John Carter

Originally posted by Esau Cairn
Regardless of disappointments & bombs...I think you're missing my point regarding marketing.

You want more examples?

Tobe Hooper's Invaders From Mars remake in 1986. Tanked.
My Favourite Martian in 1998. Big time fizzle job.

After the Mars Needs Moms fiasco for Disney last year, I can perfectly understand them being hesitant about having Mars in the title. It looks like a jinx; people had a perception about Mars these days that it isn't to be taken seriously. That's why they were in a quandary about marketing.

(Seriously - I can't believe you listed Mars Needs Moms with a straight face, as an example of Mars sells to the public.)

I refused to see Mars needs Moms because I though the idea was stupid 😛

Originally posted by Newjak
I refused to see Mars needs Moms because I though the idea was stupid 😛

It was a children's book, and perhaps it could have worked for the right audience, on a budget. Not as a motion-capture animation extravaganza. North American audiences still haven't embraced that tech as a substitute for live action or really well done CG animation. Tintin made money, but almost all of it was overseas.

Originally posted by roughrider
It was a children's book, and perhaps it could have worked for the right audience, on a budget. Not as a motion-capture animation extravaganza. North American audiences still haven't embraced that tech as a substitute for live action or really well done CG animation. Tintin made money, but almost all of it was overseas.

Originally posted by Newjak
Yeah what do you mean by it being a substitute for CG animation? I thought that is what it was or did I miss something?

That movie was motion capture animation, which has actors wearing special suits to record all their movements. We first saw this in films like The Polar Express, then Beowulf, A Christmas Carol, then Tintin and MNM in the last year. It's an uncomfortable hybrid, trying to have actors in animation do just what they do in live action. It's what they call the 'Uncanny Valley' effect in animation. CG works best to do characters almost impossible to do properly in live action. CG animation works best in the caricature realm, which PIXAR and Dreamworks et al. do. But the style seen in MNM and the other films has been rejected by North American audiences, which is why Robert Zemeckis animation company has finally shut down.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uncanny_valley

One of the biggest bombs ever?

Unfortunate as it was a decent movie.

That's so yesterday, bro.

Originally posted by ares834
One of the biggest bombs ever?

Unfortunate as it was a decent movie.

"It's not clear how much box office revenue Disney needed to break even on "John Carter," but one estimate pegged it around $600 million worldwide. That's a figure reached by fewer than 65 movies ever, Dergarabedian said."

See, what the f*ck? Why did they make the budget so goddamn huge? I blame Disney... cuz that's retarded from the get-go. You take a story that barely anyone has heard of (except rare Sci-Fi/classic literature enthusiasts) and give it an astronomical budget and expect it to do well? That's insane. F*ck you, Disney. You suck in so many ways...

😠

Everyone wants that Avatar magic. Make a movie, poor on the special fx, make a billion dollars.

The problem is that there is no lone quantifiable reason for why avatar was so popular. The movie itself was just barely above average, its marketing was good but not amazing , and the director is famous, but hardly more famous than steven spielberg or other notable directors. So why did it do so well? No one knows, and as a result everyone fails to "recapture the magic".

I assume it was because it was one of the first 3D movies.

Originally posted by roughrider

(Seriously - I can't believe you listed Mars Needs Moms with a straight face, as an example of Mars sells to the public.) [/B]

I didn't think much of the film but my 5 yr old son loves the movie.
He's chosen the movie about 3 times now every time I take him to the video shop to rent something out.

He always gets teary-eyed when the kid disses his mom in the beginning & then makes up in the end.

Originally posted by RE: Blaxican
Everyone wants that Avatar magic. Make a movie, poor on the special fx, make a billion dollars.

The problem is that there is no lone quantifiable reason for why avatar was so popular. The movie itself was just barely above average, its marketing was good but not amazing , and the director is famous, but hardly more famous than steven spielberg or other notable directors. So why did it do so well? No one knows, and as a result everyone fails to "recapture the magic".

It was because it was simplistic, pretty to look at, and touchy feely. I even agree with the propaganda it was spreading, but I still didn't like it. But I'll admit that I was entertained. It just left me with a sour taste in my mouth, nothing to really enjoy afterwards, and I don't really have any desire to see it again.

By contrast: John Carter was confusing (not simplistic), not quite as pretty to look at per se (although still visually impressive), and not as touchy feely. I actually wish it was more touchy feely. There really didn't seem like there was enough genuine emotion.. but I still have to see how it plays again...

Originally posted by Esau Cairn
He always gets teary-eyed when the kid disses his mom in the beginning & then makes up in the end.

Aww... 😛

It has never been made before, but it's influence is everywhere in science fiction and fantasy, from writers like Robert E. Howard and Michael Moorcock to films like Avatar, which borrowed heavily from John Carter.

Originally posted by ares834
One of the biggest bombs ever?

Unfortunate as it was a decent movie.

🙄

That story has been printed elsewhere. One person who responded to it said it best:

'...Are they not aware John Carter has been the Number One Film IN THE WORLD for two straight weekends?'
The World - that place outside of the USA? 😛

To write such articles after the first ten days is very shortsighted. By the end of this week, it will have taken as much at the box office in two weeks then Green Lantern (a film with a similar budget) earned in it's entire run last summer.

It's too bad it's been overlooked right now; hopefully it will get re-assed more favourably in North America in time. But when it's strong box office legs overseas gets it near the break even point - with Blu-ray & DVD to follow - I hope we see printed retractions from these bloggers creating stories without all the facts, who wrote this film off too early. bangin

I just came back from seeing it again. The theatre was pretty full, and there was applause at the end.

Who cares if no one's heard of it, it's Sci-Fi, the marketing bombed, ultimately.

Should have given it a fancier name, for starters.

I thought it was ok. I like movies like this in general but thought it was average overall. I didn't expect much nor did I get much.

Originally posted by Patient_Leech
See, what the f*ck? Why did they make the budget so goddamn huge? I blame Disney... cuz that's retarded from the get-go. You take a story that barely anyone has heard of (except rare Sci-Fi/classic literature enthusiasts) and give it an astronomical budget and expect it to do well? That's insane. F*ck you, Disney. You suck in so many ways...

😠

Well, the budget was in the same territory as Avatar's, and you have to think the money and lengthy post production for both films was needed; the render time for CG to make the Na'vi and the Tharks as photo-realistic as the normal actors.

One interesting difference: unlike the Gungans in Star Wars, the Na'vi and Tharks have fairly humanoid faces. How much budget money & time does it take to craft an actor's facial movements into their CGI faces? Likely much more.

Could someone like George Lucas have done it for less money? Maybe; he is known for stretching a dollar very far (while James Cameron is well know for far exceeding his budgets), but also has the advantage of owning all his own post facilities, so his budget money moves around in his pockets. He would find other ways.

But Andrew Stanton's previous film (WALL-E) had a $200 million dollar budget - for a very risky story with little dialogue, and the stars were all machine - and the risk paid off handsomely. So I'd like to think he was in control, despite the learning curve of directing in live action.

Originally posted by roughrider
🙄

That story has been printed elsewhere. One person who responded to it said it best:

'...Are they not aware John Carter has been the Number One Film IN THE WORLD for two straight weekends?'
The World - that place outside of the USA? 😛

They were talking about how much it gorssed from a worldwide persepctive though, 186 million. Aslo the production studios get a vastly smaller percanatage from overseas tickets due to taxes and tarrifs.

To write such articles after the first ten days is very shortsighted. By the end of this week, it will have taken as much at the box office in two weeks then Green Lantern (a film with a similar budget) earned in it's entire run last summer.

Green Lantern supposedly cost 200 million to make... John Carter is rumored to cost 350 million. (I'm factoring in marketing for both) Furthermore, the vast majority of the money a film pulls in is within the first couple of weeks plus the percantage they get drops as the weeks pass by.

Another thing that's strange about the marketing...Disney did not license any toy merchandise for John Carter.

They would've got some residual profit back & would've made it clear in the minds of children & parents alike that it was a family orientated film.

Originally posted by ares834
They were talking about how much it gorssed from a worldwide persepctive though, 186 million. Aslo the production studios get a vastly smaller percanatage from overseas tickets due to taxes and tarrifs.

Green Lantern supposedly cost 200 million to make... John Carter is rumored to cost 350 million. (I'm factoring in marketing for both) Furthermore, the vast majority of the money a film pulls in is within the first couple of weeks plus the percantage they get drops as the weeks pass by.

They include the fact it's performing strongly overseas in the small print, away from the big headlines calling it a huge bomb.

When people were jumping all over Green Lantern last summer, they were estimating the budget was between $250-350 million; just the kind of speculation when people feel like guessing, throwing in the advertising budget etc. So we don't know, really. they are in the same kind of print frenzy and speculation over this right now.

And we don't know how or when studios slide away from the standard formula of 50% of the grosses come back to them; only that is the standard agreement.

True bombs are the ones known for killing careers and studios, like:

Heaven's Gate (1980) - started the death cycle for United Artists and wrecked Michael Cimino's directing career

Howard The Duck (1986) - pretty much ended the writing/directing careers of Willard Huyck & Gloria Katz

The Postman (1997) - strike three for Kevin Costner's career, after Wyatt Earp and Waterworld. He hasn't been an A-lister who could open a picture since.

Titan A.E. (2000) - ended Don Bluth's feature career and made Fox shut down their animation studio.

Mars Needs Moms (2011) - the motion capture animation studio owned by Robert Zemeckis closed it's doors for good, after that bomb came out.

Interestingly, Cleopatra in the early 1960's was a hugely infamous flop, but everyone's career went on unscathed by it. And while Green Lantern lost a huge amount of money, I'm betting Warner Bros. will try again with it somewhere down the road. And I think they know the John Carter mythos has too much rich history to not get adapted again. If not by Disney, then by someone else, buying the rights.