Tuesday, November 09, 2010

Cheap Won't Necessarily Do It

Overseas animated features might be less expensive than the U.S. kind, but as we've mentioned before, inexpensive only gets you so far:

["Thru the Moebious Strip"], China’s first feature-length animation in 3-D, the effort cost the Institute of Digital Media Technology, a Shenzhen-based animation company, $20 million to produce. But when it was shown at the 2005 Cannes Film Festival, international distributors showed no interest.

“Moebius” flopped within China, too, taking in only $3 million domestically. ...

Even if you make a feature-length animation in 3-D and spend a tidy $20 million to do it, we're pretty sure you won't edge into profits with a gross of $3 million.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Holy moly, according to IMDB, this film had 7 exec. producers, 3 producers and 2 co-producers.

The article also mentions that the government has pumped billions into the animation industry, expanding from around 120 studios in 2002 to over 10,000 studios now. That's insane!

The main problem that Asian companies have when trying to market animated films that are specifically being catered to the west is that the stories are too Asian. They feel like they need to retell their heritage over and over again to a Western audience that "just doesn't get it", or that they feel "wants to be shown more about us". I should know, I have been advising a company in Asia (staying vague on purpose) to stay right away from Asian themed stories for now. Don't do another nine tailed fox woman story, or a kung fu film with crappy characters!

Because if you are an Asian company doing a kung fu film with talking animals that's worse than an American produced film in a similar light "Kung Fu Panda", then everyone won't give you a second look. Try something different for goodness sakes!

Anonymous said...

The Philippines will also be having its first CG animated feature this coming december. It was 5 years in the making.

here's their website.

http://www.therpgmovie.com/

Anonymous said...

WOW! For a first effort (I'm guessing?), that looks like it's made the most of it's limitations! Can't tell much about the story, but it looks pretty good.

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