How to crush LotR and SW Trilogies!

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

You sound like a studio suit. The truth is, such things can usually never be predicted in advance. Never. N-e-v-e-r.

What a bizarre assertion. Of course it can. That's how the studios pick when to release a film -- they have a very good idea, often in advance of the cameras even beginning to roll -- of roughly how much money a film will make.

It has been decades since anyone involved with the creation of a film was genuinely surprised with how much money it made. Off by a few percentage points, sure. Totally shocked? No.

And, while I appreciate there are people here with a near-religious fervor for Dragonlance, I find the notion that it's an obviously better story than Lord of the Rings to be a strange one, to put it mildly.

And "it'll do well if we sink $300 million into it" is the sort of caveat that makes discussing such things almost pointless. Give me $300 million and I could make a hit movie out of my grocery list.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I read them and thought they were decent books. I went to film school. I know how studio suits sound. They are not artists. They are about marketing and focus groups and money. And they are almost always wrong, in the positive or negative direction. Because no one can predict how well a movie will do.

They are wrong by a matter of a few percent. That's not wrong enough to matter for the purposes of this conversation.

How many times have you heard stories about authors who have shopped around books to hundreds of publishers, always told that it will never sell, only to finally publish it and find out it is a best seller?

A handful of times. And you know why those publishing houses are still in business? They're only wrong a handful of times.

It is the same sort of thing. You NEVER know in advance.

Nonsense. Come up with five movies made in the last 25 years that made 50 percent more or less than was expected and announced.

"Blockbuster" films that never had any predictions in public are films that the studios didn't expect to do well, but are putting out there for political reasons -- like Michael Bay will never do another picture with us if we send "The Island" direct to video.

 

[Ranger REG]

I liked the LotR trilogy, and SW was alright, but I got an idea seeing the DnD movie on the sci-fi chennel recently....

Want to really get DnD fans into the movie theatres and crush LotR and SW box office sales? I firmly believe they should make the original Dragonlance Trilogy into three movies. Deffinately have Tracy Hickman as a screen writer so the ending didn't get all fudged like -some- trilogies *cough*, or that there's not a resounding 'NOOOOOOOOooooooooooooooo!' when people see the films like has been said at the end of -other- trilogies *cough cough*.

Anyway, I think that would make for an awesome series of movies. Can you imagine seeing Raistlin in the third movie (Dragons of Spring Dawning) after he dons the black robes?

I can only dream.. *sigh*

FWIW, I am gleeful that Dragonlance trademark is not attached to the Dungeons & Dragons film right which Courtney Solomon possesses. I'd rather have someone else get the Dragonlance film right other than Mr. Solomon.

I agree with most of the posters here that I doubt it can dominate both LOTR and SW films in the box office. They have a very large fanbase and so does the Harry Potter franchise. Only a handful of non-roleplayers have heard of Dragonlance compared to the granddaddy of modern fantasy literary works of JRR Tolkiens. All we can hope for is that rakes in profit to warrant future DL films.

Oh, and please ... PLEASE ... let's not recycle LOTR cast, not even John-Rhys Davies for whom I hear is the #1 choice of actor when typecasting the iconic dwarven race. Use your head.

 

[xnosipjpqmhd]

Want to really get DnD fans into the movie theatres and crush LotR and SW box office sales? I firmly believe they should make the original Dragonlance Trilogy into three movies.

You accidentally put this in the General category instead of Humor.

...LOTR - many sections of the book are DREADFUL and basically unreadable....

Bite thy tongue, BLASPHEMER!

;-)

ironregime

 

[Dark Jezter]

And in many cases, I think hollywood does better than the books in terms of overall enjoyment. For instance, LOTR - many sections of the book are DREADFUL and basically unreadable, and totally unnecessary for the story - the movie neatly excised those out.

No argument there. Although I've loved the LotR novels for years, I actually think that I enjoy the movies more overall simply because Peter Jackson knew that many parts of the LotR novels were slow, boring, or meaningless and decided to either skim over them or cut them entirely.

Plus, Peter Jackson didn't throw in all of the absolutely awful songs and poems that I've learned to skip over every time I read the novels.

 

[pntbllr]

God knows we could use a great fantasy epic.

Given the success of the yu ghi oh animated series (based on a game) I think that a FR or DL animated series might be a better investment. Not only would current fans watch but it would market the game to the kids who sit and veg in front of the tv.

 

[Thunderfoot]

Weiss & Hickman blow chunks!!! The only way I'd go go watch the DL trilogy you propose is if they wrote in an ad hock edit to the end where the nuked all of the kender off the freaking planet and the lance shoved into Raislins skull!!!

LotR is literature - DL is paperback drivel...

 

[Squire James]

In order to "crush" LoTR and (the first) Star Wars trilogy, the movies would have to be FAR AND AWAY the highest-grossing films of all time. All three would (at least) have to bring in Titanic-like numbers. Yeah right. This is speaking as a person who kinda likes Dragonlance and hates Titanic.

Fortunately, the first book stands alone very well. So it could be sold as a single movie that can be expanded to a trilogy without coming up with Dumb and Obviously Unplanned New Plotlines (e.g. The Matrix and Highlander). Set your expectations at reasonable levels (spend $30 million and hope it makes $60 million), and you might not be doomed to disappointment.

 

[Steel_Wind]

It may be successful. But on the sole value of the scenario as opposed to SW and LOTR? I don't think so.

What about A Song of Ice and Fire on the big screen?

Big Screen? No. Far Far Far too long a tale for the big screen. Little screen as a regular series? A la BSG? (Or Xena, if you must)

I'm there. Totally there. But as GRRM was a moderately successful teleplay writer and producer in his day (amd one who still has connections) - he thought SoIaF just was not the sort of thing TV would actually do. It's not a Hollywood tale.

A shame. But I expect he's right.

 

[Altalazar]

What a bizarre assertion. Of course it can. That's how the studios pick when to release a film -- they have a very good idea, often in advance of the cameras even beginning to roll -- of roughly how much money a film will make.

It has been decades since anyone involved with the creation of a film was genuinely surprised with how much money it made. Off by a few percentage points, sure. Totally shocked? No.

And, while I appreciate there are people here with a near-religious fervor for Dragonlance, I find the notion that it's an obviously better story than Lord of the Rings to be a strange one, to put it mildly.

And "it'll do well if we sink $300 million into it" is the sort of caveat that makes discussing such things almost pointless. Give me $300 million and I could make a hit movie out of my grocery list.

Your grocery list? Its that sort of thinking that shows you think the same as the studio suits. Guess what - they are wrong, and not just by a few percentage points and not just a little bit of the time. Many many films fail to make any money at all. And most of them are NOT films that were expected to be losers. In fact, suits expect ALL films to make money, with very few exceptions. They are not, after all, a charity. They are in it as a business. The notion that they predict the profit of most films down to a few percentage points is pure studio suit fantasy.