Weekend estimates | Veronica mars- 2M (down 39% on Sat), 300 2-19.1M,LEGO (7.71M), non-stop (10.6M)

[iceroll]

$66 million production budget.  Give to take $50 million for prints and advertising (advert campaign was robust but they're not spending SM3 money on adds).  Let's round up to $120 million in overall costs.  About $240 million gets it even.  Unless Aaron Paul has a larger int'l following than any of us guessed, I don't see it making that in WW boxoffice alone.

That's not how you calculated breakeven, usually it's just 2x production budget.  And it will easily do that because US and China will both be around ~50m.

[Shawn Robbins]

Lilmac is correct. Break-even points are typically determined to be double the total negative costs (including marketing) of the movie.

 

That's one reason advertising budgets are even harder to come by than firm production costs. Studios don't want the world to know exactly how much money they're making or losing on each film.

Edited March 15, 2014 by ShawnMR

[a2k]

Lego recovers well after last week's drop. Should touch 260m.

90m for Non-Stop?

[iceroll]

Lilmac is correct. Break-even points are typically determined to be double the total negative costs (including marketing) of the movie.

 

That's one reason advertising budgets are even harder to come by than firm production costs. Studios don't want the world to know exactly how much money they're making or losing on each film.

I thought it was assumed that home video, tv and ancillary revenue would cover those marketing costs, otherwise the calculations get too complicated exactly because it's so hard to come by marketing budgets.

[Shawn Robbins]

I thought it was assumed that home video, tv and ancillary revenue would cover those marketing costs, otherwise the calculations get too complicated exactly because it's so hard to come by marketing budgets.

 

To an extent, that can also be true. It often depends on the film.

 

For example: something like Need For Speed isn't going to generate as much box office or ancillary revenue as, say, Captain America--yet there probably won't be as much of a disparity between their marketing budgets. Since it's underperforming at the box office, that also means NFS won't sell very well when it comes to cable rights.

 

I should amend my original post to say "profitability point" instead of "break-even". That way, there's more flexibility to account for all of the unknown factors. After all, it's one thing to make your money back... but profiting "just" $10-20+ million or is technically a success even for films we sometimes perceive to have been failures.

 

The plus side is that marketing budgets can be extrapolated based on similar movies, past studio spending habits, etc. But... it's still an estimating game no matter what.

Edited March 15, 2014 by ShawnMR

[Shawn Robbins]

To an extent, that can also be true. It often depends on the film.

 

For example: something like Need For Speed isn't going to generate as much box office or ancillary revenue as, say, Captain America--yet there probably won't be as much of a disparity between their marketing budgets. Since it's underperforming at the box office, that also means NFS won't sell very well when it comes to cable rights.

 

I should amend my original post to say "profitability point" instead of "break-even". That way, there's more flexibility to account for all of the unknown factors. After all, it's one thing to make your money back... but profiting "just" $10-20+ million or is technically a success even for films we sometimes perceive to have been failures.

 

The plus side is that marketing budgets can be extrapolated based on similar movies, past studio spending habits, etc. But... it's still an estimating game no matter what.

 

Another example: the double-the-production-budget ratio could theoretically work for animated movies. It doesn't accurately reflect the all-around numbers, but generally, those movies will earn significantly more post-theatrical than others because of their higher rental activity, higher selling value, and merchandising tie-ins.

[mcclaine]

Lilmac is correct. Break-even points are typically determined to be double the total negative costs (including marketing) of the movie.

 

That's one reason advertising budgets are even harder to come by than firm production costs. Studios don't want the world to know exactly how much money they're making or losing on each film.

 

Damn bastards!

[AJG]

Any word on 300 2

[TLK]

I'm wondering if there's a relation regarding the budget, how much is it, and what is the minimum for very low budget pics.

 

No there isn't any direct relationship but most micro-budget movies go the limited release route which is very cheap as it relies on VOD revenues to generate any profits. There are some exceptions like Blumhouse horror movies that are typically produced for under 5 millions but are often released nationwide by big distributors like Paramount and Universal. In this case the P&A budget is in the typical $30 million+ range. Purge was made for $3 million but Universal reportedly spend over $30 million in P&A.

[mcclaine]

Correct me as you wish, but this is how i (approximately) calculate the profitability point (i like that one, Shawn!) 

As there is no way for sure to know such a thing, because studios have different deals maybe for each picture and then again, different deals with each countries, to round it up, this is what i do. 

50% of US Gross (i know it's not the same 1st week than 2nd, but again, just to round i up) + 30% of OS Gross - Budget - P&A (just guessing, this is what i really don't know and what i was asking before, i assume it could be around 50% of the budget or more)

 

So, in example, let's break down World War Z:US Gross: 202.4 / OS Gross: 234.0M would make this:111.3M + 101.3M = 212.6MBudget: 190M / P&A: (for argument's sake, let's say half of this) 76M 190M + 76 = 266MSo, 212.6M - 266M = -53.4MThis is of course, just theatrically, then you have BR,DVD, Cable, VOD, TV, etc. 

 

What i am doing wrong or what am i missing?

Edited March 15, 2014 by mcclaine

[mcclaine]

No there isn't any direct relationship but most micro-budget movies go the limited release route which is very cheap as it relies on VOD revenues to generate any profits. There are some exceptions like Blumhouse horror movies that are typically produced for under 5 millions but are often released nationwide by big distributors like Paramount and Universal. In this case the P&A budget is in the typical $30 million+ range. Purge was made for $3 million but Universal reportedly spend over $30 million in P&A.

 

Thanks!!

[raniE]

That wasn't really based on a video game

It is certainly a video game movie though. It's actually about video games.

[chuck0]

It is certainly a video game movie though. It's actually about video games.

 

yes, but it is not a video game adaption... the characters in WiR know that they are video game characters...

 

rotten tomates actually has a list of video game adaptions

 

http://www.rottentomatoes.com/guides/best_video_game_adaptations/

 

though i actually would not count their number one since its also strictly speaking not an adaption.

Edited March 15, 2014 by chuck0

[raniE]

yes, but it is not a video game adaption... the characters in WiR know that they are video game characters...

 

rotten tomates actually has a list of video game adaptions

 

http://www.rottentomatoes.com/guides/best_video_game_adaptations/

 

though i actually would not count their number one since its also strictly speaking not an adaption.

 

The word adaptation did not appear a single time in the post I posted first when I asked about Wreck-It-Ralph though.

 

Even so, it still had about as much to do with the Sonic games (in that it had Sonic in it) as say the Super Mario Bros movie had to do with those games.

Edited March 15, 2014 by raniE

[grim22]

Lilmac is correct. Break-even points are typically determined to be double the total negative costs (including marketing) of the movie.

 

That's one reason advertising budgets are even harder to come by than firm production costs. Studios don't want the world to know exactly how much money they're making or losing on each film.

 

Well, no movie ever makes money anymore according to the studios. I mean, when they can claim that Order of the phoenix lost money and "Return of the Jedi" has not yet made any profits, we may never get a straight answer from the studios ever.

 

[chuck0]

The word adaptation did not appear a single time in the post I posted first when I asked about Wreck-It-Ralph though.

 

right... sorry for reading that into your post... since previous posts were talking about the NFS movie and Resident Evil i assumed that we were talking about adaptions

 

oh, and yeah regarding WiR... i love that one

Edited March 15, 2014 by chuck0

[The47th]

yes, but it is not a video game adaption... the characters in WiR know that they are video game characters...

 

rotten tomates actually has a list of video game adaptions

 

http://www.rottentomatoes.com/guides/best_video_game_adaptations/

 

I have no complaints about that top5 (although I haven't seen Prince of Persia).

[raniE]

right... sorry for reading that into your post... since previous posts were talking about the NFS movie and Resident Evil i assumed that we were talking about adaptions

 

oh, and yeah regarding WiR... i love that one

 

The weird thing to me regarding video game adaptations is that they keep deciding to adapt games with either no plot or a very rudimentary one. Need for Speed? It's a racing game, you race cars in it. At least last time I played those games (which admittedly was many years ago) there was nothing else. I think it's kind of telling that the direct video game adaptations that have made the most money are Tomb Raider and Prince of Persia (Pokemon could count, but I'd say that was based more off the TV-series than directly off the games). Games where there was an actual story, actual characters etc.

Edited March 15, 2014 by raniE

[grim22]

Somewhat on topic. Why aren't more outlets reporting on the issues with Flixster/Ultravoilet that people who wanted to redeem their Veronica Mars digital downloads encountered?

 

Ultravoilet is a major studio initiative, and if they can't get dedicated fans who paid money to get a movie made onboard then they need to take a deep look at the issues and try to make it more user friendly. Or iTunes and Amazon will basically get complete control over the digital downloads side of things. 

 

I think one of the major drawbacks of Ultravoilet is no physical copies, the other drawback is that the studios may be behind the initiative, but they refuse to let it be a single-sign on, people need their ultravoilet passwords as well as the studio password to be able to watch a movie. The lack of an actual copy on user systems will cause a lot of pushback for sure, since people don't want to be connected to watch something they own.

[a2k]

The weird thing to me regarding video game adaptations is that they keep deciding to adapt games with either no plot or a very rudimentary one. Need for Speed? It's a racing game, you race cars in it. At least last time I played those games (which admittedly was many years ago) there was nothing else. I think it's kind of telling that the direct video game adaptations that have made the most money are Tomb Raider and Prince of Persia (Pokemon could count, but I'd say that was based more off the TV-series than directly off the games). Games where there was an actual story, actual characters etc.

 

True, though I think they were going for a Fast & Furious like vibe.

Prince of Persia imo had a lot of potential, only if they had taken a lead who didn't perpetually look in need for sleep (see what i did here   ) and even if the look of the movie wasn't so dull and joyless.