D&D Movie/TV D&D Movie Hit or Flop?

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

if it breaks even in BO alone, then I am not sure why the rest matters

Because the "double its costs" thing is a benchmark, not a law of physics.

And the Princess Bride had an extremely extended pre-release period where they did more than the usual amount of testing and tossed out multiple whole marketing campaigns. The studio spent much more than usual marketing budget on what should have been a mid-budget movie.

 

[Bedrockgames]

Kevin Costner's "Waterworld" in 1995 was one of the worst bombs in the cinematographic industry. Wikipedia says the budget was 172-175M$, but the box-office is 264,2M$.

You get to see Dennis Hopper smoke a cigar on a Jet Ski but that's about all I can say in defense of Waterworld

 

[mamba]

Because the "double its costs" thing is a benchmark, not a law of physics.

And the Princess Bride had an extremely extended pre-release period where they did more than the usual amount of testing and tossed out multiple whole marketing campaigns. The studio spent much more than usual marketing budget on what should have been a mid-budget movie.

this has been cleared up, it had essentially no international release, was not aware of that and assumed it would have made roughly the same there, at which point marketing would have been covered as well

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

this has been cleared up, it had essentially no international release, was not aware of that and assumed it would have made roughly the same there, at which point marketing would have been covered as well

Someone should tell Cary Elwes he and Rob Reiner don't know what they're talking about, then.

 

[mamba]

Someone should tell Cary Elwes he and Rob Reiner don't know what they're talking about, then.

I have no idea what you are referring to, but not having an international release on its own obviously affects the box office numbers and whether it breaks even at the box office. That seems hardly controversial.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I have no idea what you are referring to

Cary Elwes is one of the leads of the Princess Bride and Rob Reiner is the director.

Cary Elwes, as I mentioned previously, has written about this in his memoir of the film, As You Wish.

Both he and Reiner have repeatedly spoken openly about how the studio had no idea what was going on.

The studio apparently prepared multiple marketing campaigns that they scrapped, since the Princess Bride isn't a conventional action movie, it's not a romcom, it's not a sword and sorcery adventure. They wanted to market it like a zany Mel Brooks comedy at one point before abandoning that plan -- and never even released a trailer for the movie during the original theatrical run.

This drove up post-production costs without generating any additional return on the investment.

but not having an international release on its own obviously affects the box office numbers and whether it breaks even at the box office. That seems hardly controversial

Do you understand why it didn't have an international release?

I get that you've all discovered a simple mathematical formula and are determined that it's the secret to understanding Hollywood, but it's really not that simple.

 

[mamba]

I get that you've all discovered a simple mathematical formula and are determined that it's the secret to understanding Hollywood, but it's really not that simple.

I get that it is a ballpark estimate, thank you very much. But unless you have better info on the movie’s cost and actual marketing budget, plus the actual share of the ticket price the studio gets this is the best we can do, and there is a reason why the formula is that and not e.g. 1 x cost or 5 x cost.

Where I was off mostly was assuming it had an international release. If they spent too much on marketing on top of that, so be it.

I am not going to study every director biography and look up all other available data to get to as precise a budget as I possibly can for a post in a forum. If you want to do that, knock yourself out. I am ok with acknowledging when my estimate turns out to be wrong based on data I did not have when I made it

 

[bedir than]

And it's back in the top 4.

This weekend will be interesting. The two horror-ish movies are basically done. They still have wide release, but their per theater has cratered.

Mario will be #1.

Then there's a swath of new stuff.

 

[Clint_L]

So, my point in raising Princess Bride is, aside from the fact that many critics have compared it to HaT (I don't really see it, except maybe that it is less serious fantasy), it demonstrates that a good film can make a lot more money over time than a mediocre film that has a much higher initial run at the box office.

HaT is a very good film, and one that I suspect will remain popular for many years. I think it will inevitably be a very profitable film when we are able to look at the big picture.

 

[CommodoreKong]

Kevin Costner's "Waterworld" in 1995 was one of the worst bombs in the cinematographic industry. Wikipedia says the budget was 172-175M$, but the box-office is 264,2M$.

Even the 2000 D&D movie being a failure had got two sequels.

We shouldn't be too hard until one year after the release to safe if they have earned enough money.

The reason the 2000s D&D movie got cheap direct to DVD sequels was so the guy TSR sold the rights to could keep the rights. Having to make a movie within X years to keep the rights was a very common contract clause when companies sold the film rights to their IPs.

Foe example it's why the Roger Corman Fantastic 4 movie was made (and probably Fan4tastic as well before Disney bought Fox). It's also why there's Spider-man movies every few years, Sony doesn't want the film rights to revert back to Disney.

We have no idea if the current D&D contract with Paramount has those kind of provisions or if they do if Paramount cares enough to want to keep the rights.