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John Marston

Armageddon (1998) and Deep Impact (1998)

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Yeah, this was epic. Even as a kid I remember thinking "why the hell are these movies coming out together? That's weird..."

 

Funny to see that it worked out well for both in the end. Yes, they are very different movies and I really enjoy them both but Armageddon just has the edge for me, it's just much more memorable for me.

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4 hours ago, DeeCee said:

I just had a look at each weekend in 1998 from Deep Impact's opening through to Armageddon's run.  It really was a mediocre summer.  Although ostensibly about the same subject I think both movies were able to co-exist in the same summer because they were actually quite different.  

It's worth mentioning the late 90s was when everything came in twos: two animated bug movies (Antz and A Bug's Life), two disaster movies based on volcanoes (Dante's Peak and Volcano), two movies about the end of the world (Deep Impact and Armageddon), two movies about WWII (Saving Private Ryan and The Thin Red Line), etc.

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Oh, The Thin Red Line. One of my friends who can't stand talky dramas blind-bought the DVD thinking it would be like Saving Private Ryan and hated it.

 

I still love Ben Affleck's shamelessly sardonic DVD commentary on Armageddon: "I asked Michael why it was easier to train oil drillers to become astronauts than it was to train astronauts to become oil drillers, and he told me to shut the fuck up. So that was the end of that talk." :lol:

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Just now, filmlover said:

It's worth mentioning the late 90s was when everything came in twos: two animated bug movies (Antz and A Bug's Life), two disaster movies based on volcanoes (Dante's Peak and Volcano), two movies about the end of the world (Deep Impact and Armageddon), two movies about WWII (Saving Private Ryan and The Thin Red Line), etc.

 

Mel Gibson did talk about that (Rob Roy released one month before Braveheart in is case) in a recent interview:

 

https://youtu.be/2HjZVx6xK4k?t=1427

 

One of the producer of Braveheart took that script with him when he was kicked off MGM as part of is severance package, they were mad about it and decided to rush a similar movie to release it before.

 

We still have a bit of that now, we did got 2 Hercule movie released in the same time, 2 jungle book movie project at the same time.

 

 

 

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5 minutes ago, Webslinger said:

Oh, The Thin Red Line. One of my friends who can't stand talky dramas blind-bought the DVD thinking it would be like Saving Private Ryan and hated it.

I was a senior in high school when The Thin Red Line came out and remember my history teacher saying he walked out on it lol. I didn't see it until it was out on video that summer.

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1 hour ago, Webslinger said:

Armageddon actually made considerably less at the box office than the 4th of July openers in the two preceding years, and it did so with a significantly higher budget ($140 million vs. Independence Day's $75 million and Men in Black's $90 million), so it's not hard to see where the edge of disappointment in the Box Office Guru write-up comes from. Overall, its run was solid, but not eye-popping.

 

 

well they said the opening was disappointing but they later praised the films legs

 

 

Quote

Disney must be delighted with the powerful staying power of Armageddon. Most big-budget special-effects pictures depreciate at a higher rate in their first few weeks. Armageddon is still running at the same pace as last summer's Air Force Onewhich went on to gross $172.6M.  Add in the extra $18.2M Armageddon earned on its first Wednesday and Thursday, and it is clear that the Bruce Willis thrill ride is headed for the $180-190M range. If it can reach this level, it will become the highest-grossing live action film in Disney's history, unseating 1990's Pretty Woman which took in $178M.

 

 

 

http://www.boxofficeguru.com/072098.htm

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1 hour ago, Barnack said:

 

Mel Gibson did talk about that (Rob Roy released one month before Braveheart in is case) in a recent interview:

 

https://youtu.be/2HjZVx6xK4k?t=1427

 

One of the producer of Braveheart took that script with him when he was kicked off MGM as part of is severance package, they were mad about it and decided to rush a similar movie to release it before.

 

We still have a bit of that now, we did got 2 Hercule movie released in the same time, 2 jungle book movie project at the same time.

 

 

 

 

Rob Roy  >>> Braveheart

 

Also, Thomas Crown Affair & Entrapment (with dueling Bonds no less)

 

One of the TCA remake's first drafts/scripts was turned down and then made into Entrapment.

 

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11 hours ago, filmlover said:

I was a senior in high school when The Thin Red Line came out and remember my history teacher saying he walked out on it lol. I didn't see it until it was out on video that summer.

 

I almost walked out on it too.  Way too melodramatic for me.

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42 minutes ago, baumer said:

It's very well made.  And not a guilty pleasure at all.

 

i'll add the 3rd option of it's very well made and a guilty pleasure to me :P

 

2 hours ago, Lordmandeep said:

and of course Aerosmith song is best.  

 

and I hear they refuse to play it at concerts because they don't like playing songs they didn't write apparently.

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On 23/2/2017 at 4:04 AM, filmlover said:

It's worth mentioning the late 90s was when everything came in twos: two animated bug movies (Antz and A Bug's Life), two disaster movies based on volcanoes (Dante's Peak and Volcano), two movies about the end of the world (Deep Impact and Armageddon), two movies about WWII (Saving Private Ryan and The Thin Red Line), etc.

 

Also Mission to Mars and Red Planet in 2000. Two mega bombs that buried De Palma's and Val Kilmer's careers for good. They pretty much killed the space movie genre for more than a decade.

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18 minutes ago, Joel M said:

 

Also Mission to Mars and Red Planet in 2000. Two mega bombs that buried De Palma's and Val Kilmer's careers for good. They pretty much killed the space movie genre for more than a decade.

I saw Mission to Mars in theaters. 17 years later, I still want my $10 back.

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On 2/22/2017 at 11:53 PM, Jiffy said:

Armageddon's impressive multiplier has always been somewhat inexplicable to me. 

 

It's opening was inexplicably small. And whatever you think of that movie's quality, it did genuinely deliver on the spectacle side. The opening meteor shower on New York was groundbreaking for its time and overall its production values were excellent. Plus, Willis, Affleck, Tyler, Buscemi and Bob Thornton make-up a great ensemble. 

 

On another note, I remember that both these movies did exceptionally well in Japan (back then, the world's undisputed number 2 market) Armageddon is still Hollywood's number 7 movie *of all time* in the Japanese market. Interestingly, Your Name's plot also revolves around a space object hitting the earth. The Japanese really have a thing for meteors/comets. 

 

Edit: Notice how the "experts" reacted to Armageddon's OW: "Cannot reach $200M but may make it to $150M" I remember being certain that they would be proven wrong. 

Edited by PPZVGOS
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2 hours ago, PPZVGOS said:

 

It's opening was inexplicably small. And whatever you think of that movie's quality, it did genuinely deliver on the spectacle side. The opening meteor shower on New York was groundbreaking for its time and overall its production values were excellent. 

 

Yes, that's the thing. It's total gross doesn't surprise me, given how high expectations were and the substantial marketing campaign attached, but its multiplier was the second best out of the Top 20 openers of 1998, and not far off from #1 (SPR -- a war film with rave reviews aimed at an older audience whose longevity was to be expected). It also isn't far off from ID4's multiplier, a film whose spectacle seemed a lot more unprecedented for its time (and that film reached the highest echelon of uber-blockbuster status).

 

The multiplier was even a fair bit better than the July 4th Will Smith tentpole released the year before (MIB), despite that straddling another genre (comedy) that's typically better-suited to longevity than your average action blockbuster. No Michael Bay film enjoyed such a strong multiplier either before or since, and you didn't see the other blockbusters that surprised with an underwhelming opening on the heels of a marketing blitz / lofty expectations (Godzilla and Pearl Harbor) rebounding in such a way afterward.

 

I'm fully capable of acknowledging when the general audience's tastes aren't in line with my own (not that I've ever considered myself above enjoying a well-crafted action blockbuster), and I certainly understand the appeal of Armageddon on paper (and why people were expecting it to be huge), but it's the strength of the multiplier itself that strikes me as anomalous in light of the initial disappointment and the critical savaging it received upon release. I think the song contributed to sustained public interest.  

 

 

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7 minutes ago, CaptainJackSparrow said:

I love disaster movies. Should I give Deep Impact a try? Isn't it just like Armageddon? I doubt it's anywhere near as good as that.

 

It's much more of an ensemble character study and it tries to take a more "realistic" approach to that disaster scenario. (Not that it's perfectly realistic, just way more so than ARMAGEDDON.) It's pretty solid -- admittedly I haven't seen it in a really long time. 

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I think Deep Impact is definitely worth seeing.  The cast is terrific and Robert Duval has one of the cool lines in the film.  One that has stuck with me forever.  Armageddon is great fun but Deep Impact is not far behind.

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2 hours ago, Jiffy said:

 

Yes, that's the thing. It's total gross doesn't surprise me, given how high expectations were and the substantial marketing campaign attached, but its multiplier was the second best out of the Top 20 openers of 1998, and not far off from #1 (SPR -- a war film with rave reviews aimed at an older audience whose longevity was to be expected). It also isn't far off from ID4's multiplier, a film whose spectacle seemed a lot more unprecedented for its time (and that film reached the highest echelon of uber-blockbuster status).

 

The multiplier was even a fair bit better than the July 4th Will Smith tentpole released the year before (MIB), despite that straddling another genre (comedy) that's typically better-suited to longevity than your average action blockbuster. No Michael Bay film enjoyed such a strong multiplier either before or since, and you didn't see the other blockbusters that surprised with an underwhelming opening on the heels of a marketing blitz / lofty expectations (Godzilla and Pearl Harbor) rebounding in such a way afterward.

 

I'm fully capable of acknowledging when the general audience's tastes aren't in line with my own (not that I've ever considered myself above enjoying a well-crafted action blockbuster), and I certainly understand the appeal of Armageddon on paper (and why people were expecting it to be huge), but it's the strength of the multiplier itself that strikes me as anomalous in light of the initial disappointment and the critical savaging it received upon release. I think the song contributed to sustained public interest.  

 

 

 

 

Nobody cared about critical savaging. That's why 

 

 

opening was low because Deep Impact stole some

of its thunder 

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