Hollywood Babble On & On #354: Shutter Island Shuffled

Paramount has moved moved Martin Scorsese's adaptation of Dennis Lehane's Shutter Island from its October release to February 2010.

Now the point of the October release was to catch the mature audience as well as leave it open to Academy voters in time for the nominations. Moving the film to February kind of puts it into the winter hinterlands. Paramount is saying that it's not a problem, because the recently expansion of Oscar nominations from five to ten opens the possibility of it still being remembered for the 2011 nominations.

But I think that's just window dressing. The main reason for the bump is the plain and simple fact is that Paramount just doesn't have the money to cover the $50-$60 million costs of releasing the movie. Paramount is blaming this shortfall on the recent plunge in DVD sales.

However, I think this whole thing is a case of Hollywood's business practices coming home to roost. The high cost of making movies, coupled with the studio's obsession with big "tent-pole" blockbusters, and the sheer dearth of quality in many of these movies are starting to affect day to day operations.

This isn't some shoe-string indie company struggling to survive, this is Paramount we're talking about, one of the oldest and biggest movie companies in the world. But the Weimar Republic style inflation affliction film production and marketing, is starting to price itself out of business.

If this isn't a warning, I don't know what is.

Hollywood Babble On & On #353: Special Avatar Preview

Welcome to the show folks, if you spent any time on-line today you've probably heard that they released the trailer for James Cameron's Avatar.

Or at least they tried to release the trailer. So far the only version I've been able to see was a French version, sans any real dialogue, and while some complained that the blue alien critters still looks all CGI, I thought everyone looked like they were CGI, even the human actors.

I don't want to trash James Cameron, during the 1980s and 1990s he was one of my few living film-making idols. Terminator, Aliens, T2: Judgment Day, and True Lies, set a standard for action adventure storytelling. Now I couldn't bring myself to see Titanic, because the whole tween Leomania, and that goddamn Celine Dion song turned me off that movie, but I was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt, and was actually glad for all the success it had.

But I'm really worried about Avatar, he spent too long waiting for technology to catch up to his ego, and I fear it's made him a lazy writer. You already know of my suspicions that the film will be Dances With Wolves in outer space. The preview and publicity stills don't inspire much confidence either, and I'm not talking about the often malfunctioning English language trailer. I'm talking about the creeping cliches...

1. Crippled bitter veteran lingering in a redneck bar while white trash play pool and no doubt some country music plays on the jukebox.
CHECK.

2. Hard-ass (he's got scars to prove it) commander who is probably going to turn out to be a nut.
CHECK.

3. The tough yet sensitive chick who won't let her sensitivity ruin her butt-kicking.
CHECK.

4. The oily bureaucrat/middle-management businessman who represents the sinister military/industrial complex who wears a tie half a dozen light years from Earth.
CHECK.

5. The mature and intelligent doctor/scientist who acts as the voice of reason and cultural sensitivity.
CHECK.

I hope I'm wrong, I really do, but when it comes to Hollywood, I rarely turn out to be wrong, which is actually kind of sad.

Anyway, we can always hope.

Hollywood Babble On & On #352: Money Movies & Madness

Welcome to the show folks...

If you're a regular reader of this blog then you've probably heard that the Halcyon Company, who made Terminator: Salvation, have filed for bankruptcy, because they owe everyone involved with the film and their brother a truckload of money, and are currently embroiled in a lawsuit with the film's financial backers Pacificor which could cost the company ownership of the Terminator franchise.

Now Terminator: Salvation made around $370 million worldwide at the box-office.

Think about that for a second, I'll wait.

...

...

...

Okay, did you think about that little tidbit of news and the cognitive dissonance associated with it?

Good, but I will rant about it anyway.

There was a time when if your company's film made $400 million you'd be dancing on the street. You'd be a big time blockbuster success story, and the profits would be so big, you'd actually pay people at least some of their back-end deal.

There was even a time when making $100 million was considered a blockbuster success. In fact, the original Terminator made only around $78 million, and was considered a smash.

Nowadays you can make $100 million, even $400 million, and guess what, you're in bankruptcy court, people aren't getting paid, and reports say that you're in the hole by $50 million.

What the hell happened?

I mean $78 million was pretty good for The Terminator, in fact, it was excellent, so why isn't $370 million not good enough for the prequel?

Well, it starts with the simple fact that The Terminator cost $6.5 million to make and Terminator: Salvation cost over $200 million to make. The first Terminator was a comparatively small film, with just a handful of characters, and modestly conceived but well constructed action set-pieces. Terminator: Salvation was an attempt at an epic, with everything done on an epic scale that would dwarf the first film.

However, if you went simply by the rates of inflation in the 20+ years between films it still shouldn't have cost over $200 million to make even with its grander ambitions.

You see, it's not inflation that's killing Hollywood, it's complication.

Everything is complicated, raising money is complicated, spending the money is complicated, and earning back the money is even more complicated.

Why is it so complicated?

Well the complicating started because studios and producers didn't like having to share the profits with the people who actually make the film, and started making every damn thing involve 50 pages of legalese. Because with complications come opportunities to screw people out of their money.

Feeling screwed, people started demanding more up front, and more from the back end. Prices started to go up, way up, beyond the rates of inflation, and that's just production. Prints and advertising rates also skyrocketed, especially after the "synergy" supposedly created by having all the media companies merge into mega-conglomerates.

Unable to pay for making films on their own, studios and production companies need outside investors. But to find those investors you need to sign on with specialist deal-makers, adding another mouth to feed, and you need to constantly find new investors, because a lot of studios can't maintain healthy relationships with investors (for obvious reasons).

Things just keep getting more expensive, and even though technology has made the means of making a professional quality movie a hell of a lot cheaper, the actual costs of making and releasing a movie have gone up so far that a $370 million box-office take isn't even enough to break even.

It's pretty sad when you think about it.

Hollywood Babble On & On #351: Flogging a Dead Horse & Possibly Raising The Dead

Welcome to the show folks, here are a few quick thoughts to fill that empty void in your life that only my griping about business can do.

WHY NOLAN ESCAPED THE PRISONER

Director Christopher Nolan has dropped his plans for a big screen adaptation of Patrick McGoohan's mind-bending series The Prisoner. Some say it's because he is making room for a third Batman movie, but I think this paragraph from the report shows the real reason:

Nolan's departure has thrown The Prisoner into jeopardy - producer Barry Mendel admits they might not get the green light for the project until movie executives have gauged the success of the new TV version, which stars Ian MCKellen and Jim Caviezel and is set to air later this year (09).

I think he took a look at the project, and saw what happened to the Terminator franchise and didn't want that happening to him. In case you don't recall, Halcyon Productions had a Terminator TV series, and movie, and not to say that they underperformed, but Halcyon did just file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

Do you see my point?

When people watch a franchise property they invest themselves emotionally in the characters and their situations. However, if you were to ... Oh, perhaps, put out sequels and a TV series that tell you that all the suffering the characters went through in the first installments were all for nothing, because some studio suit thinks they can boost their bonus. Why bother getting excited about how a show or movie series ends, some executive is going to piss all over it and expect you to shell out to see it all over again because it has a familiar title.

Hell, Universal is reportedly getting Bryan Singer to reboot Battlestar Galactica. So all you BSG fans out there can just forget all you put into the ending of the series's last reboot (which was mere months ago), because this movie is going to be the definitive version.

All that will do is piss off fans, and judging by the domestic under-performance of T:S, and the cancellation of the series those pissed off fans will stay away.

I think Nolan didn't want to get caught in that kind of trap, and the sort of nasty chatter such boondoggles entail.

PROJECT SMITH IN FULL SWING?

Sharon Waxman over at The Wrap is convinced that the honchos at Relativity Media are planning to take over MGM. Her proof is a document called "Project Smith." Project Smith details the purchasing of MGM's considerable debt to where they can get enough together to force a takeover of the company, by trading the debt for ownership. And guess what, Relativity's financial backers have started buying up MGM debt again.

Now I've talked before how Project Smith could have just been a trial balloon, and that the backers of Relativity could be buying up the debt to make a quick buck. However, there have been some things that are making people think that they are going for a full takeover.

1. Relativity's pre-existing relationship with Universal Pictures (via Rogue Pictures) isn't all that hot, mostly because Universal isn't all that hot and seems to be operating under some sort of gypsy hex.

2. The prices for the debt are pretty tempting for someone looking for a takeover bid. I'm talking 50¢ for every $1 in debt. Which is a pretty good price because...

3. MGM has over 4,000 titles in their library. Many of them perennial sellers like the Bond movies, and other classics. It also has a domestic distribution system, as well as some valuable TV assets. What it doesn't have is the capital to make new product and properly market the product they have.

So, with all the shuffling going on, there might be a takeover in the offing. We can only watch and see if the venerable lion will roar once again.

Hollywood Babble On & on #350: Do The MGM Shuffle

Welcome to the show folks...

The borderline moribund studio MGM has announced a major shake-up of its management. CEO Harry Sloan has been promoted out of the CEO position, though he will remain as the company's Chairman of the Bored Board. In his place will be worldwide movie chief Mary Parent, CFO Bedi Singh, and vice-chairman/ "restructuring expert" Stephen F. Cooper to hopefully bring the studio's finances into some sort of coherent shape.

And damn, do they need those finances reshaped. The company's $3.7 billion debt has hampered it from making a dent in the movie market despite its massive library and the revenue it brings in, it's just barely able to keep creditors paid off and the company afloat. And while their upcoming movie slate has some promise, I fear their performance may be hurt by the sheer dead weight of the MGM brand.

I would like to see MGM rebound, because I think a healthy, competitive film business is vital to our cultural survival, so I'm going to wishing them luck on this potentially impossible task.

Hollywood Babble On & On #349: Some News Bits

Welcome to the show folks, here are a few takes on recent movie-biz news.

DREAMWORKS DREAMS OF INDIA COME TRUE:

Dreamworks has finalized their deal for financing from India's Reliance BIG media, and distribution via Disney's Touchstone Pictures.

This looks like a good deal for everyone. There's some real cooperation between Bollywood and Hollywood, and I like cooperation, Disney gets some product for their borderline moribund Touchstone Pictures label, and if things work out they could both stand to make some good money.

I just hope they follow some simple advice:

For Hollywood:

1. Keep things simple. Their vagaries of international finance complicates things enough as it is. This deal does not need Hollywood bookkeeping making it worse.

2. Remember that Bollywood is bigger than Westerners like us can ever comprehend. It has a built in billion+ audience in India alone, as well as millions of other fans worldwide. While folks like I may jest about the film's simple stories and spontaneous musical numbers, the people behind them are not rubes. They are sophisticated business people who have managed to build a powerful industry in a country with a myriad of hindrances to a successful enterprise, from massive poverty, to bureaucratic meddling. Don't let your Hollywood ego drive a wedge between you.

For Bollywood:

1. I think the best advice I can give comes from some Cold War nuclear arms reduction treaty negotiations. Trust, but verify. Get your own accountants looking in on things.

2. Put some of those stunning Bollywood actresses in Dreamworks movies. If only for me.

HALCYON RAISES HELL

Independent producer Halcyon, the folks behind the attempted revival of The Terminator franchise are suing the hedge fund Pacificor for a variety of financial sins both mortal and venal over the financing of Terminator: Salvation. They are also accusing the man who helped broker the deal of pretending to be Halcyon's agent when he was, they allege, secretly working for Pacificor.

Now do you see why I keep demanding simplicity in film financing. The more complications, the more lawsuits. It's that simple.

BANDSLAM SLAMMED AT BOX OFFICE

Summit, the independent distributor of such hits like Twilight, recently got their ass handed to them on a plate with the release, and crashing of their movie Bandslam.

Now Nikki Finke received a message from someone claiming to be an "insider" at Summit, claiming stubbornness at a high level at the company made them wrongly sell the pic as a High School Musical rip-off when it was more of a John Hughes teen drama, with music.

And despite some people disagreeing with the veracity of the e-mail, you really can't buck the accuracy. The film scored an overall 80%+ at Rotten Tomatoes, and almost 90% with the top critics. That's pretty impressive, and should have done way better than the ass end of the Top 10, with a per-screen average beaten by my home movies of my trip to the hardware store. (Which Roger Ebert declared: "A slapstick masterpiece.")

The film's performance shows an egregious failure at Summit, and puts the continued success of the Twilight franchise into question. I mean, the fury of the Twilight fans can only burn so hot for so long, when it starts to dim, you need a slick and professional marketing campaign that knows the audience to keep the franchise going until the finish line.

Maybe a couple of hot Bollywood starlets could liven it all up?

Damn I got a one track mind.

Hollywood Babble On & On #348: More Whys?

Welcome to the show, I have a few questions, I while I think I know the answers, I'd like to know what you, all two of my readers, think.

1. WHY HARVEY WHY?

Harvey Weinstein made a rather telling statement to a New York Times reporter that was picked up by The Wrap's Sharon Waxman. It was...

“In the end, I realized that I’m not a good C.E.O., I’m not a good manager.”

Now if I was doing the interview I couldn't resist replying to that statement with a "No shit Sherlock!" but I'm not working for the New York Times, and will probably never work for them, because I would say something like that to someone who was probably a personal friend of the publisher.

Now Waxman raises some questions that the New York Times didn't raise about the state of the The Weinstein Co., and you can read her piece for them, but I have my own question.

Why?

Why move from the low budget/high quality films to the big budget/questionable quality films that will no doubt sink TWC under red ink?

Why did you think that buying films at Sundance because of their festival buzz, and then sitting on them, sometimes for years, until that buzz died completely, and then dump them was not going to eventually hurt your company?

Why invest so much money that you won't admit exactly how much into a "social network site for millionaires," when the sort of Type-A millionaire types you're thinking about are way too busy for social networking? I mean it would basically turn into a bunch of their assistants talking shit behind their boss' back. Why?

Why invest in a myriad other ventures, from fashion to publishing that were so alien to your experience as a movie producer?

I have one answer to all those questions, and it's the word EGO.

What do you think?

2. WHY DOES MEGAN FOX LEAVE ME COLD?

Now I'm a man who appreciates a beautiful woman. I've found a variety of women highly attractive, and I think my fantasy file can be described as diverse to say the least.

So why do I not find Megan Fox in the least bit attractive?

According to the media she's the hottest thing on the planet that doesn't involve the processing of metals, yet the most interest I can work up is a weak "Feh." I mean she has all the "parts" of what Hollywood tells me are attractive, yet the whole seems to leave me cold.

It could be the tattoos, I'm a tad old fashioned in the belief that women shouldn't put on anything that could result in scar tissue if removed. But I think there's more too it.

In almost every picture of her, which appear 10 times daily on any website with the slightest interest in showbiz, she's posing with her back arched slightly, her eyes narrowed, her lips parted slightly, and her tongue rolling around her mouth like we've just walked in on her mid-coitus when in fact, she's standing in line outside a theater for yet another premier.

Then there's her Angelina-lite image, skipping the vampirism and adopted children, and the almost constant media speculating on her sex life, usually spurred by some comment she made about her sex life when asked a question about her shoes.

I guess it boils down to her trying too damn hard. She comes across as a pose not a person, and that's not sexy to me.

What do you think?

3. DC- DOLING CASH

The heirs to the co-creator of Superman have won control of the rights to Superman's name, basic appearance, and some of his powers, while DC comics has kept custody of Lex Luthor, kryptonite, and Jimmy Olsen.

This comes after decades where DC and its parent company Time-Warner used everything in their considerable power to crush the creators of their flagship character. I mean both Jerry Siegel and co-creator Joe Shuster ended up living in poverty, while Superman raked in hundreds of millions over the years, only getting a small pension from Warners when shamed into it before the opening of Superman: The Movie.

Now I can understand, but not condone, the original owners of National Publications (which later became DC) putting the screws to Siegel and Schuster. Most early comic book publishers operated like fly-by-night operators, desperately scrambling to avoid paying anyone anything because they were expecting to declare the company bankrupt at any minute and wanted to hold onto as much money as they could for themselves.

So why did Warners keep on doing it for decades after.

I know Siegel and Schuster must have had some overwhelmed lawyers for accepting some of the settlements they were given over the years, but why did Warner force those shitty deals down their throats when a little diplomacy, and a decent cut, could have made everyone happy, and make the heirs more amenable to letting Warner/DC keep the copyright?

Right now the character could easily end up in a sort of creative limbo. DC unable to use their flagship character, and the heirs unable to use it in any coherent and recognizable form with anyone else. So why did Warners let it get this far?

Do you know what I think?

I think it's because most media companies are run like fly-by-night operations desperately scrambling to avoid paying anyone anything because it might dock some spare change off their bonus, and since they're usually expecting to be fired at any moment, treat every bonus as their last big jackpot.

That's my theory.

What do you think?

Hollywood Babble On & On #347: Why?

Welcome to the show folks, right now I have a question that I need answering.

WHY DO I SMELL TURKEY EVERY TIME I THINK ABOUT AVATAR?

Here's what I think are the reasons why I think James Cameron's Avatar is going to flop:

1. The plot isn't exactly original, it's basically Dances With Wolves in Space. American Soldier goes to a civilization that seems primitive and alien to him, learns that their simple ways are superior, and he turns against the evil forces of western industrial civilization that threatens to destroy them.

Now this plot hinges on certain conceits:

• Centuries into the future humanity hasn't learned how to handle their own pollution even though they appear to have mastered interstellar travel.
• Centuries into the future humanity hasn't learned how to trade with alien cultures, or in Cameron's view, trade in itself has become a fundamental evil.
• That these minerals couldn't be found someplace else in the galaxy, or figured out a way to get them that won't result in an expensive war.
  
• That the somewhat condescending notion of the "noble savage," won't rob the Na'vi characters of any traits that the audience can honestly relate to, and make them caricatures of angelic primitives yammering a lot of claptrap about a lifestyle that the filmmaker himself wouldn't dare live without the ability to return to his mansion at a moment's notice.
  

2. James Cameron hasn't made a film in over a decade. His excuse is that technology hadn't caught up with his wondrous artistic vision. That set my bullshit detector into the red-zone. Yes, Titanic was huge, in fact, it was titanic, and it appears to have unleashed the beast of self-indulgence. We've had ten years of anticipation for him to do something, something that he promises to be so huge, he had to wait 10 years for technology to catch up with him.

That gives me the impression he's trapped in the notion that whatever he does, he must top Titanic in size, scope, and most of all importance.

There's the rub, but it comes with no tug. The moment you start aiming for importance before story, the story will suffer, and that will make the audience suffer. You have to let the importance emerge organically from the story, or you'll end up making some tedious pretentious crap. It happens to a lot of Oscar winners, because the moment they win one, all they can think about, is winning another one.

Years ago I wrote an article, sadly it appears lost, where I advised James Cameron to just get back on the horse and make something completely trivial. A light-hearted action movie, or comedy, something on a small scale, anything really, to break the cycle of self-importance, and remind him that film is supposed to be entertaining. And if people compared it unfavorably to Titanic, he should tell them to go kiss his ass, he's James Cameron, he made over $100 million on Titanic, and can do whatever the hell he wants.

But he didn't listen to my advice, and now I fear it's going to drop a bigger bomb than the Enola Gay*.

3. The budget is reportedly over $300 million. Or to be more exact: Three fucking hundred fucking million fucking dollars!!! It would have to be as big as The Dark Knight just to break even once you bring in prints and marketing.

Now that's what I think, I could be wrong, I mean there's a first time for everything, and I want to hear what you think.

Will Avatar sink or swim?

*A Dennis Miller Style Reference Level 2 Alert.

Saturday Silliness Cinema: Yo Joe!

Welcome to the show, it's time for my usual Saturday break from griping about business to have a wee bit of a laugh.

The movie version of GI Joe has dropped 68% in ticket sales since it's grand opening weekend, beaten by newcomer District 9. If you go by Hollywood math, you have to assume that the film would need to pull double its production budget of $175 million to make a profit (that's to cover prints, advertising, etc.) and so far it's hit around $150 million worldwide.

Paramount might end up taking a bit of a bath on this one.

So, here's a video that shows the movie version they should have made:

The Ballad of G.I. Joe from Olivia Wilde

Hollywood Babble On & On #346: Miscellaneous Money, Movie, Media Musings

Welcome to the show folks, here are a few little musings:

1. NETWORKS VS NIELSENS

Here's the scoop from Nikki Finke. The companies behind the top TV networks are banding together to create their own TV ratings monitor to compete with the Nielsen TV ratings monopoly. The big media boys claim that it's a necessary move because Nielsen's flawed TV ratings collection system is under-reporting the real numbers, and exacerbating the viewer flight from the mainstream networks.

Okay, let's say that the big media boys are right and that Nielsen's ratings system is flawed, something that a lot of people seem to agree with, and the fact that Nielsen is a big lumbering monopoly seems to provide evidence for that claim. I also love seeing companies compete.

But, and this is a big but, I am really suspicious of the major network's claim that they can handle this job objectively.

They live and die by ratings, and the temptation to fudge their results is just too great. Like it or not, Nielsen may be a monopoly, it may be inaccurate, but at least it's independent.

Which brings me to what I think is the major question here:

Where are the advertisers?

They need to have accurate numbers and demographics to judge how effective shows are at reaching their target audience, and if Nielsen isn't as accurate as it should be the solution is simple.

The big ad agencies know market research, so why don't they get together, start their own ratings measurement company, or, better yet, start several companies, with new methods, and more detailed metrics than Nielsen, to either light a fire under the old guard with some good old fashioned competition, or to pool their numbers together to create something hopefully more accurate.

That's my opinion, though I do tend to be right, about everything.

2. WHY G.I.?

Patrick Goldstein, the blogger at the Los Angeles Times Big Picture Blog asked why did so many people go to see GI Joe on its opening weekend despite reports of its epic crappiness.

The theories are diverse, from the film as sensory escape, to Sienna Miller in a tight leather catsuit. But I think there's a little something else to it.

Take a look at recent movies that feature the US Military.

How many of them cast the US Military personnel as unquestioned heroes?

Outside of the Transformers flicks, not many. In fact since the start of the Iraq War, Hollywood's created their own sub-genre of anti-war films that portray US military personnel as either intellectually deficient victims of the cruel machinations of Halliburton and their political puppets, or psychopathic rapists who commit atrocities with wild abandon. Even films that try to be either evenhanded, or treat the subject from a purely action-adventure standpoint, can't resist making some sort of statement against the soldiers and/or their mission.

Americans like their soldiers, because their soldiers are their fellow Americans. They like to see them in a positive light.

Now I fear that GI Joe will not have the legs it needs to make a profit from it's $175 million production budget, once you include prints and advertising. That's because a lot of folks are complaining that they de-Americanized GI Joe, to make them some sort of UN force.

Flyover country might be fooled on the opening weekend, but they're not going to go back if they feel the film lacks the testicular fortitude to wave the flag a little. I'm expecting District 9 to best GI Joe this weekend.

3. ST. ELMO'S FART

ABC has announced that they intend to turn the 1980s ensemble movie St. Elmo's Fire into a television series.

The series will follow a group of recent college grads making their way in the real world, in an attempt to replace the long departed Friends in the hearts of viewers.

Now here's where things get screwy.

ABC is paying money, to redo an 80s movie, in order to win the audience from a 90s sitcom.

Think about that for a second.

Why didn't they just do a show about college grads and make no claim to the movie? I doubt enough people remember the film to make the connection, or put any real value in the title.

They're so scared of anything new, they will buy anything old, no matter what.

It's officially insanity.