Barnack

Agree with the awesome opening, the movie fall completely and all the tension goes away the minute it reveal the villains and introduce supernatural/magic element imo, it is not easy to sustain an horror movie at that point in general thought.

It is not a high pay check (they made more money from Grown Up than the billion dollar at the box office Skyfall), but it is a really safe one. I wonder how much value they give to the fact they have the ability to equal any offer to put Sony product into the franchise, maybe it is seen like a good Sony product placement vehicle machine at a good price (after the money Sony spend on product placement participate at reducing the cost of their own movie) for them more than anything else. Even thought they would not loose that much money if they were too loose the distribution deal it would still hurt them in that way.

It did look like it was going to do so: http://www.the-numbers.com/movies/custom-comparisons/La-La-Land/Chicago It's 15 million advance just melted away, even if it would have if it would have won a couple more Oscar and best picture, it look like it could still have ended up a bit below. Thanks

You could be right that they underestimate a little bit promotional but they are clearly trying to take them into account and why they suggest that low $100m world P&A for Ghostbuster that is cheaper than White House down or the usual sony big world release, while they were everywhere. Reading they're take on Spectre for example (the Smarthphone placement deal on Spectre was a 50 million budget of co-ads + 5 million in money with some of it going directly into Craig pocket). -------------- http://deadline.com/2015/11/spectre-profit-box-office-skyfall-james-bond-franchise-1201615942/ That has been part of every conversation I’ve had on the movie’s performance, and it is a relevant question: With a combined estimated production cost and global P&A upward of $350M, how much will Spectre need to gross to churn a profit? The math is fairly simple: Cut the domestic gross in half for the exhibitor split, the studio retains 40% of the overseas B.O., another 25% from China receipts that will kick in next weekend, and estimate the value of the ancillaries. Then place that up against the considerable budget and P&A spend. Unless it veers off track, the Bond picture is going to make money for MGM and its producer/rights holders and less for Sony Pictures, even though the studio co-financed the picture. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The expected global P&A for Bond 24 was of 150 million, giving a production + Global P&A of around 370 million, at the time of the green light an expected net budget at 220 million, not that far from Deadline 350 million estimate. And Bonds is arguably the franchise that get the most and best product placement deal. Sony estimated break even point was at 524.5 million WW (478.5 in Sony territories), that is quite high for a 220 million budget movie, with a reasonable 150$ million P&A, but it is intl heavy, they have only the theater distribution right (and not from everywhere like they say in the article) no home media and a deal that is significantly at MGM advantage like they are saying (it is bit the cost are 50-50, profit are 25-75 for MGM). Of all deadline estimate numbers, I think releasing cost is the one they tend to be the closer too, budget are secret, participation deal are secret and they tend to be really wrong about those, but releasing is very public and how much poster cost, trailer on TV, etc... can be estimate fairly well.

They usually include them, they probably assume no cost for any promotion made via a partner and do not include them, otherwise the P&A of those franchise movie would be ridiculously high and not the reasonable number they tend to use. Some franchise like James Bond would look strange if they do not include promotional partners (they have ridiculously low world release cost)

321 million for production budget + world P&A is not a specially high number for a giant world release, that is cheaper than Hancock, significantly cheaper than Angel&Demons, only 77 million more than Angelina Jolie movie Salt, specially once you consider that they are not giving much first dollar gross if any, keeping the break even bar low. Break even point, depending of revenue source is probably estimated between 360 and 480 million I would guess.

I suspect they are overestimating Transformer 4 profit quite a lot, particularly that 75 million participation, that is less than 10% of the gross, I would imagine it is closer to 25% of gross going away, more in the 150/200+ million range going to Hasbro, Spielberg, Bay, Wahlberg, etc...

The list (completely imperfect, usually overestimate studio profit) is trying to list the 20 most profitable (in absolute profit, not ROI) movie of the year for the studios, it tend to be fill of big budget movies, but you have mid budgeter in it too, like Neighbors, Jump street, etc...

Not sure they had those aspirations really, press aspiration for movies is often quite different than studio aspiration, the biggest star of the movie was by far Binoche, a budget not that far from last year Deepwater Horizon, that do not scream going for the billion dollar world box office mark to me. Sony had a 764 million target for James Bond 24, the sequel of Skyfall that made over a billion, I'm sure you can find people saying they aspired to do more than the 880 million it did.

Yes on that list of the most profitable movie of the year, by their evaluation. And it is because they are cutting the profit between legendary and WB, and ranked it by studio profit alone (while most movies on that list had co-financier taking a share of the profit), otherwise it would be just below the Hobbit on that list.

We obviously never know for sure, but if the rumored 160 million dollar budget is true, with that low profit participation director and cast, it must have turned a huge profit. According to deadline estimate Godzilla turned a giant profit of 91 million shared between Warner and Legendary: http://deadline.com/2015/03/godzilla-profit-box-office-2014-1201389604/

No one (well no one reasonable) will ever disagree with this, the best way to evaluate how different movie made in money at the box office is certainly using the US inflation ratio. But that is not what people usually try to achieve when they are adjusting for something else.

Metacritic and Rotten tomatoes Top critics is pretty much the same (almost always really close score, using pretty much the same reviews) RT give you 2 metric, the % of people that liked the movie and how much it is rated, the first being how much of a consensus the second score happen to be. The 2 metric have their merit, the RT score being about the chance you will like the movie and the average rating by how much. Many dislike trailer because of spoiler, same for reading about them, for many the best experience is going to a movie 100% cold, using something like a score to curate what you see become a really interesting option. And there is just so many movie thousand of new movies every year's, ten and ten of thousand from the past, no one will go by alphabetic order of the 16000 movies of 2016 on IMDB and read/watch trailer's about all of them, it is just impossible time wise, everyone use some pre-curating method. That would be a positive thought, no ? The only goal to go to a movie is having a rewarding experience/good time, anything that help toward that is positive, anything that reduce it is bad. I would say that you are in part rights, a lot of external element to the actual movie will affect our subjective experience, but it change from people to people, a high RT score can trigger the contrarian in us or set high expectation (Boyhood for example did suffer from it a little bit to some, Moonlight to others). RT can have a little bit of influence, but it probably not come close of the movie being a big name prestigious director.

In term of market share it is possible, Avatar made 2.788 billion, in 2009 the global box office was of 29.4 billion It made a ridiculous 9.48% of the world box office that year. Achieving a third of that (3.16%) of a say 41 billion world box office when it will be released, would be making 1.295 billion, that is a movie that could loose 66% of is market share and still be a huge success.

With the Internet today, the different interpretations (that it is not sappy at all, everyone that dream and try to reach for something get killed in that movie, while everyone that do not try or want to die on the battlefield live long and rich life) would maybe become popular.

The theater run was so long that he had time to become a star and help the box office before the end of it in a way.

Well like it was pointed out Star Power today tend to be only when you are cast in what the audience expect of you, few have clout independently of the movie except Denzel Washington and Leonardo Dicaprio. That said, one that has the most star power in the right role right now is Cumberbatch, he is one of the biggest foreign draw in China. Hugh Jackman can help a movie too, there was a windows were Liam Neeson was a draw in an action movie, Seth Rogan in a comedy, and I am probably forgetting some other non americans. The draw are dying is a common talk since at least the mid 90's, there is a press conference of studio head talking about it that occurred when Titanic was destroying everything with no star in the cast. We still have star power, but it need to be the right match, it is the most obvious in humor, Sandler, Ferrel, McCarthy, Hart, etc... obviously have huge impact on a movie performance. One difficulty to evaluate star power is the sample size, it is really rare that we get some big movie with a big release, that has no IP attached to them or commercial high concept that do not have any star power attach to them, to be able to compare them to those who do. You will read in the same month: what were they thinking doing John Carter without any star and star power do not exist, from 2 different person.

That is already the case, much more small horror movies are made than giant superheroes movies, it has been year's that horror is considered the most commercial genre for theater ticket sales and they are doing a tons of them. 2016 horror output: The Boy Jan 22, 2016 STX Entertainment PG-13 $35,819,556 $35,819,556 Southbound Feb 5, 2016 The Orchard R $205,048 $205,048 The Pack Feb 5, 2016 IFC Midnight Not Rated $0 $0 The Final Project Feb 12, 2016 CAVU Releasing Not Rated $0 $0 The Witch Feb 19, 2016 A24 R $25,138,705 $25,138,705 The Other Side of the Door Mar 4, 2016 20th Century Fox R $3,000,342 $3,000,342 Ava’s Possessions Mar 4, 2016 Momentum Pictures R $0 $0 Bleed Mar 25, 2016 Gravitas Ventures Not Rated $0 $0 Baskin Mar 25, 2016 IFC Midnight Not Rated $0 $0 The Channel Apr 8, 2016 Indican Pictures Not Rated $18,319 $18,319 The Dead Room Apr 8, 2016 IFC Midnight $0 $0 Green Room Apr 15, 2016 A24 R $3,220,371 $3,220,371 Bite May 6, 2016 Shout! Factory Not Rated $0 $0 The Offering May 6, 2016 Momentum Pictures Not Rated $0 $0 1920 London May 6, 2016 Reliance Entertainment Not Rated $0 $0 The Darkness May 13, 2016 High Top Releasing PG-13 $10,753,574 $10,753,574 Sorgenfri May 13, 2016 IFC Midnight Not Rated $0 $0 Most Likely to Die May 13, 2016 Not Rated $0 $0 Another Jun 6, 2016 Epic Pictures Group Not Rated $0 $0 The Conjuring 2: The Enfield Pol… Jun 10, 2016 Warner Bros. R $102,470,008 $102,470,008 Clown Jun 17, 2016 Dimension Pictures R $55,007 $55,007 The Neon Demon Jun 24, 2016 Broad Green Pictures R $1,333,124 $1,333,124 The Purge: Election Year Jul 1, 2016 Universal R $79,042,440 $79,042,440 Satanic Jul 1, 2016 Magnolia Pictures R $252 $252 Lights Out Jul 22, 2016 Warner Bros. PG-13 $67,268,835 $67,268,835 Busanhaeng Jul 22, 2016 Well Go USA Not Rated $2,129,768 $2,129,768 The Childhood of a Leader Jul 22, 2016 IFC Films Not Rated $0 $0 Viral Jul 29, 2016 Weinstein Co. R $0 $0 The Mind’s Eye Aug 5, 2016 RLJ Entertainment Not Rated $0 $0 Don’t Breathe Aug 26, 2016 Sony Pictures R $89,217,875 $89,217,875 Daylight’s End Aug 26, 2016 Self Distributed $0 $0 31 Sep 1, 2016 Saban Films R $779,820 $779,820 Antibirth Sep 2, 2016 IFC Midnight Not Rated $0 $0 The Disappointments Room Sep 9, 2016 Relativity R $2,423,467 $2,423,467 Demon Sep 9, 2016 The Orchard R $104,039 $104,039 Happy Birthday! Sep 9, 2016 Orion Pictures R $0 $0 Before I Wake Sep 9, 2016 Relativity PG-13 $0 $0 Blair Witch Sep 16, 2016 Lionsgate R $20,777,061 $20,777,061 The Devil’s Dolls Sep 16, 2016 IFC Films Not Rated $0 $0 ClownTown Sep 30, 2016 ITN $0 $0 Phantasm: Ravager Oct 4, 2016 Well Go USA Not Rated $0 $0 Under the Shadow Oct 7, 2016 Vertical Entertainment PG-13 $28,884 $28,884 The Alchemist Cookbook Oct 7, 2016 Oscilloscope Pictures Not Rated $0 $0 Jack Goes Home Oct 14, 2016 Momentum Pictures R $0 $0 Ouija: Origin of Evil Oct 21, 2016 Universal PG-13 $35,144,505 $35,144,505 Recovery Oct 27, 2016 Orion Pictures R $0 $0 The Fiancé Nov 11, 2016 Indican Pictures Not Rated $22,282 $22,282 The Monster Nov 11, 2016 A24 R $12,544 $12,544 Evolution Nov 25, 2016 IFC Midnight Not Rated $23,538 $23,538 The Eyes of My Mother Dec 2, 2016 Magnolia Pictures R $27,099 $27,099 The Ghosts of Johnson Woods Dec 2, 2016 Driving With Our Ey… Not Rated $2,335 $2,335 SiREN Dec 2, 2016 Chiller Films Not Rated $0 $0 Duelist Dec 2, 2016 Sony Pictures R $0 $0 Beyond the Gates Dec 9, 2016 IFC Midnight Not Rated $0 $0 Abattoir Dec 9, 2016 Momentum Pictures R $0 $0 City of Dead Men Dec 16, 2016 Gravitas Ventures Not Rated $0 $0 The Autopsy of Jane Doe Dec 21, 2016 IFC Films R $0 $0 2016 giant superheroes movies: BvS Civil War X-men Apocalypse Suicide Squad Doctor strange That is 61 horror movies versus 5 superheroes, they were already trying to do more than one horror movie by week in theater, the difference is that most of them end up direct to dvd, we just have the best in mind those who end up being successful in theater, while we remember every big superheroes movie because they do not have the luxury on only wide releasing and putting marketing effort on the best one. Green Room/It follow/The Witch were some of the best reviewed horror movie, they didn't came close to be the success of Get Out, Don't Breath or split, it is far from being automatic.

2002 to 2006 was a bit of a different era for Hollywood, probably it's most profitable one, with 2004 being the peak: Even thought the box office was much smaller than now, the industry was not smaller globally, back then doubling your budget was not a rules of thumb about making money or not, but entering the zone of being a big success, some movie made their money back while doing 1.4 time their budget in theater during the Dvd bubble era. It is a bit dangerous to look at movie performance without taking the era into account, the Aviator probably made good money. In 2004 movie made a bigger share of the box office the first weeks, didn't have any market with a 25% return like China today and most of all, the risk was really small because of how well movie did after theatrical were 68% of the movie industry revenue was made, theater was a bit of a publicity for the next windows, studio's were spending more releasing movie in theater than what they were making from tickets at that time. I'm not so sure studios are willing to bet on him that much, like you said they didn't fund Silence, it took him 20 year's to find financing outside studios. It was never easy for him, but post-Hugo (that just lost too much money) is studio career would have been even harder. He also independently funded Wolf of Wall street and it turned to be financier linked to organized crime, corruption and so on, apparently because studios do not give him that much freedom and he didn't wanted to have to deal with them during production, and they didn't gave him final cut either when they distribute is big movies like Wolf, he often had to pay out of is own pocket to do some reshoot he wanted in the past, etc... he didn't seem to have a good relationship. I'm not surprised at all he went to work on Netflix, they will be happy just to have a big Scorsese movie and give him total freedom. Eastwood is maybe the fastest worker out there with very reasonable price tag, he has the longest relationship with a studio in history with Warner Brothers and J Edgar, Hereafter, Invictus still all doubled their budget, not exactly the same situation.

When Jolie and Depp were in a movie together, The Tourist, it did cost 77.6 million in participation bonus (and I imagine 40 million in salary), Jolie seem to have been making around 50+ million by movie around that time when including the first dollar gross bonus, so was Depp I suppose. I imagine that when big stars assemble for a movie now, they cut on what they usually get because they want to work together, Concussion was giving around 50% of the profit to is cast like American Hustle, the difference is that on Concussion 50% of the profit went to Will Smith alone, while the cast and director of Hustle had to split it among themselves.

Those number were discussed in Sony leaked e-mail when they were planning what would be a good starting offer for Wahlberg as the lead role in Uncharted, it look like studio/agents talk between themselves on how much people got on previous project.

Wahlberg cost a reasonable cost, not cheap, but reasonable: Salary $15M for Transformers 4, he has options in place for 2 sequels, at $19M and $20M respectively. On the first he had points starting at 4% after 200 million at the world BO ramping up to 7.25% Paramount give already a lot to Hasbro, Bay and Spielberg, so they cannot give much point to the cast, they try to limit first dollar gross going away to 25%, on a movie making 1 billion worldwide, that is a giant amount that goes away.

It does seem to have went overbudget, it was greenlight for 210 million net, 35 million less than the end result, Sony also expected getting 58-59% of the domestic box office at one point.... Angels&Demons loosing money was a total surprise to me too, The Da Vinci code was such a giant success (the studio revenue on that movie were of 833 million) that they spent a lot on the sequel (probably have no choice, how do you say no to that team after the first movie), Angels&Demon net production budget was of 193.56 million and people obviously got big first dollar gross deal, they gave 62.25 million in bonus, turning it effectively in a movie costing over 250 million with a giant 170 million world P&A release. Having a budget + bonus + p&A of 425 million was not updated to the new reality of the dvd market that just started to decline, the sequel declined of just 35% at the box office from the original, but declined by 50% on home video, 2006 when Da Vinci Code was release was maybe the all-time peak of Hollywood profitability. Yes, that must be why they cancelled the sequel and did skip one book (the sequel had a release date planned and all), the cast/director/producer accepted to open their contract, remove first dollar gross and divided their salary by 2 to make Inferno happen.

They are extremely rare in the last 10 year's, outside American sniper 2009: The blind side made 255 million/Hangover 277 million 2011: Hangover 2 made 254 million

If only, the net budget was of 245.908 million Depends for who, for the cast, director and Spielberg it certainly was, with a very nice 88.43 million participation bonus, but a 245.9 million movie + a 88.43 million from gross participation turned it into a massive 334.33 million dollar movie, it's box office should have been enough to break even but the movie flopped on home media. Third party investor lost 19.93 million on the movie, Sony studio lost 28.112 million. Men in Black 3 and Angels&Demon loosing a lot of money are 2 of the most extreme example that we just don't know, except for the most obvious case, if a movie was profitable or not.