Financial analysts aren't happy.
Susquehanna Financial Group’s Vasily Karasyov: The weekend gross [of Puss in Boots] is “yet another argument supporting our thesis that it is time for the company to revise its film costs structure ...”
Which means what? (Insert your own imagined scenario here.)
You can always make c.g. movies cheaper. The question is, how do you make them more efficiently? And raise quality at the same time?
Backtracking on art direction, animation and/or story is something animation studios can't really do at this point. The bar keeps going up and won't be dropping down again. Film creators will need to go on leaping over it.
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The Shrek franchise and ancillary franchises aren't moneymakers anymore. There isn't anything wrong with the effin cost structure. The executive decision to keep milking the dead cash cow was the problem.
For the love of god, the problem is obvious. I sincerely hope layoffs don't happen.
You're writing like Puss is declared a bomb. Why? Because it made 5 million less than "analysts" thought it should?
It just opened, it has an A- Cinemascore, and you'd better believe that with the knives out for anything remotely DW related, that means it's likely actually a really good film.
Love em or hate em, every single analysis I've read from Wall Street types on animation has been ill-informed and wrong. In all things movie related, in fact, they are always clueless.
I agree with Anonymous (directly above) in that they've based everything off the initial box office.
That's becoming increasingly irrelevant in terms of how a film makes its money. It's almost reckless to say how the studio will perform next year based on a 72 hour window of time on a weekend that saw the east coast pummelled in unexpected snow.
Heck, look at How to Train Your Dragon from a few years ago, that didn't have the best opening either but it was a slow burner and actually did quite well in the end.
Mark my words, the buy and hold guys are making a killing on this kind of nonsense.
"Susquehanna Financial Group’s Vasily Karasyov"
I can't believe their analysis, they even made up their own names.
This is what 's wrong with wall street. Even if puss can't make the $600 million plus it'll need to cover it's cost--I'm sure it will sell billions in toys like all dw cartoons.
Hell--even how to train your dragon almost made it's money back--and may have because of home video.
Poor DWA...They can't catch a break even when they make good films.
This isn't just a problem for one film (even though the film is really good) I think all studios have these rising cost concerns. Look at Tangled 260M reported production budget before the P and A. These are huge numbers to try and make a return on.
What is the actual weight of such analysts' comments?
Dreamworks stock may go up or down or up or down... but it isn't out trying to drum up funding by selling more stock right now or in the foreseeable future.
Aside from "Bee Movie" it's making money on all its pics, so there isn't a track record of disaster that would normally be needed to incite big changes.
The actual governing clique of DWA seems not to be a desperate cost-cutting set likely to be panicked by "analysts".
So what is the significance of this analyst group's press release except an attempt to gather attention to themselves? Aren't they basically the Wall Street equivalent of internet trolls?
Sure, Puss n Boots did fine but if it had been a new, original, exciting property, it might have done gangbusters. Face it, the Shrek world is old news in the movie-goers eyes. I'm not saying PIB is a bad film, I'm saying Shrek and Shrek franchises are not worth what they used to be
This analyst groups release is going to get ignored. Greece dropped a bomb on the EU deal and everyone is going to get slammed.
I think regardless of the BO everyone is taking a haircut on stock value...
http://articles.latimes.com/2011/oct/29/business/la-fi-ct-dwa-india-20111029
"Puss in Boots' marks the first time DreamWorks has relied on Indian animators to help produce a full-length feature film. The Bangalore, India, animation studio has become an increasingly important piece of DreamWorks' production pipeline."
"Aside from "Bee Movie" it's making money on all its pics, so there isn't a track record of disaster that would normally be needed to incite big changes."
That's going pretty far back. Going back a bit further, the first 4 or 5 DW features didn't make their money back--until they got their footing with the Shrek product.
Here's hoping they do a stretch of more original films. More films like Dean Dublois' How to Train Your Dragon" would be great.
Hopefully DW'll dump that snail movie now. That is the dumbest idea for a movie I have ever heard.
Over 80% of stocks are owned by the 1% and we are letting these greedy bastards decide what film is a hit or not?
Not to mention that because of the twitchy whims to buy and sell stocks like they're toilet paper they're ruining are retirement funds.
We need a better system where are economy isn't based on these a-holes erratic decisions
"Susquehanna Financial Group?!? Slowly I turned... " :0)
yes the shrek franchise is totally dead, the last shrek only made 70 million opening weekend.... It is so difficult to understand why they would keep flogging a "dead" horse. I am being sarcastic.
70 million dollars is nothing compared to the 108 million dollars that Shrek 2 did back in 2004 or the 124 million dollars that Shrek The Third did in 2007.
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