Pixar (and other Disney companies) will be staying on board the sequel and franchise express, because conglomerates believe that's where the big, long-term money is:
Walt Disney Co. Chief Executive Bob Iger got right to the point in a conference call last week to discuss the company's financial performance with Wall Street analysts.
"Let me start off by saying how thrilled we are with the global success of 'Iron Man 2,'" he said. "It makes me even more enthusiastic about the great things that Marvel and Disney can do together." ...
"I like franchises, not necessarily because they fit the corporate model, but because that's what I was a fan of when I was a kid," said Kevin Feige, president of Marvel Studios, who produces the company's films. "Toys simply extend the experience that people had so much fun with for two hours in the theaters. And if it feeds other divisions, that's awesome."
Our fine entertainment conglomerates opt for awesome, every time. Creativeness and originality are all well and good, but it's awesomeness (as in awesome cash flow) that gets the Big Boys' blood racing ....
Fox News Corp. will keep searching for the next big animated teevee series. And will work to expand the Sunday night cartoon block, even as it hangs onto its current Sunday night cartoon block. This will happen because ....
FOX Sunday’s animation line-up #1 in Teens, 18-34; Simpsons #1
The Simpsons' voice actors are going to have leverage at the end of the 22nd season (now in production). Fox will try to cut a deal to keep the parade moving forward. If new episodes end, the franchise withers that much more quickly. And Fox still wants another animated feature (how could they not?)
(And animation artists will continue to get squeezed amidst all the cost-cutting.)
Three Dee won't be the box office salvation that movie companies want it to be:
For the first time ever, a standard movie ticket will be sold for $20. The Wall Street Journal reports that several AMC theaters in Manhattan's Kips Bay neighborhood will charge the incredible price for a ticket to Shrek Forever After, the fourth Shrek installment from DreamWorks Animation, in IMAX 3D. ...
Happily, my local AMC (Burbank division) was selling Shrek Imax tickets for $15. But I don't think the big premiums for 3-D viewing is necessarily helpful as we move along. I think price resistance might be setting in ...
On Friday, Shrek Forever After grabbed an estimated $20.8 million on approximately 9,500 screens at 4,359 locations, easily leading the day but debuting closer to Kung Fu Panda than its Shrek brethren. The fourth Shrek's release included a record number of 3D locations (2,373) and a record number of IMAX locations (194), but how much they contributed is unavailable as of this writing.
Without a 3D boost, Kung Fu Panda made $20.3 million on its first day, while Shrek the Third generated $38.4 million on its first day and went on to break the animated opening weekend record with $121.6 million. Shrek 2's first Friday was also greater than Shrek Forever After ...
Movie history tells us that technological changes at the cinema follow a kind of pattern: When sound came in (1927-28), people rushed to see whatever piece of crap was thrown at them because it was, you know, a talking picture. But that ended after a couple of years, and the drek that had a soundtrack couldn't find much of an audience.
Then came three-strip Technicolor, which added $400-500 thousand dollars to the cost of a film's budget (a sizable bite in the 1930s.) Snow White, The Adventures of Robin Hood and Gone With the Wind did huge business using the rainbowed process, but The Wizard of Oz and Drums Along the Mohawk didn't make their costs back.
So I think, as time flows by, studios are going to note that Three Dee is not enough. They must also create stories that movie goers want to see.
One last thing regarding DreamWorks Animation: I don't think I would agree with director Mitchell's terminology:
... "Dreamworks kinda works like a hippie commune, where everyone, like all the directors and [story] boarders, they all help each other out on other films. So, it was really neat to approach this — what was relatively new at the time this was three years ago that we started this film." ...
I've always thought of the place as more of a Florentine art workshop with high-end computers and render farms than a commune. But that's me.
I'm old enough to have actually wandered through a few hippie communes. And for one thing, DreamWorks Animation smells a lot better.
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13 comments:
"hippie commune?" Hardly. Pretty buttoned down stuff there---all cow-towing to the sycophants who surround Jeffery.
I have never heard "Dreamworks" and "Hippie" used in the same sentence. Ever. DW films are as Button-Down Establishment as they come: Real hippies do not find Jerry Seinfeld funny. ;)
(And while working for Pixar may be far from a "commune", on the "corporate ex-hippie" scale, their product ranks somewhere between Apple Computer's and Ben & Jerry's.)
I think price resistance might be setting in ...
Think the suburbs may not be charging $20 as opposed to the big cities, and I suspect there to be a number of reasons why not as many people went to see a Shrek sequel.
(Although we can't wait for Alibi Jeff to leap on THIS one as a possible "industry" explanation that doesn't involve judging the actual movie.)
** "It makes me even more enthusiastic about the great things that Marvel and Disney can do together." ...**
Yeah, completely erase Walt's legacy and identity by burying it under lesser purchased properties.
Screw you, Iger. I never thought I'd say this, but I hate Eisner a little less because of you.
How can people be so out of touch with what get's the general public's blood racing!?! The public's only interest is to be entertained and surprised by seeing and experiencing things they have never seen before! Originality and creativity are the way to go. Sequels often reek of lazy, money-hungry attitudes and the audience KNOWS it! The suits should get it through their thick skulls that they should serve the public, not their own wallets and bank accounts!
"ith what get's the general public's blood racing!?! The public's only interest is to be entertained and surprised by seeing and experiencing things they have never seen before! Originality and creativity are the way to go."
The Box Office disagrees with you. And that's all studios care about.
If I follow that logic then Pixar's "Up" should have been a flop.
C'mon, we all know the "suits" embrace sequels because they lack the stones to take risks on new ideas. Even the once creative leaders have sold out for a fat paycheck.
It's good to be the king.
"The Box Office disagrees with you. And that's all studios care about."
But that theory still only works for great original ideas! If they run out of great original formats and concepts then they won't have any succesfull franchises or projects to make sequels from...
uhh, I'm sorry but 70 mil for a #4 sequel is fantastic! And I don't like DW.
not too many animated features or studios can claim a 70 Million dollar open. not to mention with a 10 year old franchise.
"C'mon, we all know the "suits" embrace sequels because they lack the stones to take risks on new ideas. Even the once creative leaders have sold out for a fat paycheck."
You tell 'em, Floyd.
We have all seen bad sequels kill a franchise. A hit movie creates expectations and a ready made audience, but the sequel still has to deliver. That's why Shrek VI's opening was disappointing; Shrek III.
not too many animated features or studios can claim a 70 Million dollar open. not to mention with a 10 year old franchise.
There is also the old joke that any movie that hypes "the Final Chapter" will always ritually sucker in audiences one last time, because "it's just a matter of giving the public what they want".
I found the "hippie commune" comment kind of sad. Apparently, the typical corporate workplace atmosphere is so toxic that a company environment with a relatively high morale seems counter-culturish by comparison.
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