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Ron,
Thanks for the link to bigscreenbiz.com... lots of interesting stuff.
But where did you find the figure for the publicity budget for MI 3
-- and is there a place where we can find out the PR
budget for other films? I'm dying to know how much they spent on all
those TV commercials for MONEY DOWN THE DRAIN... I mean SNAKES ON A PLANE.
-- JR
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Wednesday, August 23, 2006 19:47
Subject: Re: [MOPO] Behind the Blow
There is also a matter of booking agents that can be thrown into the mix
and can alter everything. I know the closest theater to me has an agent that
works a deal where studios get 65% of the first two weeks. If a distributor will
not go for this then they will not show the film. The booking agent of course
gets paid a fee for negotiating this but it's well worth it. This theater
doesn't show any movie for more than four weeks (it's a matter of number of
screens) and for weeks three and four the studios receive 30%. I have been
involved with the financial side of this theater and that's the way it operates.
This was true for Kong, DaVinci, Lion the Witch and Wardrobe, Cars, as well
as Descent and John Tucker Must Die, big films and small films alike.
Will this be different for other theaters and other distributors? Yes. But
at that theater if they won't do that deal they won't show the movie. A resource
to find out more about that end of the business is here.
Some distributors actually demand an up front advance on what the box
office is likely to be. But that's generally for event films and theaters don't
mind paying it, they'll get it back in the end if not through tickets then
through popcorn. Of course, with the declining health of event films some are
starting to drag their feet on this, and for good reason.
This is all thrown out the window when it comes to foreign distribution.
They operate in their own world. Even someone as big as Paramount doesn't
distribute in most countries and they use foreign distributors that are going to
take about 15-25% in addition to what the theater takes. And this isn't
just for a country like Chad, this is for countries like the UK.
MI3 had a $40 million marketing budget and a $150 million production
budget. A studio is going to walk away with about 40% of foreign distribution
and about 55% of domestic.
So rounding to $104 million from foreign and $73 million domestic. About
$177 million. Of course, the film is profitable. Cable, DVD, pay-per-view, all
of that will push it over the edge. Far over the edge. Of course, Cruise/Wagner
Productions receives 10% of that profit when it happens, J.J. Abrams gets a
small cut, and several others will at least get a taste.
But studios don't want that much money tied up in a production for such a
long time without huge and quick returns. Who can blame them? I'm sure they
thought it was a no brainer that this would out perform MI:2. Perhaps they
should use their brains a little more. Ron
JR <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
Ron (and others),
Thanks for your take on this. In continuing my research, I did find this
article:
Which echoes what you said, but has somewhat different numbers...
specifically:
"During the film's opening week, the studio might take 70 to 80 percent
of gross box office sales. By the fifth or sixth week, the percentage the
studio takes will likely shrink to about 35 percent, said Steven Krams,
president of International Cinema Equipment Co. "
I also found several references to how George Lucas managed to get a full
100% (!) of the box office take for the first two weeks of the last two STAR
WARS films. So, apparently there is nothing like a "standard" deal and each
film gets negotiate for how much the studio will get and how much the theater
will get.
For working purposes, it seems we would be safe enough to say that, on
average, the studio gets 75% of the box-office take for the first two weeks,
then 60% for the third, 50% for the fourth, on down to the where the studio is
only getting about 35% if the film lasts 6 weeks. That gives us something to
go on when trying to gauge "how much money a film made" in comparison to its
reported "production budget" (which is, of course, often vastly over-inflated
by Hollywood accounting practices).
I don't think there's going to be anyway for regular folk to be able
to figure out with much accuracy how much a studio spends for publicity
for a given film... the best we could do would be to come up with a
guess.
Still, I think it is reasonable to assume that if a film does twice it's
production budget that it has at least broken even for the studio,
particularly if it does that in the first 2 to 3 weeks, when the studio is
getting the lion's share of the box-office take.
On that basis, MI III made money:
Production Budget = $150 million
Total Box Office (11 weeks) = $393,162,011
... looks like even figuring in $30 million for Promotion and cutting the
studio's take of the remaining $63 million in half, that the film made AT
LEAST 30 million in profit for Paramount (and that's *before* any DVD sales,
pay-per-view, rentals and TV sales... which could easily bring in another $100
to $200 million). Seems like claims that MI III "didn't make money" are
grossly exaggerated.
OK, not as much as MI 2, but that film was 6 years ago and even though
not as good as the original, was apparently far better than MI III (which I
have not seen).
But let's take a look at the other Tom Cruise film that came out within
the past year, WAR OF THE WORLDS:
Production Budget = $132 million
Total Box Office (21 weeks) = $591 million
....that had a bigger Promotion budget than MI III, let's call it $50
million. That leaves $277 million of which we'll figure the studio got
50%...for about $138 million in profit.
So, it seems Tom Cruise's last two films... just within the past year...
"only" made for Paramount something like $170 - $200 million in
theater profits alone (and what, twice that in DVD and other sales)?
Maybe $300 to $400 million TOTAL in the past year or so alone? Well,
heck... No wonder Paramount dumped him. I mean, somebody who can only
bring in $300 to $400 million a year in profits just isn't pulling his
weight...
Only in Hollywood.
But the truth of the matter seems that if one digs below the talk show
jive, the politically-correct knee-jerk outrage over "women troubles" and
other such Entertainment Tonight chatter, that Tom Cruise's "star" still
has quite a bit of luster left, even if he is aging a bit (which didn't
hurt the careers of Sean Connery or Harrison Ford or many others)
I'm sure there are other people who can run even tighter, more accurate
numbers than mine and come to the same conclusion, so it's no wonder that
Cruise/Wagner productions was able to announce that they have already lined up
a $100 million dollar revolving line of credit for their independent
production company's future operations.
I sure hope for the sake of Viacom's shareholders that Sumner Redstone
has a couple of mega-star rabbits hidden in his desk drawer somewhere to
replace those "weak" profits Cruise has been making for him.
-- JR
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