The TV Show We've Been Waiting For

But maybe it was inevitable, now that Hangover III is in the can.

In the new animated comedy series Mike Tyson Mysteries, Mike Tyson is taking the fight from the boxing ring to the streets… by solving mysteries! Armed with a magical tattoo on his face and a trusty associate by his side — a talking pigeon — if you have a problem that needs solving, Iron Mike is in your corner. The series incorporates live-action appearances featuring Mighty Mike himself, and the gloves come off as the former heavyweight champ and his fowl-mouthed partner gear up for weekly adventures as they put unsolved mysteries — like how to defeat a super computer at chess or why a famous author/werewolf can’t finish his novel — down for the count. Animated quarter-hour from Warner Bros Animation. ...

Bad guys, protect your ears! Click here to read entire post

TAG 401(k) Plan Changes

Regarding America's favorite retirement plans, the Wall Street Journal tells us:

... Participants in 401(k) plans ended 2012 with less than half of their assets invested in stocks, down from 59% at the end of 2006, Chicago-based Spectrem Group reported on Tuesday. That's despite the fact that the S&P 500 stock index rose 6.4% over that period and has more than doubled since it hit bottom in March 2009.

"The population of participants has really remained a little more conservative and really hasn't benefited as much ... (as non-retirement investors) ... from the economic and stock market rallies of the last couple of years," said George H. Walper, Jr., president of Spectrem Group, a market research firm. ...

I spent Thursday afternoon barricaded in a Disney conference room with other trustees of the Animation Guild 401(k) Plan where we mapped out some new alterations to the Plan ...

1) The trustees of the Guild's plan have hired a new 401(k) advisor whose mission will be to get as many new cost efficiencies into the Plan as possible.

2) Trustees have voted to move to the lowest-cost share classes of the mutual funds on the TAG 401(k) Plan platform. (Actively managed stock funds, index stock funds, and SAGIC's bond fund.)

3) Plan administrative costs will become more equitable across the board. Instead of some participants paying large administrative fees and others paying none, starting July 1st costs will be shared by everyone on a pro rata basis.

(What does this mean in the real world? That fees will go up a few basis points for people in Vanguard index funds -- which now pay zero fees. For other funds, costs will go down ... or remain the same.)

More detailed information as it develops.
Click here to read entire post

Inside the Middle Kingdom

China Daily tells a tale of struggle.

In the summer of 2008, Hollywood's animation studios kicked their Chinese counterparts out of the ring in technique and power. To add insult to injury, they did it in true Chinese style.

That was Kung Fu Panda, which took $26 million to become the highest-grossing animation film released in China.
In true plucky underdog style, the humbled, undervalued but newly inspired Chinese animators fought back, and in the summer of 2011 released five features, including the first to use 3D - The Legend of a Rabbit.

Sadly, although they all showed marked improvement in quality of animation and special effects, like the hero bunny's ears, they flopped. The Legend of the Rabbit grossed only 20 million yuan ($3.2 million; 2.47 million euros) in China. It had cost around 150 million yuan to make.

Of course, it didn't help that the superior sequel Kung Fu Panda 2 was released a couple of months before, going on to take a record-breaking $93 million for an animation film in China. ...

It is not enough to do an animated movie cheaply. You must also do it well. Or nobody will come to see your movie ... and you won't be able to stop them.

There will come a time when China produces credible animated features that movie-goers will want to see. I'm just not convinced that the time is near at hand.

But you have to give China credit. It's building infrastructure and training technicians. THe barrier, as always, is creativity. Can the middle kingdom build a culture inside its spanking new facilities that will nurture experimentation and independent thinking. You can't make an animated feature by rote.

But let's give the Chinese credit for perseverance. They're not giving up.

... Dong Fachang is producing The Legend of a Rabbit 2, due for release next year. Perhaps this one will stand up to the might of Kung Fu Panda.

Click here to read entire post

Jesse Santos, 1928-2013

Comic artist and animation designer Jesse Santos died on April 27. A prolific comic-book artist in his native Philippines, he worked for Western Publishing on Dagar the Invincible and The Occult Files of Dr. Spektor. From 1980 until 1999 he worked for DePatie-Freleng, Filmation, Hanna-Barbera and Warner Bros.

Mark Evanier eulogizes him on his blog.


Click here to read entire post

Commerce!

A big reason that animation is being produced in great abundance just now? It's coveted by many distributors.

Netflix has reached an agreement with the Disney/ABC Television group to become the only subscription streaming service to offer the popular children's shows "Jake and the Never Land Pirates" and the animated "Tron: Uprising."

The multiyear licensing deal also brings "Handy Manny," "Special Agent Oso" and "JoJo's Circus" to the movie and television service on a non-exclusive basis. ...

Netflix has been courting families, especially younger viewers, for whom streaming video services come as second nature. It created a "Just for Kids" interface that relies heavily on images, to remove any barriers to finding shows. In February, it partnered with DreamWorks Animation to create an original animated series for the service based on the forthcoming summer family film, "Turbo." ...

Decades ago, employment for t.v. cartoons revolved around seasonal pickups by the Big Three broadcast networks. Most television animation employment was six months on, six months off. You learned to live small and shave your expenses, because you were going to be unemployed at "the end of the broadcast season" for a long stretch of time.

Today, a lot of that has gone away. "Seasons" are what prime-time cartoons go through. Everything else is tied to "orders." As in, "6 episode order," "13 episode order," "24 episode order." The old "Saturday morning cartoon" model is long over. Now it's time-shifting, cable, hand-held devices, and all the rest. And Turbo is being done for Netflix, the well-loved subscription service.

Happily, the speed snail is providing jobs on DWA's t.v. side even as its theatrical side is down-sizing. Click here to read entire post

Starz' Profits Sag

The owner of animation studio Film Roman hits a rough patch.

Starz reported lower earnings as its Netflix deal ended and new affiliation agreements call for smaller subscriber fees.

First quarter net income fell to $57.9 million, or 47 cents per share, from $77.8 million, or 65 cents per share a year ago.

Revenue fell 1% to $399 million primarily because the company's affiliation agreement with Netflix was not renewed. Affiliation agreement with two other distributors renewed in the fourth quarter called for less favorable financial terms. ...

Starz purchased Film Roman several years ago in a stock deal with IDT Entertainment. The company has since decided to spin its cartoon unit off as a separate company. (FR has done The Simpsons for decades now, and also produces Marvel's Spider Man series.) Click here to read entire post

News Corp.'s Little Helper

Rupert and his minions had a good year.

... For the quarter ended March 31, News Corp. earned $2.85 billion, or $1.22 a share, compared with $937 million, or 38 cents a share, in the year earlier period.

Revenue for the quarter increased 14% to $9.54 billion, beating Wall Street estimates. ...

Filmed entertainment, the company's second-largest unit, generated 17% higher revenue, rising to $2 billion. The division posted $289 million in operating income, an increase of 6.3%. The company benefited from the home entertainment releases of "Life of Pi," "Taken 2" and "Ice Age: Continental Drift." ...

Fox is beefing up animation. They're doing more prime time half-hours, and they now distribute DreamWorks Animation's output, the first feature of which is climbing past $500 million.

Company knows how to make money. Click here to read entire post

Royalties?

Good luck.

Harvey Weinstein's hopes of getting Congress to enact a royalty-based compensation system for movie clips played on the web so far appears to be a long shot.

None of the movie industry trade associations are rushing to champion Weinstein's idea.

"While Harvey's ideas are characteristically interesting and provocative, the topic isn't something that we're able to comment on at this time," said Chris Green, supervisor of communications for the Producers Guild of America.

... Weinstein attacked Silicon Valley for profiting from the work of the movie industry without payment to the creative that created the work.

"Look at 'Chicago.' If you go to YouTube, you can download nine songs. There are 13 songs in the entire movie, pretty much 70 or 80 minutes of it. Nobody is getting paid for that. Neither Rob Marshall who directed, me, nor the studio. Nothing," ...

And there are Disney shorts that play on YouTube. And Disney clips. Also a host of other copyrighted material. But nobody seems to ask why companies should collect a big chunk of the money they are currently losing out on. Why not the people who actually created it?

There's an easy answer, of course. Most of the product comes about via "work for hire," and companies own the copyrights. In the U.S. of A., companies hold the power and they line their wallets. The pockets of authors, artists and the rest remain relatively empty.

But now we're in the age of the internet, and everything is free, free, FREEE! All the looting and pillaging must piss off our fine, entertainment conglomerates something fierce. It certainly pisses off entertainment unions since they have a symbiotic relationship with movie companies: they get paid when the Big Boys get paid.

But let's not kid ourselves. If Disney, Viacom, News Corp. and the rest could figure out a way to keep ALL the cash for themselves, they would do it. In the 21st century, however, the big Hollywood players bump up against the technology giants, which (face it) don't share Old Media's interest in paying for what they now distribute (and profit from) for free. Click here to read entire post

Studio Rounds at WBA and WDAS

Now with Add On!

Today was a double studio day, starting at Walt Disney Animation Studios where I had a long talk with a staffer.

We've ramped up to doing one film a year, and the movies are overlapping now. Big Hero Six is taking a story pause, but it'll probably be in production by August or September. Artists are pitching their ideas to to John [Lasseter], and people who are starting to develop something now will have to get at the back of a long line, because there's lots of pictures in development. ... John likes to have environments and worlds and character ideas pitched to him, not honed down plots. ...

It's a good thing that there's so many different projects happening. Not too many years ago there was a lot less movies in work. Another employee told me that Big Hero Six has a couple of Marvel reps who sit in some of the story meetings and kick in suggestions (although Disney artists are doing the boarding and scripting.)

In the afternoon I was at Warner Bros. Animation for a 401(k) enrollment meeting and my usual walk around. WBA's cartoon studion the Warner Ranch is pretty quiet. Most of its current shows have wrapped, and although a couple of new shows are close to greenlight, no crews have been hired. Said one artist:

I keep reading on the internet how Bruce Timm is leaving. But he's not going anywhere. He just stepped down from his executive producer position. He's still here. Still working on his projects. ...

Speaking of projects ...

... [I]t’s no secret that the studio worked for years on a new iteration of the character before both Man of Steel and Bryan Singer’s 2006 film Superman Returns came to fruition. A number of screenwriters and directors tried to crack Superman, and one of the better-known versions that never made it to the screen is the J.J. Abrams-scripted Superman: Flyby. Abrams’ take was an origin story that saw Krypton besieged by a civil war that spills over onto Earth, but it was eventually passed over in favor of Singer’s Returns story.

Steve recently landed an exclusive interview with DC Comics Chief Creative Officer Geoff Johns, and during the course of their conversation Steve asked Johns if DC would ever consider turning one of the many Warner Bros.-owned unproduced screenplays for a superhero movie into a direct-to-video animated feature. Johns revealed that, in fact, that notion has come up before. ...

I think the odds of the above happening is nil. But it's pretty to think that it might. (There are, at present, video features centered around a Great Dane. But then, there are always video features going on that are centered around a Great Dane. Their production will be continuing until the sun reaches its red star phase.

Add On: Disney officially announces Big Hero 6:

Walt Disney Animation Studios is announcing its first movie inspired by a Marvel comic Thursday, an adaptation of a lesser known crime fighter series called “Big Hero 6.”

Directed by Don Hall (“Winnie the Pooh”) and due in 2014, the CG-animated movie will center on a robotics prodigy named Hiro Hamada and his robot companion BayMax, who join a team of superheroes in a high-tech city called San Fransokyo.

(For a closer look at the city of San Fransokyo, see the video above).

Even die-hard comic book fans may have trouble recalling the Marvel series, which was created by Steven T. Seagle and Duncan Rouleau in 1998 and is something of a whimsical love letter to Japanese culture. Characters in the original comic include a samurai, an agent who invented a nanotechnology-based Power Purse and a monster born from a child’s drawings. ...

Disney says that "Marvel Chief Creative Officer Joe Quesada has been participating in brainstorming sessions about the project." (Which is what one of the artists on the third floor of the hat building told me yesterday.)
Click here to read entire post

"Above Expectations"

The Mouse frolics.

Disney reported earnings and revenue that beat Wall Street expectations for the latest quarter on strength in its parks and recreation and studio businesses. The stock shot higher in extended hours trading.

The media giant posted fiscal second-quarter net income of $1.51 billion, a 32 percent increase from the $1.14 billion earned a year earlier. Earnings excluding items were 79 cents a share, up 36 percent from 58 cents a share in the year-earlier period. ...

Robert Iger has done a good job cranking up cash flow and profits for the House of Mouse. Disney has become kind of an entertainment Berkshire-Hathaway (the Warren Buffet conglomerate) that has a lot of different businesses and a lot of moving parts.

Disney today is a lot like Time-Warner. TW still has "Warner" in its corporate title, but it has only a bit less to do with Jack L. Warner and his big brothers than "The Walt Disney Company" has to do with Walt.

Time marches on. Click here to read entire post

Sometimes Rainy, Sometimes Sunny

Visual effects is in melt-down mode in Southern California. But not for everyone.

Shade VFX is the rare California-based visual-effects company today that says it is expanding.

The boutique firm relocated to a new facility in Santa Monica this week that doubles the company's space and includes areas that can accommodate greenscreen shoots.

What makes the move notable is that Shade says its business is thriving at a time when other visual-effects companies are teetering on the brink of financial ruin. ...

It's a funny thing about animation, visual effects, and say, the game industry. Much of it has melded together in the computer age, and as one part is going down the chutes, another is climbing up.

Take the Animation Guild as an example: DreamWorks Animation has gone through major downsizing in the past few months. You'd expect that our membership ranks -- since DWA is a large TAG employer -- would have withered. But such is not the case, because as DreamWorks Animation has become smaller, other animation studios under Guild contract have become larger.

* Walt Disney Animation Studios has two features in production.

* TV animation studios are ramping up work.

* Animation sub-contractors are working on their own projects plus productions from Disney, DreamWorks, Marvel, and others.

Animation has been a boom-and-bust business since the 1930s, with expansion and frenzied hiring followed by lay-offs and bankrupt animation studios. As I've said multiple times before, Disney is the only studio that has been continuously under an IA contract over the last sixty-one years. Even Warner Bros. Animation, which was among the first Hollywood cartoon studios to be unionized, disappeared for a stretch of years.

There is no doubt that the animation/visual effects industry in California is getting tough competition from states and countries offering lower wages and/or government subsidies. But there remains a huge number of designers, animators and programmers working in Los Angeles County, to wit:

TAG Employment -- First Quarter

2010 -- 2,586

2011 -- 2,533

2012 -- 2,669

2013 -- 2,750

Why the upward trendline? Because animation has grown by leaps and bounds for twenty years, and though Southern California has lost market share, the overall market for animated product is immensely bigger. In fact, cartoons are the most dynamic profit center of movie-making, which explains why the employment/production pie has gotten steadily larger.


Click here to read entire post

Ray Harryhuasen, RIP

There's few on the planet who haven't seen his work ... or the work of his direct descendants.

ay Harryhausen, the stop-motion animation legend whose work on "The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms," "Jason and the Argonauts" and other science fiction and fantasy film classics made him a cult figure who inspired later generations of filmmakers and special-effects artists, has died. He was 92.

Harryhausen died Tuesday in London, where he had lived for decades. His death was confirmed by Kenneth Kleinberg, his longtime legal representative in the United States.

In the pre-computer-generated-imagery era in which he worked, Harryhausen used the painstaking process of making slight adjustments to the position of his three-dimensional, ball-and-socket-jointed scale models and then shooting them frame-by-frame to create the illusion of movement. Footage of his exotic beasts and creatures was later often combined with live action. ...

In my long-ago youth, Mr. Harryhausen was THE man. You were an adolescent male, you dug the belligerent skeletons, the cyclops, the flying monsters and all the rest. You didn't know exactly how it was done but you sure as shit knew it grabbed you by the neck hairs.

"Anyone in the world of animation, SFX, or fantasy owes everything to Ray Harryhausen," Andrew Stanton, director of "John Carter," said on Twitter. "A true legend. RIP Sir." ...

Harryhausen was "a source of inspiration, the master of stop motion, and even a voice actor in Elf. His work still holds up." -- John Favreau

Click here to read entire post

Disney Profits

They get reported tomorrow, but the news hounds prognosticate today.

Heading into its fiscal second quarter earnings announcement on Tuesday, Disney shares are trading around an all-time high, up about 50 percent over the past 12 months. With analysts growing increasingly optimistic this quarter, and the majority of analysts rating the company a "buy," the big question is whether the media giant will beat expectations. ...

This quarter the studio, bolstered by "Oz: The Great and Powerful," faces easy comparisons to the year-ago quarter when big budget "John Carter" bombed. Perhaps even more important than this past quarter's films, are the current quarter's, including "Iron Man 3," which opened last weekend with the second biggest U.S. box office debut ever—$175 million. ...

Analysts are projecting Disney's fiscal second quarter revenue to grow 9 percent to $10.49 billion, while earnings per share are projected to grow 32 percent to 76 cents. ...

Say what you will about Robert Iger, he has presided over steady growth during his time at the helm of Diz Co.

So I get the logic of cutting wages and personnel from various divisions. He wants to keep expenses down when the Mouse shells out heavy coin for the Lucas companies, the Marvel Company, etc. I'm just not sure I agree with all the thinking in that direction.

But what do I know? I'm a Marxist-Socialist labor thug. Click here to read entire post

Five Hundred Bucks A Week

... and no benefits.

Eliza Skinner has spent the past year writing jokes for the E! television show Fashion Police. Skinner pens about 200 jokes per episode (almost a full work week’s as far as ‘hours worked’), pitching them at a weekly meeting with the host, Joan Rivers, and the show’s producers. For this, she is paid roughly $500 a week.

What is unique about this arrangement, in comparison with Hollywood norms, is the intensity of the work (the 30-40 hours of work are usually compressed into 3 days), and the meagerness of the compensation. Fashion Police writers’ paychecks say: “Hours worked: 8” every week, regardless of the actual time spent on crafting their contributions to the show. This exploitation is especially galling because the tempo of TV production often requires marathon stretches on the writer’s part: as long as 17 hours in a row, in the case of awards specials. “8 hours. $500,” Skinner marvels. “To write a hit TV show–– one of the top rated shows on the network.”

So on April 13, Skinner and her fellow writers at Fashion Police went on strike.

Some time ago (1988, to be precise) I was a teacher at Stoneridge Prep, a private school in Tarzana, that paid the princely sum of $350 per week. I was an English teacher handling five classes at three different grade levels, and usually put in a fifty-hour week.

Like Ms. Skinner, I had no benefits. And though I didn't write jokes for Joan Rivers, I did get to grade Drew Barrymore's English papers.

So I can identify.

You never know how shitty "white collar" jobs can be until you've worked some of the shittier ones. I hope Ms. Skinner is on the winning side of the strike; she more than deserves union benefits and more respect. (In 1988, I didn't have the balls to do what she is doing. I simply quit the teaching gig at the end of the school year and got a writing job at Filmation -- which was A) union, and B) paid a lot more money WITH benefits.) Click here to read entire post

Catch Up Retirement

Since I seem to meet people in the Boomer category who haven't thought much about saving for retirement ... or simply think they can't, here's some ideas.

Don't worry about the contribution not being enough and just start small. Have loose change in your pocket? Save it. Get a raise? Save that too. The most important step to take is the first one. ...

Utilize tax deferral options fully. Most people in their 50s who don't have enough saved for retirement should focus their attention on contributing to a 401(k) and traditional IRAs. ...

Consider whether you can downsize expenses. I don't like to use the phrase "downsizing your lifestyle" because not every reduction in spending is really a sacrifice. I recently cut my cable bill and joined Netflix via their free trial offer. ...

Don't be too aggressive with your investments. It’s tempting to increase the risk level of your investments to try to reach your financial goals faster, but that would be a huge mistake. ...

Lots of artists are visually oriented and can't work up a lot of enthusiasm for investing, for poring over stock prospectuses or trying to figure out how much they should allocated to bonds and how much to equities (stocks). Bo-ring.

But anybody can make it simple, and relatively effective. When you're in your twenties, thirties or early forties, divvy up the money into three index funds: 33.3% into Total U.S. Stock Market, 33.3% into Total International Stock Market, and 34% into Total Bond Market.

When you hit 45-60, split the money 50%/50% between stocks and bonds, and when you enter geezerhood, slide the bond portfolio up to 60%-66% of your portfolio. (None of this hs to be complicated, the major trick is: not bailing when one fund or another goes south. (Some people "stay the course" better than other people.)

Lastly, I've got 401(k) enrollment coming up over the next few weeks. Find times and locations below.

401(k) Enrollment Meeting Dates

Disney

Disney Feature - Southside Bldg.
Tue. May 14th, 10 am Rm. 1300

DisneyToon
Thur. May 16th, 2 pm,
Conf. Rm. 101

Disney TVA - Sonora Bldg.
Wed. May 22nd, 10 am, Rm. 1172

Disney TVA - Empire Cntr..
Wed. May 22nd, 2 pm, Rm. 5223

Cartoon Network
Wed. May 15th, 1 pm,
Main Conf. Rm.

Dreamworks Animation
Thur. May 30th, 2 pm,
Dining Rm. B&C

Dreamworks - Dragons
Thur. May 23rd, 2 pm,
Main Conf. Rm.

Fox TV Animation
Wed. June 5th, 2 pm,
Main Conf. Rm.

Marvel Animation
Thur. June 13th, 10 am,
Marvel Anim. Conf. Rm.

Nickelodeon
Wed. May 29th, 2 pm,
Main Conf. Rm.

Robin Red Breast
Tue. May 21st, 2 pm,
Large Conf. Rm.
Santa Monica Bldg.

Starz/Film Roman
Tue. May 28th, 2 pm,
“Glass” Conf. Rm.

Sony Pictures Animation
Tue. June 4th, 2 pm,
North - Rm 2050

Warner Bros. Animation
Wed. May 8th, 2 pm,
Bldg. 34R - Main Conf. Rm. 107

And a reminder to TAG members: Our "investing for retirement" panel/seminar happens on Tuesday, May 28 after the General Membership Meeting. Click here to read entire post

Wired Big Screens

DreamWorks Animation purchase of AwesomenessTV isn't a Out There as it might have been a couple of years ago. And that's because ...

Households with broadband Internet access are increasingly piping Internet video to their TV sets, through a variety of devices.

... [T]he speed at which television moves off of cable and onto the Internet will be determined largely by what people decide to do in their living rooms. ...

More than half of them -- 56% of all households with broadband Internet access -- now have at least one TV set connected to the Internet, according to a report from Diffusion Group, "Defining the In-Home CE and Network Ecosystem 2013." About two-thirds of the nation's homes have broadband. ...

Smart TVs are coming on strong, growing faster than dedicated Internet-to-TV devices like Roku or Apple TV. About 14% of broadband households own a dedicated device, while about 25% own a smart TV. Ownership of smart TVs has doubled over the past year, while ownership of dedicated devices grew by only two percentage points. ...

The big movie companies are still trying to figure out how to master all the new delivery pipelines and maximize their profits.

Cable systems, I think, will soon be Yesterday's Gatekeepers, losing power and market share the same way broadcast networks started losing it decades ago. The entertainment landscape keeps getting divided and subdivided, and distributors and content providers have to figure out a way to stay relevant and profitable in the age of YouTube.

Who looks at shows when they're piped into the house, after all? People know they can store them for later or pull them out of the Cloud. Makes things a wee bit tougher for our fine, entertainment conglomerates. but they'll figure something out.

They always do. Click here to read entire post

Fox's New Non-Signator Animation Studio

Rupert and his minions have always had Blue Sky back east in the tri-state area. But now they have a newer studio in Hollywood, a few miles from their unionized version on Wilshire Boulevard.

... Nick Weidenfeld [is] head of Fox Broadcasting's new ADHD Studios ...

ADHD stands for Animation Domination High-Def, an extension of the stalwart Sunday animation block Fox built on two decades of “The Simpsons” and newer hits like “Family Guy.” But in this incarnation, ADHD — a not-so-sly allusion to attention deficit hyperactivity disorder — is aimed at an audience that expects the kind of content it can’t see on TV, and for which the Internet is the first screen. ...

The new 12,500-square-foot studio on Sunset Boulevard, down the street from the Cat & Fiddle pub, now houses more than 100 staffers. Fox owns the ADHD Studios facility, but the network licenses content from Weidenfeld’s Friends Night production company.

TAG has had ADHD on its radar for the last few months. Like many non-union studios, it offers artists lower wages and fewer benefits than the TAG variety (such a deal.)

But hey. If you can't pay your staff less money, what point is there in being non-union?

What I've always enjoyed about our fine conglomerates is, no matter how many of their studios you sign to a contract, there are always more low-rent facilities popping up.

They come in two varieties: The wholly-owned subsidiary, and the independently owned "sub-contractor" that is at least partially (and often wholly) dependent on the Big Five Entertainment conglom's largesse to keep its doors open.

Either way, TAG -- or any other guild/union -- has to find a way to get them under contract to keep wages up for everybody. Click here to read entire post

Your International B.O.

Iron Man 3 is a giant, ravenous squid sucking up various global currencies, but there are other movies in the marketplace doing rather well.

Foreign (Worldwide) Box Office

Iron Man 3 -- $175,900,000 ($680,100,000)

Oblivion -- $6,500,000 ($222,768,615)

The Croods -- $17,400,000 ($520,443,159)

GI Joe -- $1,200,000 ($355,857,316)

Olympus Fallen -- $2,500,000 ($132,364,879)

I assume that the Cave Family will surpass $600 million in global box office before it's all over. Click here to read entire post

The Analyst's Prediction

What's called "the smart money" tells us what will succeed during the summer season.

Doug Creutz of Cowen and Co. picked his “Dirty Dozen” list of movies that he figures will account for about 70 percent or more of this summer’s total domestic box office. ... Creutz estimates Iron Man 3 will top out at $350 million domestically. His pick for the second biggest film of the summer is Monsters University, which he figures will earn $275 million.

Next on his list is a tie at $250 million between Star Trek Into Darkness and Despicable Me 2.

The rest of his Dirty Dozen: The Hangover Part III ($225 million); Man of Steel ($220 million); Fast & Furious 6 ($220 million); The Wolverine ($190 million); Turbo ($171 million); a tie between The Great Gatsby and Pacific Rim, ($150 million); and Grown Ups 2 ($125 million).

The titles he thinks are most at risk of not performing as well as he has predicted: The Wolverine, Pacific Rim and Turbo.

Titles having only a “reasonable chance” of cracking the Top 12 this summer are Epic, The Heat and The Internship; and This is the End and Smurfs 2. ...

Kindly note that there are four animated titles (one of them a hybrid) which are candidates for The Magic Twelve.

Me, I would estimate that of the animated contingent, Epic has the highest likelihood of under-performing. The trailers are gorgeous, but movies from William Joyce books have a tendency to do less well at theatre turnstiles.

For the rest of the cartoon features, I think most will gross in the $400 million to $600 million range at the world box office.

Smurfs 2 is the sequel to the first blockbuster feature starring the tiny blue people. My assumption is the followup will repeat the box office hat trick, landing between $550-$650 million when all the folding money is counted.

And I've already made my glorious predictions about the other animated releases here.

Global Box Office

Monsters University -- $527 million

Turbo -- $445 million

Epic -- $345 million

Despicable Me 2 -- $501 million

I made the guesses directly above two weeks ago, but of course I could have my head far up my large intestine. It wouldn't surprise me if each of these titles did $50 million to $150 million more than I think they will.
Click here to read entire post

Weekend Grosses

Beginning with Friday's take.

1) IRON MAN 3 -- $68,312,000

2) PAIN AND GAIN -- $2,345,000 ($28,664,000)

3) 42 -- $1,790,000 ($73,916,000)

4) OBLIVION -- $1,700,000 ($71,872,000)

5) THE BIG WEDDING -- $1,200,000 ($11,535,000)

6) THE CROODS -- $945,000 ($165,463,000) ...

The Croods has been hanging in nicely and will move past $170 million (domestic) easily.

Meantime, the new Marvel/Disney picture looks to be sucking up a lot of box office oxygen. No big surprise there.

Box Office Weekend Numbers

1) Iron Man 3 -- $175.3 million

2) Pain and Gain -- $7.6 million ($78.3 million)

3) 42 -- $6.2 million ($78.3 million)

4) Oblivion -- $5.8 million ($76 million)

5) The Croods (7); $4.2 ($168.7 million) -37%

6) The Big Wedding $3.9 million ($14.2 million)

7) Mud -- $2.2 million ($5.2 million)

8) Oz Great and Powerful -- $1.8 million ($228.6 million)

9) Scary Movie 5 -- $1.4 million ($29.6 million)

10) G.I. Joe: Retaliation -- $1.3 million ($118.8 million)

So as the greenbacks roll in, Iron Man 3 sees the second biggest domestic gross ever, and The Croods has the second smallest drop in the Top Ten, remaining at #5. The summer box office season has begun.

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