Jump to content

A future of Box Office Bombs?


Freya Black

Recommended Posts

  • Premium Member

At the time "Blade Runners" box office was regarded as poor. You can find it discussed in more detail in "Future Noir" It was up against ET that summer.

 

Are you sure those figures aren't the rolling total, rather the box office in a particular week?

 

Not according to the figures. Maybe they were expecting a Star Wars or ET turnout or something. If so, then it failed to hit its target, but it's hardly a failure.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Premium Member

 

That's really interesting! Films are generally judged on their opening weekend as there tends to be a big drop off after that. Blade runner did badly on its opening weekend but oddly seems to have managed to maintain at its initial level for weeks and weeks and weeks. I never see that happen with films. What tends to happen these days is as soon as a film starts doing badly it tends to loose theatres. Occasionally films do bounce back and get more theatres added back on but Blade Runner seems to have been fairly consistent over a long period of time. I'm guessing the film had really good word of mouth. It was critically panned at the time, but of course that isn't the same as box office.

 

I've not seen figures like that before! Fascinating! :)

 

Freya

 

This was before home video was as ubiquitous as it is today. Piracy is a huge issue right now in the motion picture industry. I don't know, but last I checked Taiwan, Hong Kong, China, Burma, pretty much the entire South East Asian area is a haven for bootlegs. Also, studio employees have been known to just rip off their employers by taking footage home (I saw a couple of news pieces on it).

 

The point here being that before the movie theater was the only place you could see a movie unless you had access to really expensive home video equipment. It's part of the reason of why on other threads I've argued that there needs to be a chance in exhibition practices, because there's no reason to shell out $100+ to take your family to that new Disney flick when you can snag a pirated version for your home hi-def set. In the "olden days" if you wanted to see a movie more than once, you had to pay a full ticket price to see it until you could rent the VHS 6 months to a year or mare later. If you were lucky, you might see a cleaned up edited version on network TV.

 

People don't like to admit that, but, people steal, even if it's a Disney property.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Premium Member

A nostalgia blast here; some intros for made for TV movies, the intros were used for features that made it to broadcast.

 

To follow up on my post, those of you old enough to remember, this was why Network TV used to be so big. If you missed something like "A Bridge Too Far" or "Marathon Man" or "The Godfather" in the theaters, then you had to wait, hope, and maybe even pray that one of the big three would air the film. Here are the intros of people my age and older saw before that Sean Connery Bond flick or some other big production was transmitted;

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ooph7jAE5vM

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gS-drqqVuWA

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Premium Member

Two more;

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-VjsOEpntLQ

 

 

If you were a night owl;

 

 

Again, the point here being that waiting to see a movie because you missed it in the theatre or only saw it once, used to be something special. Tech has democratized distribution, and unfortunately that includes criminals, and even otherwise honest folks or stupid people who don't know the meaning of intellectual property; i.e. now everyone who has the means and ignorance of the law can upload a copy of a film they do not own for everyone to see.

 

And I think that, combined with computer games, more than anything else is bringing the industry down many notches.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Premium Member

I'm not familiar with the US distribution system, but a quick Google search taught me that an American theater claims between 20 - 25% of a film's gross on the 1st week, 45 - 55% on weeks 2 and 3, and 80% and above from week 4 onwards.

 

Now, assuming these numbers are correct and assuming they were relevant at the time, Blade Runner only made a little under $13,500,000 during its initial run (I did the maths using the numbers you gave).

 

Of course, I only did this out of curiosity, and... for fun basically (I get really bored at work). They're not meant to prove anything, but I'm sure they give us a bit of insight as to how much the studio actually made back during the initial run, and yeah it's pretty far from the estimated $28,000,000 budget (assuming this figure is also correct).

 

Anyway, now I understand why opening weekends are such a big deal for the studios and why nowadays films usually disappear after 3 or 4 weeks. No point in the studios renting theaters any longer when they practically make no money out of their movies after the third week...

 

Edit:

 

 

They are the rolling total.

 

Films used to run for months on end. Sometimes a year or more. But TV cut into the take, and so different distribution deals got made. Once VHS hit the market those deals got altered even more.

 

I think nowadays there really is no way to keep the current "open wide" model retrofitted with current technology, unless digital distribution with anti-camera/image-capture technology is brought into the theatres. And even then I'm sure someone's going to find a work around.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

 

Not according to the figures. Maybe they were expecting a Star Wars or ET turnout or something. If so, then it failed to hit its target, but it's hardly a failure.

 

By the figures it didn't make a profit during the first theatrical release, this how studios and producers measure success. It only made it in the longer term, when the film found its audience through the new means of distribution (video) in the 1980s. Some films are slow burners and the studios used to plan for this, but these now achieve get this through DVD etc, rather than the theatrical release.

 

I don't recall "Blade Runner" screening for months at the time.

Edited by Brian Drysdale
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Premium Member

 

By the figures it didn't make a profit during the first theatrical release, this how studios and producers measure success. It only made it in the longer term, when the film found its audience through the new means of distribution (video) in the 1980s. Some films are slow burners and the studios used to plan for this, but these now achieve get this through DVD etc, rather than the theatrical release.

 

I don't recall "Blade Runner" screening for months at the time.

 

Yeah, I don't recall that it did either. I'll add that those numbers are strictly domestic gross. I don't know what it did overseas.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think the big factor to consider in all this is Opportunity Cost.

 

I think that is the basis of a lot of the thinking in the movie world and the key to understanding a lot of this stuff.

 

There are basically only a limited amount of theaters that the movie can open in.

There is a certain time that is considered to be the peak time for movie viewing.

Obviously the studios want to maximise profit, to do so they want to have the most successful movie they can have open in as many screens as possible at the peak time.

 

This is why they want to have high budget mega movies that open at peak time on as many screens as possible on the basis that spending more money can bring in more money by being more of a must see spectacle and being more impressive and more of a known name when it comes to home video releases too.

 

It's the reason why a film like Pacific Rim might be a bit of a problem. It may do well in the long term and may not make a loss, but that isn't the issue. The issue is that it has taken away the space and opportunity for a different film to make money. One that will bring in the money faster.

 

So whether the film makes a profit or not in the long term may not be the issue. Obviously a movie like Pacific Rim will be much preferred to something like R.I.P.D. (OMG!) which looks like it's going to be a mega bomb but it still isn't the super hit the movie studios are hoping for.

 

I actually expect Pacific Rim will make money somewhere in the process (although I'm sure it won't appear to by the time Hollywood have finished with the accounting) but that may not be the core issue.

 

I guess it's different to the way a lot of us think about business as there is a scarcity of resources (screens) that are effectively controlled by a few companies, so it's about maximising the profit on those screens.

 

Freya

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Premium Member

Which is why I think there needs to be a new distribution model. Or maybe even bust the gentleman's agreement the studios have, and actually lower prices, by making leaner, better, less expensive films that people will like, and put them up against the big dogs.

 

Competition the old fashioned way.

 

God forbid American innovation get reintroduced to the film industry.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Theres a very different set of figures for Blade Runner on Box Office Mojo.

 

Check it out if you have a strong stomach:

 

http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?page=weekend&id=bladerunner.htm

 

Those are absolutely horrific numbers and make me feel ill to look at, as it is such a beautiful and amazing film.

Of course we know that this film must have made its money back many times over since and is quite rightly respected as an all time classic now.

 

I guess we have to consider as well that this was 30 years ago when each dollar would have been worth a lot more money too.

 

Freya

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I got my figures off of the IMDB. They can't both be right. Unless the US figures were accidentally summed with the international take.

I think they are both right, but IMDB's chart can be confusing. Wiki says a total of $33 million, but that might include the director's cut 10th anniversary re-release. It appears that the movie played to mostly empty theaters for around 4 weeks.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Which is why I think there needs to be a new distribution model. Or maybe even bust the gentleman's agreement the studios have, and actually lower prices, by making leaner, better, less expensive films that people will like, and put them up against the big dogs.

 

Competition the old fashioned way.

 

God forbid American innovation get reintroduced to the film industry.

 

I'm not sure quite what you are saying?

Do you have in mind quotas or something?

Ultimately there is a finite resource and that's at the core of the problem.

The internet is the other way. On youtube for example there is effectively no scarcity of this type.

 

I got my figures off of the IMDB. They can't both be right. Unless the US figures were accidentally summed with the international take.

 

Ah! Personally I don't trust IMDB as much but who knows.

 

Freya

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Premium Member

I think they are both right, but IMDB's chart can be confusing. Wiki says a total of $33 million, but that might include the director's cut 10th anniversary re-release. It appears that the movie played to mostly empty theaters for around 4 weeks.

 

Yeah, I'm not quite sure how to read those figures now. I think the film's done okay by now, but I'm hazy on how it initially did. The one complaint I remember from a lot of people was that the film was visually dark, and that was probably a factor.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Premium Member

 

I'm not sure quite what you are saying?

Do you have in mind quotas or something?

Ultimately there is a finite resource and that's at the core of the problem.

The internet is the other way. On youtube for example there is effectively no scarcity of this type.

 

 

Ah! Personally I don't trust IMDB as much but who knows.

 

Freya

 

Not really. Just hire competent actors to do good scripts.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

 

Not really. Just hire competent actors to do good scripts.

 

I think we must be talking at cross purposes.

I was meaning the issue of there being a finite number of screens to play on.

Obviously having good, or even great scripts isn't going to change that.

 

Freya

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Theres a very different set of figures for Blade Runner on Box Office Mojo.

 

Check it out if you have a strong stomach:

 

http://www.boxoffice...bladerunner.htm

Actually, they are the exact same numbers. The IMDB ones were just a rolling total, which means that they added the BO numbers of each week to the total gross accumulated by the film up to this date, something I had to take into account for my calculations.

 

Box Office Mojo has the same numbers in the "Gross-to-date" column on the right.

 

Sorry for the digression.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Premium Member

 

I think we must be talking at cross purposes.

I was meaning the issue of there being a finite number of screens to play on.

Obviously having good, or even great scripts isn't going to change that.

 

Freya

 

No, it won't. But to get people back in the theatres prices have got to come down, or product has got to improve.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

 

Blade Runners take in summer of 82;

 

$26,168,988 (USA) (22 August 1982)

$25,832,755 (USA) (15 August 1982)

$25,347,916 (USA) (8 August 1982)

$24,600,832 (USA) (1 August 1982)

$23,443,381 (USA) (25 July 1982)

$21,774,216 (USA) (18 July 1982)

$19,002,404 (USA) (11 July 1982)

$14,866,486 (USA) (5 July 1982)

$6,150,002 (USA) (27 June 1982)

$27,580,111 (USA) ( 1982)

 

It doesn't appear to be a bomb.

 

Those numbers look like they're cumulative, the number at the top is supposed to be the total take up to that point.

 

With the Blade Runner: The Final Cut DVD (C 2007) is an extra disk Dangerous Days: Making Blade Runner, including interviews with the producers, discussing all the financials.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Dangerous Days, The Making of Blade Runner is also on youtube, in three parts. Couldn't see part 1. Not sure which part the producer interviews are in. Anyway, if one is a Bladerunner devotee or a believer in art crossing the divide into the mainstream this collection of documentative pieces is unmissable.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Just to pre-empt a possible misunderstanding. I'm not saying Bladerunner was main stream.

 

Edit: I'm finding the edit function a bit twitchy. May have a short time interval to complete or something. Otherwise these three posts probably could have been one.

Edited by Gregg MacPherson
Link to comment
Share on other sites

 

Not according to the figures. Maybe they were expecting a Star Wars or ET turnout or something. If so, then it failed to hit its target, but it's hardly a failure.

Breakeven would have been around 75 mil, maybe as much as 90. So yeah, it was an immense failure. Not PLUTO NASH level, but a b.o. loser.

 

The 2.5 to 3x multiplier for breakeven is even lowballing it ... I've seen a Kubrick breakdown someplace that shows a film could easily make 8 times what it cost and still not be out of the red.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...