MOVIES WITH RIDICULOUSLY HIGH BUDGETS?

[TombRaider]

Which movies made you think... what were they thinking, when it comes to the budget??

 

This flop rom com comes to mind

How Do You Know   Domestic Total Gross: $30,212,620 Distributor: Sony / Columbia Release Date: December 17, 2010 Genre: Comedy / Drama Runtime: 1 hrs. 56 min. MPAA Rating: PG-13 Production Budget: $120 million

[nick64]

John Carter, King Arthur, The Promise, and Geostorm immediately come to mind.

[TombRaider]

12 minutes ago, nick64 said:

John Carter, King Arthur, The Promise, and Geostorm immediately come to mind.

well those 2 were meant to be blockbusters

[MovieGuyKyle17]

45 minutes ago, TombRaider said:

Which movies made you think... what were they thinking, when it comes to the budget??

 

This flop rom com comes to mind

How Do You Know   Domestic Total Gross: $30,212,620 Distributor: Sony / Columbia Release Date: December 17, 2010 Genre: Comedy / Drama Runtime: 1 hrs. 56 min. MPAA Rating: PG-13 Production Budget: $120 million

That budget made no sense. Also I actually was one person who somewhat enjoyed that movie. 

Edited November 6, 2018 by MovieGuyKyle17

[terrestrial]

No matter how much they made, first reaction was, wtf

 

PotC - all of them, but especially On Stranger Tides

 

Cleopatra (that one together with a few others was one reason way back to get interested into BO)

 

Spectre

 

Van Helsing (2004)

 

some animated ones

[Barnack]

3 hours ago, TombRaider said:

This flop rom com comes to mind

That category will be filled with Rom-com and comedy greenlight between 2004 and 2009, when the risk was really low and would look crazy today, but were relatively safe and sound business back then.

 

How do you know real net budget was a bit lower at 111m and was a production hell type of experience + huge salaries.

 

Fun with dick and Jane was over 123m at the time,

Takin of Pelham: 115.4 million

Don't mess with the Zohan: 102m

The other Guys: 98.5m

 

Matthew McConaughey Sahara had quite the (contested) high budget:

 

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-movie15apr15-story.html

 

They hired 10 writers in total and had an alleged production cost of over 210m in today dollars, the cost included paying bribe to local politicians to get the permissions to move rivers around and other really expensive decisions like that.

 

Stuff green lighted after the economy crisis + dvd bubble collapsing say after 2010, tend to be more strict budget wise, specially for stuff without franchise/sequel appeal.

[nick64]

4 hours ago, TombRaider said:

well those 2 were meant to be blockbusters

Regardless of the intention, no movie with such an unproven fanbase had any right having a budget of $175M...let alone the $300M JC had

[Barnack]

4 hours ago, nick64 said:

Regardless of the intention, no movie with such an unproven fanbase had any right having a budget of $175M...let alone the $300M JC had

Wasn't the budget exploded because the director try to make the movie using the Pixar way's (and Pixar/Lasseter was much stronger than Disney movie at Disney at the time) ?

 

That include for example doing iteration and redoing the movie instead of doing it in one go, costly but normal with computers, really costly in live action.

 

Has for a movie with an unproven fanbase not should not get a 175M budget, come-on now, what about Inception, 2012, Tangled, Titanic, World War Z, Pacific Rim, Brave, Wall-E, Edge of Tomorrow, Interstellar, Troy,  Armageddon,  etc...

 

There is a lot of scenario that fanless or small fanbase affair are worthy of a 175m budget in 2012 money.

[nick64]

3 hours ago, Barnack said:

 Has for a movie with an unproven fanbase not should not get a 175M budget, come-on now, what about Inception, 2012, Tangled, Titanic, World War Z, Pacific Rim, Brave, Wall-E, Edge of Tomorrow, Interstellar, Troy,  Armageddon,  etc...

 

There is a lot of scenario that fanless or small fanbase affair are worthy of a 175m budget in 2012 money.

Most of those had proven fanbases, just not in the traditional sense. Tangled, Brave, Wall-E are all Disney/Pixar, that’s not a risk. Armageddon, 2012, Troy, World War Z, Titanic, Inception, and Interstellar all had bankable directors and/or stars. I believe Pacific Rim and Edge of Tomorrow failed to breakeven (correct me if I’m wrong), so regardless of quality, they weren’t lucrative. In addition, most of these films had fresh ideas, so they also benefited from an interesting hook.

 

Guy Ritchie is not a bankable director. Charlie Hunnam is not a bankable star. King Arthur is not a bankable or fresh property. It’s simply bad business to put that much money into something so risky. I don’t know how Warner thought they could make that money back in 2017’s box office climate.

[Barnack]

If you look at the director, writers and producers of John Carter box office track record it is quite phenomenal, from Avatar, to Toy Story/Wall-E, Incredible, Finding Dory, Monster Inc, etc....

 

Saying no to the Pixar people was not easy (thus the giant over the budget), but can they're technics of filmmaking giant success and perfect track record transfert to live action and trying to do it in the space adventure action genre just after Avatar made 2.7 billion, sound crazier in hindsight than when the decision was made I am pretty certain.

 

For King Arthur, I can imagine WB could have been influenced by their Games of Thrones success and trying to do it on movies + possible for it to be an movie universe + being a free IP even if it is limited, giant pre-awareness, a good King Arthur movie would have big potential.

Edited November 7, 2018 by Barnack

[John Marston]

GI Joe: The Rise of Cobra - 175m

The 13th Warrior - 160m

Stuart Little -133m 

Stuart Little 2 - 120m 

Prince of Persia - 200m 

John Carter - 250m+

Wild Wild West - 170m (in 1999!) 

Lethal Weapon 4 - 140m in 1998! Seriously WTF

Rush Hour 3 - 140m 

Evan Almighty - 175m  lol

 

Edited November 14, 2018 by John Marston

[TombRaider]

I Still Know What You Did Last Summer   Domestic Total Gross: $40,002,112 Distributor: Sony / Columbia Release Date: November 13, 1998 Genre: Horror Runtime: 1 hrs. 40 min. MPAA Rating: R Production Budget: $65 million

 

 

LOL. Loved the movie but it was a mess! 65m...

[Barnack]

19 hours ago, John Marston said:

Lethal Weapon 4 - 140m in 1998! Seriously WTF

 

Apparently (I remember vaguely Shane Black talking about sequels issue of those days), salaries got a bit out of control.

 

Gibson got a rumored guaranteed 30M for example, that 46M in today dollar, today when Dwayne Johnson make deal with less than half of that it make the news.

 

It also was made with full overtime payment and rushed in a very short window:

https://www.denofgeek.com/us/movies/lethal-weapon/247889/the-ridiculously-fast-turnaround-time-of-lethal-weapon-4

 

Compared to a well oiled machine ultra efficient production like Spielberg was doing at the time with a Tom Hanks Saving Private Ryan, the difference look big.

 

[terrestrial]

On 11/14/2018 at 1:52 AM, John Marston said:

The 13th Warrior - 160m

That includes promotion

The original production budget was reported at $85m, the overshot (incl based on behind the scene squabble, they did also a lot of late re-shoots, new score,.... ) still every text mentioning $160m I read has incl promotion added

[The Panda]

On 11/6/2018 at 5:29 PM, nick64 said:

Regardless of the intention, no movie with such an unproven fanbase had any right having a budget of $175M...let alone the $300M JC had

You’re forgetting that Starpower used to be he equivalent of a franchise today.  Sequels, prequels and spinoffs are much more frequent now than they used to be

[Krissykins]

On 11/14/2018 at 8:32 PM, TombRaider said:

I Still Know What You Did Last Summer   Domestic Total Gross: $40,002,112 Distributor: Sony / Columbia Release Date: November 13, 1998 Genre: Horror Runtime: 1 hrs. 40 min. MPAA Rating: R Production Budget: $65 million

 

 

LOL. Loved the movie but it was a mess! 65m...

I’ve always thought that was a BOM mistake, IMDB when they had budgets had it at $25m

[nick64]

On 12/14/2018 at 8:10 PM, PANDA said:

You’re forgetting that Starpower used to be he equivalent of a franchise today.  Sequels, prequels and spinoffs are much more frequent now than they used to be

I’m not forgetting that. It’s very true, but I fail to see how starpower has anything to do with John Carter or King Arthur. Taylor Kitsch and Charlie Hunnam aren’t exactly big pulls.