According to The Numbers website, Spiderman 3 has a production budget of $250 million which means the film will spend (given a runtime of 120 minutes): $2.8 million a minute, $34,000 a second and $1,446 an frame. It holds the record for largest budget ever in a film, beating the second highest film (the second Spiderman) by $41 million. Given the box office success of the previous films, I am sure it will easily make it’s money back within two weeks at the theatre. Considering the first film set the box office record for the biggest weekend at $115 million in three days and the second brought in $152 in five days, and the hype surrounding the third release is bigger than the previous two, it won’t have a problem.
Also think about Pirates of the Caribbean which had a budget of a paltry $150 million and grossed $135 million domestically in its first three days in theatres, averaging $32,817 per theatre, not theatre complex but per theatre. The UA Denver Pavilions has the film screening on four screens at a total (based on the average) of $131,268.
Consider as well, Superman Returns 3D Imax drew in an average of $89,000 a screen and the UA Colorado Center theatre has Pirates on three screens and Superman so, they probably took in $250,000 this weekend.
The top ten box office films account for $10.26 billion dollars in world wide ticket grosses. All of which are major Hollywood productions and most of which are franchises including: The Lord of The Rings, Harry Potter, Spiderman, Star Wars and Shrek.
So why do I share all this? Mostly because I am constantly intrigued by the money associated with Hollywood cinema. There is just an obscene amount of money being spent and made in our theatres…. most of which will never be made by the films that actually deserve it.
Thursday, July 13, 2006
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2 comments:
All films make money regardless if they deserve it or not. It is the take of the opening weekend that matters to the production houses as that is where their revenue stream is centralized. The longer a film has been released the less money flows to the production companies and the more money that goes to individual theaters. Independent theaters (of which there are a few left) will "accidentally" punch tickets for an older film rather than the new feature because they can retain more revenue on an older film than on a new one.
First of all, not all films do make money. Some films with extremely bloated budgets never make back the money invested in them and some have catastrophic box office losses. For example: The Adventures of Pluto Nash (2002) at $96 million, Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within at $94 million, The 13th warrior at $95 and Superman Returns is still operating at about a $116 million dollar loss, but is still in theatres. Huge percentage losses are not exclusive to big budget films All the Queens Men lost 99.92 % of its investments and not far behind was a Phaedra release of Tax man that wile it only cost $3.5 million to make failed to even draw $10k in box office.
Secondly, the percentage take does lessen over time which is why $1 houses are able to charge such low ticket prices. In fact, many of them pay a flat rate for a film to exhibit it for a week, and don’t actually have to pay a percentage at all.
As far as independent theatres go. That is a whole different ball game. Some theaters that are considered to be more of a cinématique, actually pay flat fees for films that they exhibit and are usually done with a studio or company that is different from the original distribution. Then again sometimes they can even work deals out with filmmakers directly if their film lacks distribution. Larger art houses will negotiate percentages that follow more instep with corporate theatres.
I don’t know about ringing tickets under older films but, I am sure it is done in some parts but I wouldn’t trust a theatre like that to show my rare, most likely one of a kind print anyway. They would probably scratch the hell out of it.
Of course box office, particularly opening weekend is how the companies judge the success of a film. There are formulas that can predict off the opening weekend how much it will do in DVD and cable sales as well as other merchandising and cross promotional successes. For mainstream film, opening weekend is all they care about, well and maybe the Oscar nods so they know who will be worth more money next year.
Lastly, the point I was trying to make is how much money is made in a small concentration of films. Titanic’s worldwide box office return is more that the GDP of most developing countries. I have a great deal of affection for independent cinema and not enough people are getting out of the big box crap traps to see films that actually make a difference. It kills me that Pirates made over $135 million this weekend and Robert Altman’s Prairie Home Companion is struggling at $16 million and is one thousand times a better film. I think it is another example of what is wrong with our culture and what we place value in. That is really the point I wanted to make.
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