Predicting the Movie Hits and Bombs of 2015

We just watched "Aloha" and really enjoyed it. He's generous with his characters, and the resolution of a plot involving a romance threatening to become a triangle is resolved in an emotionally logical but touching way. The acting is pretty solid too, as well as the sensitivity to Hawaiian culture. There is kind of sustained mystical dimension to the movie that works quite well. The one downer is his over reliance on music (ref. the Stones "Factory Girl" on the tarmac sequence. He tries to imbue even minor transitional sequences with more emotional weight than they deserve or need). I'm sure his idol Billy Wilder could have told him to knock it off and let some scenes play on their own merits.

I wonder what SONY made him cut out or add or whatever. It's possible they were improvements as some of the story points are a bit oblique. So, not trying to oversell this as a masterpiece, but a movie that deserved a wider audience. I'd rank it below Crowe's "Almost Famous" and "Jerry Maquire" but above the (overrated imo) "Say Anything" and Singles" and "Bought a Zoo". I still don't know what to make of 'Elizabethtown"

 

The Good Dinosaur apparently had a tortured production history, and I think some of the creators were taken off and replaced, and a lot of the movie was reshot from scratch. I believe it was supposed to come out in Summer 2014, so it's pretty late. I think there's room for a big kid's film at Thanksgiving -- 3 weeks ahead of Star Wars -- and often what happens when a huge blockbuster film comes out is that all the other films go up slightly in box office, simply because more people are going to theaters.

 

Wow. Looks like "Tangled" set a trend

 

I kind of forgot that The Good Dinosaur was even coming out so soon. I think it'll definitely own the Thanksgiving box office. Disney/Pixar + dinosaurs = $$$.

 

Ditto. And I haven't seen a lot of promotion for it. (Granted, I don't watch regular broadcast/cable TV anymore, and I don't go to a lot of kids movies where they would be showing trailers.) I think I had assumed it was coming out next year, since it's pretty rare to see two Pixar movies so close together. Makes me worry about its eventual performance. It's not really up against much direct competition this weekend, which is good. And it's got a pretty strong score on RT (88%, as of this instant). Not nearly as high as Inside Out got, though (98%).

 

Exactly. I think they're keeping the wraps on the real budget for Good Dinosaur, but officially they're saying it's $200M. Consider that Minions only cost $74m (!!!) and grossed over $1 billion (!!!!!!!!), it has to make some execs wonder why Pixar's films need to cost so much.

 

I believe this is the first time that Pixar has ever released two films in the same year, so it is a bit of a gamble for them in that sense. You're right that it doesn't have much competition for the long Thanksgiving weekend, so I think it will clean up there. In my mind, anything with dinosaurs is a big money-maker with kids. I don't know how long its legs will be with Star Wars following a mere 4 weeks later, though.

 

That's exactly what I was wondering myself! I wrote up the "Minions" BD tonight, and my review template lists budget and box office. I assumed "Minions" would've cost $150 million or so like seemingly every other CG animated movie, so when I saw that $74 million budget, I was shocked - I never expected it to be that low.

Sure, the lead characters are all played by the co-director, so that saved money, but it still has a cast of "name actors" who wouldn't have been cheap. "Penguins of Madagascar" had "cheap talent" for the leads - ie, the filmmakers - and it still cost $132 million!

 

I'm sure this kind of thing drives Dreamworks, Pixar, and Disney absolutely crazy. I would've pegged Minions as costing maybe 50% more ($125M) and then grossing at most about $500M. I would've been way wrong!

I think the execs running movie studios are just as puzzled and freaked out by movies that make way, way too much money as they do with films that are totally, unexpected flops. Investors get very irritated and cranky the more they realize what a crapshoot this whole business is.

I think avoiding high-priced voice talent and avoiding any profit participation and just nailing down the script once and shooting it is a huge part of the success of Minions and Despicable Me. The Pixar, Dreamworks, and Disney projects often come encumbered with all of those problems -- although I think it's totally fair to give the actors, directors, producers, and writers a piece of the pie once the film breaks even and makes ridiculous money.

I'll bet it's possible for Star Wars and Good Dinosaur to be neck-and-neck at the box office for weeks. Even if they're out at the same time as Hateful 8 and The Revenant and other high-profile films, there's always a market for huge mass-market family films, particularly around the holidays. People who can't get into one will go to the other.

 

I liked Spielberg's latest, Bridge of Spies, and it seems to have done OK at the box office. It's grossed $85m so far compared to its $40m production budget (and it looked more expensive than that to me). But my guess is that Spielberg and Hanks each put aside their salary to get 15% of first dollar gross. If so, that 30% off the top means that two people are going to get nice paychecks, but maybe the studio and producers might end up with a loss? What do you think, Vidiot?

http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=coldwar2015.htm

Bridge of Spies
Domestic Total as of Nov. 23, 2015:$65,457,320
Distributor: Buena Vista Release Date: October 16, 2015
Genre: Thriller Runtime: 2 hrs. 20 min.
MPAA Rating: PG-13 Production Budget: $40 million
Total Lifetime Grosses
Domestic: $65,457,320 76.2%
+ Foreign: $20,393,792 23.8%
= Worldwide: $85,851,112

 

And in most european countries it has yet to premiere, so no doubt it'll make a nice profit.
Sadly, I'll have to wait until mid-december to see it in my country. Strangely, the italian distributors are going to release it the same day "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" opens.

 

I would suspect the budget differences between Good Dinosaur and Minions are due to the following:

• Minions is based on already-established characters. So there wasn't as much upfront character design work involved. On the other hand, Pixar movies (except the sequels of course) start from scratch, creating entirely new universes for each movie, with wildly different aesthetics.
• Pixar prides itself on basically tackling one new visual challenge on every movie. For instance, Monsters, Inc. required them to invent a way to make hair/fur look as realistic as possible. Finding Nemo had them experimenting with a primarily underwater environment and all the optical effects involved with that. For Good Dinosaur, apparently they spent a lot of time working on the backgrounds, making them look hyper-realistic, in particular a raging river sequence. (I haven't seen the movie myself yet, mind you.) A lot of other digital animation studios still keep things rather simplistic and "cartoonish" looking (especially the backgrounds).
  
• And of course, Good Dinosaur was basically made, scrapped, and remade from scratch.

 

The cost of "Minions" doesn't surprise me due to comparisons with "Good Dinosaur" - it surprises me due to comparisons with virtually every other CG animated movie out today!

Like I mentioned, "Penguins of Madagascar" was virtually identical to "Minions" in many ways: not Pixar, spinoff of established movie series, lead characters played by the filmmakers, not professional actors.

And yet "Penguins" cost nearly twice as much as "Minions"!

 

To answer your question look at the lay off Dreamworks and a studio shut down.
Dreamworks had way too may people work for them there budgets really
are over board.. They enjoyed the success of of Shrek and other movies that made
losts $$$$$. I think they figured why not continue with same model..
What could it hurt then you have movie like Turbo total crap...
Some kind of money thrown at it most likely hire more and more people.
And company will grow like Pixar.. Dreamworks has massive ego problem..
As for future projects I don't think they will do well?

 

"Concussion" looks horrible. Horrible. I can't imagine anyone wanting to go watch this movie.

 

Going out on a limb and predict The Force Awakens to be a hit. You've heard it first here.

 

Did you see it? I was looking forward to it.

 

I thought the PBS Frontline documentary on the subject pretty much covered everything. I don't think a dramatization of the behind the screen cover-up will be that much more interesting.

 

i want to go see it.

 

I wouldn't mind seeing it, but it's going to have to come to me.

 

EXACTLY! It's gonna be like "The Insider" but with worse acting.

 

It's pretty hilarious and sad to see Will Smith vying for an Oscar nom. The dude just does not have the acting chops and probably never will.

 

Smith?

 

He has two more Best Actor nominations than you do.

 

How will I sleep at night?

I actually forgot about that. But still, he's never going to win.