How much money does the average straight-to-DVD film make?

[Rick L]

Very good post, you had many good points, I do want to expound on one if it's okay...

 

There's so many movies out today, it almost feels like the industry is saturated and like you said, you need something to punch out through the noise. I think if you were about to embark on making a movie now and want monetary success, not only art success, you might have to go off the beaten path. For example, a latin influenced movie, or a mix of cultures or a weird sci-fi comedy. I don't think every movie has been told although it does seems like it. I think we have to look we'll out of the box and take a chance because people really want something different like Napoleon Dynamite.

 

Best regards,

Rick

[Jean Dodge]

Getting back to the original question, the answer is that a "Straight to DVD" film doesn't really exist anymore. It's more "Straight to digital" since a lot of revenue can be sought through Video on Demand, streaming, television sales, foreign sales, etc. if the movie has any aspects that can be marketed/ exploited, etc. and anyone who wants to sell or buy a film is going to want those rights to be part of the deal as well.

 

There are established genres like "horror" and "mexican narcotraficante" that can be pandered to, but even those have a wide range of sales figures. Recent indie fare from second tier festivals are "enjoying" deals like, "IFC would love to distribute your touching personal drama," for NOTHING, sign here" and picking up product from directors and producers who jump at the chance to have their film shown in any market. So the money figure you wish someone would cough up here isn't going to be an easy one to quote. It is rumored that the 70 million dollar budgeted CHE duo of films sold to IFC-on-Demand for 100k. Everything else that they have bought recently has been for significantly less, ie, nothing or next to nothing. And they are "the only ones who are buying nowadays'" according to some.

 

Then again, the answer you are probably looking for is that if a distributor can manage to sell a film to various tiers of sales, there are reasonable figures you can attach to the idea. The make-or-break point in the USA usually comes when the buyer from large outlets like Blockbuster or Best Buy, Fry's, etc decides whether or not to order the film. Their criteria is going to be, if Joe Six Pack spends twelve seconds looking at the box on the shelf, is he going to say to himself, "oh yeah, I've heard of (fill in the blank) and I love movies where people (fill in the blank), especially when the smokin' hot girl on the box here is going to (fill in the blank) with the (whatever... there are some sick people out there) then he stands a reasonable chance of renting or buying it, having heard NOTHING at work or on the radio or on television or internet or in a magazine about the actual movie itself. He's ONLY going by what is on the box itself and what he's heard or more likely IMAGINES he has heard about the movie's "elements" in conjunction with OTHER, more successful films from the past. This is why "Underwater Zombie vs Ninja Sex Change Buddy" movies still get made, and star D list actors who fail to carry the plot from A to B, much less engage a couch potato who has smoked ten bong hits and drank a twelve pack hoping against hope that THIS underwater Zombie ninja teen sex change comedy will be better than the last ten he rented. And aren't we lucky?

 

If you can get K-Mart, for example to order the film "Billy's Little Independent Christmas Slasher Sled Dogs Movie" starring the corpse of Bela Lugosi's Pomeranian and Pamela Anderson's illegitimate daughter (or similar semi-marketable names) then you might eventually approach six figures, but I wouldn't bet the farm on it. More like "you are so lucky to be offered five figures, take it, I know you are losing money but take it." And yes, one is a figure that can have four zeros behind it.

 

In the past, if an established distributor saw the potential for a film to get some attention and attract a renter on a shelf based on KNOWN salable elements of any kind, and they really LIKE the film and trust themselves, they might go as high as a 30-50k advance, knowing that these are levels at which they can afford to take a risk, based on sales they know they can push through. That's assuming the film has the production value of a 500k film (regardless of it's actual cost, but trust me, there is usually a way to tell if you have spent less. It's called "this looks like poop and sounds worse!). Of course, the structure of such a deal is everything. You, the film maker or investor/producer may be offered (if you were so lucky) a deal in which you "take the risk" with the DVD distributor and get your tiny advance but share in a better split after costs are recouped (this is cheaper for them, obviously) or you might try to negotiate a deal where you the film maker gets as large an advance as the distrib has ever offered, but if your movie somehow becomes a runaway hit you don't share in the windfall. But those sorts of deals are gone with the wind.

 

All of this adds up to, please don't make another film the world does not need, or cannot use, even if you think you have a novel approach to add (but THIS TIME the emo asian shark is really a ninja zombie ghost assassin in disguise, and the hero has an iphone app that will unleash the teenage lesbian army to defeat the bad sharks!)

 

Or, short answer... none. The AVERAGE straight to DVD film loses money because the hoped for sale never happens because the film is never even shot, much less completed. And of the ones that are released, the AVERAGE figure is very very low. Upper four figures, lower five figures at best. But again, keep in mind we are talking about the best, most successful ones here.