 and earlier. Chinese films now dominate Chinese box office.

I can’t help but wonder if US theaters would be doing better if ticket prices had stabilized 5 years ago.

That and China is not the economic power house it once was.... even using their BS numbers. However, that is a topic for a different thread.


Perhaps this slump at the cinema will lead to more mid-range movie types that have been squeezed out by streaming. Genres like the Rom-Com may make a comeback for the right price.

I wish. I’d love to see more low and mid-budget movies find big audiences.

Often when I bring up supporting smaller or more independent movies, people push back by insisting theaters are too expensive to take risks, or to watch comedies and Rom-Coms.

I don’t know. I try to support comedies in the theaters as much as I can, but I get why it stings a family to fork over $80 for a movie that has no spectacle.

ccs wrote:

 Easy E wrote:
I am also inclined to think it is a theatre problem related to larger market forces.

Consumers are still spending in the US despite inflation, but they are not spending on movie theatre tickets. Consumer spending maybe shifting away from experiences and back to staples/products with a life span. This shift will impact cinema ticket sales as they fall on the experience side of the equation.

There's also streaming to consider.
I've got Netflix, Amazon, & D+.
Anymore if I see what looks like to be just a mediocre movie? If it's going to be on one of those 3 platforms & I've got any interest? I'll just wait patiently.

For example: Disney's Haunted Mansion this summer. I didn't think it looked good enough to spend the $ or work it into the schedule to see it in the theatre. (I was correct)
But since I'm already paying for D+ for the various SW/MCU stuff? Sure. I'll give Haunted Mansion a watch some evening while building/painting Wharhammer....
And that's exactly what I did. On Halloween.

I don't know how Disney counts my monthly subscription fee as far as determining if something was successful. Especially if I watch the thing months after it debuted. But they've got to be making less than if I'd seen it while it was in the theater.
And I know my local theaters making less.

Yeah, I’m in the same boat, if it’s not something that I absolutely have to see on the big screen (e.g. Dune), I will likely wait. It also then becomes a justification of how much I’m spending on monthly subscriptions…

Christmas at the Box Office Hinges on ‘Aquaman 2.’ Movie Theater Owners Are Worried.- Variety

Every year around Christmas, Phoenix Theatres puts all of its chips on one major tentpole, gambling on a movie so big, so broadly appealing, it’ll keep auditoriums stocked into the new year. In the recent past, the Midwest-based chain has gone all in on 2022’s “Avatar: The Way of Water,” 2021’s “Spider-Man: No Way Home” and 2019’s “Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker.”

But this holiday season is different. For the first time in more than a decade, excluding the pandemic-stricken 2020, there’s no surefire blockbuster with the potential to gross $1 billion globally to cap off the year.

“The holiday season is on the shoulders of ‘Aquaman,’ and that’s not a good shoulder to put anything on,” says Jeff Bock, an analyst with Exhibitor Relations. “Can it cut through the negative DC noise?”

It sounds like the theaters are a little leery of Aquaman being able to save Christmas for them this year.

Early tracking doesn’t look good, but early tracking is often blind to enthusiasm. I wouldn’t be surprised if it flopped, but I also wouldn’t be surprised if it hit $1 billion. Momoa has charisma, and the first film was the kind people “had” to see on the big screen.