the scary calculations involving getting Serenity to profit

POSTED BY: ethan
UPDATED: Tuesday, January 3, 2006 20:01
VIEWED: 19463
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PAMELAONE

Monday, January 2, 2006 5:31 PM

Actually, places like walmart, pay almost 17.00 a dvd. In the case of Serenity, they paid 16.98. So that's how much goes back to Universal not 7.00.

CBY

Monday, January 2, 2006 5:41 PM

What about film funding, sponsoring and other external sources of capital? I doubt that Universal payed all the money themselves.

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ANDRE83

Monday, January 2, 2006 5:48 PM

And for the zillion time; Marketing isn't taken into consideration when deciding wheather a movie has made profit or not. Dont ask me why, because i have no idea.

My only guess would be that each studio have a total marketing budget for the year or something. For all the released movies together.

Jayne: All those years of preacher training, getting knocked out by one bounty hunter
Book: Oh, dont get me wrong. I gave him a hell of a fight
Jayne: Epic i'm guessing

ANDRE83

Monday, January 2, 2006 5:53 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by SameErtia:
I was dragged to see "Underworld" at the theater with a group of friends. Second worst 10$ I've ever spent. Worst was for that overcooked hamburger at the Blue Chalk Cafe in Palo Alto.

So really, when a movie rates only slightly better than a dried out burger, it's amazing to me that it gets a sequel.

Then again, "Highlander; The Source" is in post-production, even with the agony that was "Endgame", so there's no accounting for Hollywood.

I honestly dont know why people needs to have this explained but...Hollywood is about making money. Not quality.

Jayne: All those years of preacher training, getting knocked out by one bounty hunter
Book: Oh, dont get me wrong. I gave him a hell of a fight
Jayne: Epic i'm guessing

MYCROFTXXX

Monday, January 2, 2006 6:01 PM

Chiming in one more time, the other advantage that Serenity / Firefly has over, say, the St*r Tr*k movie / TV franchise from a business and artistic point of view is that not all of the stories have been told in the new 'verse. It has truly unique possibilities thus when Joss (and let's not forget Tim Minear) pitches his next Big Damn Idea in the Firefly 'verse it will be refreshing yet still have that all important sequel feel to it (execs LOVE sequels, especially ones that have built-in fan bases like ours). It may take a year or three so I hope y'all are in for the long haul.

I, for one, am in the for the long haul right down to the firefly decals on my Saturn VUE. Already had someone ask me what the Chinese was all about. Needless to say, they were intrigued when I explained it.

"We'll be in our bunk..."

CWNEK

Monday, January 2, 2006 6:13 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by GatorMarc:
Quote:
Originally posted by cwnek:
Quote:
Originally posted by GatorMarc:
1) The Box office is at about $38.5 million now, not $35 million.
GatorMarc

Eat 'em up, chomp, chomp.

Assuming that you get your #s from the same source as I do (boxofficemojo.com...visit often...get Serenity back into the top 5 most popular!), it's worth noting that this figure does not include earnings post 11/17. Overseas is more up to date, and accounts for the slow trickle over the last 6 weeks.

Yep. And that also never calculated in the revenue that Universal brought in from the pre-screenings of the movie over the summer.

GatorMarc

Eat 'em up, chomp, chomp.

I hope you're right, but I believe:

(1) Pre-screenings get included in opening weekend estimates, and that

(2) They did not amount to much $wise.

ROCKETJOCK

Monday, January 2, 2006 6:31 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by ChrisPV:

And I just can't picture Spider-Man not making money until DVD.

Ah, but you're figuring in real-world 1+1=2 math, not Hollywood math. I suggest you read Art Buchwald's book "Fatal Subtraction" for a review of how the latter works.

Buchwald proved in court that the Eddie Murphy movie "Coming to America" had been plagerized from a story outline he had submitted years before; having lost, the studio proceeded to claim that the movie--one of the largest grossers of 1988--had never turned a profit. And weirdly, by standard entertainment industry mathematics, it hadn't. They charged off every possible expense against the film's budget--including advertising and promotion for other, totally unrelated films--while discounting every source of profit for the film. More or less a standard practice, a way to screw those whose pay for the film was expressed as a percentage of profits.

"Nothin' into nothin' is -- let me do the math here--carry the nothin'..." -- Jayne Cobb

STORYMARK

Monday, January 2, 2006 6:37 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Andre83:
And for the zillion time; Marketing isn't taken into consideration when deciding wheather a movie has made profit or not. Dont ask me why, because i have no idea.

My only guess would be that each studio have a total marketing budget for the year or something. For all the released movies together.

Jayne: All those years of preacher training, getting knocked out by one bounty hunter
Book: Oh, dont get me wrong. I gave him a hell of a fight
Jayne: Epic i'm guessing

For the second time in the same thread, that's just not true. In fact, it's rather silly. When the average cost of marketing a hollywood movie is in the ballpark of $34 million (That's the 2004 average, though I doubt thet spent 1/2 that on Serenity, but that's the indusrty average) that money is going to be factored in. Serenity's opening on 2,189 screen cost around $9 million in print costs alone. Someone is counting.

Yes, studios are notoriously sketchy about how they cook their books, and the marketing cost may not go into any public offical budget statement, but studios are rarely honest with official budgets, and you can be damn sure someone is accounting for that money.

"Well, my days of not taking you seriously are certainly coming to a middle."

SUASOR

Monday, January 2, 2006 6:38 PM

Uh...No. Fox is owned by Rupert Murdoch's Newscorp. Universal is owned by Vevendi/Seagram Corporation. Totally different mega-massive-evil-conglomerates.

Oops, sorry, That's what happens when you hang out with investment bankers. You get the deals that didn't go through mixed up with the ones that did. It's hard to figure out who owns who in the entertainment business these days.

One thing's for sure, Fox made a pile of cash off Firefly, and it's still rolling in.

DEFIANT1701

Monday, January 2, 2006 7:07 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Ruxton:
I'm gonna go out on a limb here, based on some of the insight I've got from this thread's commentators combined with my own empathetic perceptions, and PREDICT that within six months a second Serenity movie will be greenlighted. Or at the latest, whenever Wonder Woman gets some obvious and dedicated publicity.

Within six months........Serenity #2 greenlighted... = prediction.

Hi all,

New Browncoat here. Just for a bit of background...I am one of the people you are all talking about. Someone that had never watched the TV series until about a week ago when my housemate let me borrow it. I watched it straight thru and just finished watching Serenity (for the second time). I LOVE this show! I had always wanted to watch back in the day when it was on, but never got the chance.

Anyway, I wanted to respond to your prediction. I sincerely hope and pray that there will be more of this fabulous crew but I hope it's not on the big screen. In order to get any kind of serious character developement, it has to be on the small screen. I hope Sci-Fi smartens up and ponies up the cash to make it an original show like they did for SG-1 and BSG.

That's it for now. Keep fighting!

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