Much like the Peak Oil analogy, the concept where all the easy oil-wells (cue The Beverly Hillbillies theme, or wailing Middle Eastern aria) have been tapped and exploited and now we either have to drill way off into the ocean, or remove copious amounts of sulphur to get good, usable hydrocarbons or by brute processing force, extract it from the sticky tar sands. Thus several treatments of Superman, Batman, Spiderman, and the popular mutants of the X-Men have yielded their massive cash bounties, nowhere more greater than the summer of 2012 where The Avengers and The Dark Knight Rises reaping box-office windfall (albeit at very high production and marketing costs).
The origin story has been done to death (albeit, The Amazing Spiderman trotted it out once again.) And with it (hopefully) passing, it invites more complex things like the tableaux of societal anxiety in the Nolan Batmans, flirtations with classical tragedy in Ang Lee’s Hulk, period-pieces like Fist Class and Captain America, the universe-slash-continuity building with Marvel Studios across many different characters or even the risky The Last Temptation Christ experiment in Superman Returns.
My question to you is this, with smaller comic book properties such as Ant Man in production, but really, just a slew of sequels and spin offs (Ironman, Thor, Wolverine, Robin) or team ups (Avengers 2, Justice League, Guardians Of The Galaxy) or the eventual reboot of Batman, do you think we’ve hit the peak of Box-Office, at this point, and that the slide (slow or fast) down the curve (with ever increasing budgets to make these things) will convince the major Hollywood Studios to start looking for another trend to get on board with for their big summer tentpoles? Or do you think that things are here to stay, and a more experimental, extracting black gold from the tar sands approach will yield the continuation of a golden age of Comic Book Superhero Films?
A primer of both the optimistic and not so optimistic views from last year, The Great Comic Book Movie Debate:
Completely agree with the long-term strategy point. Now that J.J. has left the building and I hope all his...
Of course not. THE AVENGERS demonstrates that we’re only at the beginning of this – the end of phase one, to use Marvel’s marketing term.
About ten years ago when there was a Starbucks on every corner in every major city in North America, one of the guys inside that organization said something along the lines of “we’re coming to the end of our initial phase and ready to start our rapid expansion phase.” Which sounded insane at the time, but when you consider the kind of market depth Starbucks actually wants, makes sense. I think we’re at the head of a similar rapid expansion period for comic book movies – I doubt we’ll see a slowdown again for at least another decade at this point. Hell, cinema itself will probably be over and done with before comic book movies…
I hope that Marvel plans ultimately fail. I do not want blockbusters to follow the comic book, continuation structure.
This is my fear as well, and while I did genuinely enjoy THE AVENGERS, I’ve always been uncomfortable with Marvel Studios’ assembly line approach towards their product.
I hope that Matt Brown is right in that more genuine risk taking will happen over reboots and endless versions of the same few characters, but my fear is that audiences can punish financially this sort of risk taking. Currently, however, the Batman franchise with Nolan has proved my anxieties to be false…But how many Chris Nolans are out there?
Are we at peak in terms of Box office? Probably not. Are we at peak in terms of interesting content? Most likely.
People will continue to flock to films with characters who can fly and blow shit up with their minds or tightrope walk to the moon with nifty gadgets. When Iron Man 12 comes out, people will go as long as the budget is there and it “looks cool” – no matter how inane it is.
Anything of depth or interest will likely not get made as it would be divisive. And studios tend to not put billions into anything divisive.
Also, it may seem like peak right now, but for every Nolan Batman or Avengers, you have a Green Lantern, Green Hornet or a Spider-man clone; so it kind of balances the genre out.
And OP’s point is well taken – glance at what we have to look forward to in the near future: all sequels, rebooted origin stories or team-ups. And he forgot to mention Hellboy III. Will Hellboy get drunk and fight another giant plant monster? Probably, but this time it will be purple instead of red or green, so people will pay money to see that. Especially if he fights a giant CGI army for the last 45 minutes of the film.
I hope we’re done with this sub-genre soon as it is tired. Very very tired.
Hellboy is awesome. Take it back.
Or prepare to die.
Hellboy is more awesome when drawn by Mignola, Corben or Fegredo but the movies are pretty good too.
Mike Mignola is drawing the new Hellboy series after everything came to a final close recently. It’s going in a very different direction.
Hellboy is a bad example for Andrew to bring up, since the with a single writer controlling everything there is progression to the storyline in the comic. While there might be a short stories with Hellboy fighting the monster of the week, it’s not where the character is anymore, just a piece of the past.
The movie is balls. I’m not getting into that again.
I know your feelings. I was just provoking.
Does Hellboy become the destroyer of the world and fulfill his prophecy or does something else happen? The story of the 3rd one should move the story forward and do something different from the last 2.
They simply don’t have the budget to do what was done with the comics: huge army of the noble dead of Britain (aka old knights in armor), versus an queen of the witches fighting in the form of a giant dragon. However, they have already taken Hellboy in a different direction introducing a kid.
Hellboy SPOILERS
This is for Andrew James who isn’t likely to read the Hellboy comic.
SPOILERS
SPOILERS
SPOILERS
SPOILERS
SPOILERS
SPOILERS
SPOILERS
SPOILERS
SPOILERS
SPOILERS
SPOILERS
SPOILERS
SPOILERS
SPOILERS
SPOILERS
SPOILERS
Last chance… avoid this:
The latest Hellboy comic they wrap up a bunch of on going storylines and then kill him off. A witch rips out Hellboy’s heart and he turns to stone and crumbles into ash.
Also Hellboy doesn’t win and stops the apocalypse. He sort of delays it a bit, to give B.P.R.D. a chance to fight it off. All cross the world countries are invaded by all sorts of H. P. Lovecraft-like monsters and it seems like B.P.R.D. are almost fighting a losing battle. The new B.P.R.D. comics even now have the subtitle “Hell on Earth” as it becomes almost a post-apocalyptic storyline for the survive of the human race.
It’s a great payoff and I would love to see them do even a small amount of this in Hellboy 3. But it wouldn’t be just the same old as the first 2 movies.
The new Hellboy comic is called Hellboy in Hell, picking up in his afterlife in hell and apparently will be very abstract. Mike Mignola’s Hell will apparently be borrowing from all sorts of different mythologies making up different parts and levels of Hell.
I doubt they will ever get to a Hellboy 4, as these movies were never hugely successful, but if they did once again it wouldn’t be more of the same but something very different.
“Are we at peak in terms of Box office? Probably not. Are we at peak in terms of interesting content? Most likely.”
I’m actually arguing that the initial box-office may invite more risk taking, and yield better films, but the box-office will diminish.
Well I hope you’re right, but I don’t think so. Why would a studio knowingly go down a path towards less money? Since I don’t give a twat about dollar signs, I’m all for more interesting content. It would get me back into these types of films – I thought Capt. America was a start.
Admittedly, I like The Avengers a lot (going to go again with the gf when it hits second screens), but that’s about as far as it goes. I don’t think I’m really interested in Avengers II and III. Will I see them? Probably. Will I think they’re good? Probably not. So again, I’ll be contributing to the box office but the content won’t be of much interest or depth.
” Are we at peak in terms of interesting content? Most likely.”
Absolutely wrong. We’re clearly at the beginning of interesting content. What we’ve seen so far have been the most mainstream, base-hit superheroes – Iron Man, Superman, Batman, Spider-Man, blah blah blah.
We have only begun to crack the lid of what can be done with the more obscure, complex characters. Films like THE AVENGERS will drive Marvel and DC (and hopefully Dark Horse while we’re at it) to take bigger chances with their titles – chances which might not pay off (per HULK and SUPERMAN RETURNS) but could yield a far wider and more comprehensive field of genre movies.
I return to Price’s parallel from our podcast and in the debate above: look at the superhero genre like the western. We’re about at the end of the 40s right now. Think about what the 50s, 60s, and 70s brought in that genre.
AGREED! This is EXACTLY my point, which begs the question will audiences embrace more edgy content or scope. They said yes to Nolan’s Post-911 America, but resoundingly no to The Green Lantern’s Space Police BIG BIG Universe. But then they embraced The Avengers BIG BIG Universe. But goofier oddball comics like Johah Hex and Ghost Rider have been met with complete indifference. Ditto The Punisher no matter how many times they reboot him.
Which is exactly what I said above.
People will go to proven properties. They won’t go to more experimental or thought provoking stuff. Since studios know this, they won’t make them for fear of losing money. So they go back and make Spider-man. Again. The exact same Spider-man as the one made ten years ago. Or Superman. Again.
If they do go back and make the “lesser-known” super hero stuff, they won’t put much money into and get lesser or new-comer directors (Jimmy Hayward) or stifle their creativity (Michel Gondry) so the movie will be shit.
I don’t care about Ant-Man movie, but an Edgar Wright Ant-Man sounds awesome!
Punisher they really messed up, then this little fan-film comes out of no where that is quite great. Perhaps Marvel might have a better crack at the character.
We’re clearly at the beginning!? With what example would you base this assumption on?
“We have only begun to crack the lid of what can be done with the more obscure, complex characters.”
Like who?
With what example do you conclude that we’re at the end?
Like who: Ant Man, Guardians of the Galaxy. Neither of those would have been greenlit even a year ago. Hell, three months ago nobody even knew what the Guardians of the Galaxy were.
What examples do I have? I already gave several. I think re-making the EXACT SAME Spider-man movie ten years later speaks volumes about the sub-genre. I think Green Lantern and Green Hornet are pretty good examples too. I don’t think John Carter was a comic, but it’s of that same ilk (sci-fi hero saving the day with super powers) and it was panned. Plus all of the other sequels and reboots that have been mentioned. So why would Hollywood see this and decide to try and keep doing something different when they’re constantly critically destroyed and/or not making any money? What other examples do I have to give?
There is plenty of evidence to show that Hollywood is rehashing the same old same old over and over and over again with very mixed results. Will Superman be cool? Yeah maybe; I’l see it. But they just rebooted it 5 years ago. And they rebooted that 25 years before. Again, people go to a lot of this out of curiosity and/or because it looks cool (which I’m not saying is a bad thing; it just is what it is).
So again, what I want to know is why you think we’re on the cusp of something spectacular. It would be great if we were – I’d LOVE to see some awesome, new and creative ideas come out of the super hero comic book world, I really would. I just don’t see that happening. Ant-man may very well turn out to be awesome, but who’s going to go see it? No one’s heard of it and it’s directed by Edgar Wright, whose last three films made about $65 million domestically combined.
Are you automatically discounting Reboots and Sequels entirely? That seems foolish.
I need a SCUD the Disposable Assassin comedy.
THAT should be the Edgar Wright comic book movie.
Oh My God Goon I kinda love you for knowing what SCUD is.
Although I doubt that level of insanity is translatable, so much of that book is how Schrab messes with the page layout and the structure of the conflicts.
Anything is possible however.
Seriously, I admire your hope and enthusiasm for a sub-genre you clearly love. But I don’t see anything that shows we’re about to bust loose with new and exciting material. All I see is example after example of films that show us the exact opposite.
And here, you bemoan the lack of existing examples while talking about the future. Because you’re “that way.”
Frankly, I think it is almost certain after this year of empowered women, and the great successes of Avengers, Batman3 and SpidermanRB, that there will be a Wonder Woman movie go into production, maybe even with the Joss Whedon treatment (even if he is too busy to direct it) for which I have but two words:
Gina (fucking) Carano.
She would be my pick too, but that property has a lot more problems going for it over casting.
I have tons of examples from the future (2013):
Hellboy 3, Ironman 3, Superman again, Avengers 2, Thor 2, Fantasic 4, G.I. Joe 2 (or is it 3 now?), X-Men 5, rumors of a Spawn reboot, Hancock 2, rumors of a Wanted 2, Wolverine…
Yeah, we’re clearly on the cusp of new and exciting things.
EMPIRE STRIKES BACK IS ONE OF YOUR FAVORITE MOVIES.
Jesus Christ. Do people not read? I’m not saying sequels are bad. I’m saying that the entire genre as whole is made up of entirely old ideas and characters and there is no evidence that is going to change that groundwork it has laid for the past thirty years.
Whether or no I like Iron Man 2 or Empire Strikes Back has NOTHING to do with this conversation.
But for the record, I like Episode IV better.
It does though because your perception of “I’m saying that the entire genre as whole is made up of entirely old ideas and characters” is built up by the FILMS and not the source. Which is ludicrous to do to a genre of film which has only really been going for 12 years.
70 Years of Comics
12 Years of Movies
Which do you want to put stock in?
The potential for an amazing Avengers II is there. I really hope Marvel convinces Joss Whedon for one more round, to go with Thanos. Opening scene, Thanos kills half of all sentient life in the universe, including half the population of Earth and goes from there. Sure, Whedon gets some criticism about killing people off too much, but he is so good at milking the story potential of this.
There is always possibility for growth. However I am not sure any more interesting film makers than the ones we have already gotten will ever feel the need to take a stab.
You can tell all the themes, settings, characters in Science Fiction & Fantasy just you remove the tights.
In that way Superheroes were born in Comics and as such will always work the best in the format in which they were created within. As good as these Superhero movies get they will never compare to just really good other genres of movies or the original comic stories that have a certain level of craft.
If anything the films / business practices I have seen the departure of Nolan signals the decline for me.
In the comic book debate above, I should have perhaps made the argument that Comic Book Superhero is not a genre, but a sub-genre of sci-fi (and to a degree, action)?
Maybe not, considering all the sci-fi (horror, comedy, action, romance) mash-ups that have happened in the past 25 years, Sci-Fi is genre that is often a way of re-working another genre.
The lack of good action stars (at least by 80s standards – the good old fashioned musclemen that all appear in The Expendables -which I supposes is a questionable benchmark) is due to both the meterosexualization of action stars via Keanu Reeves, Matt Damon (Neo, Bourne), Mark Wahlberg (Shooter, Contraband) and JGL (Inception, Looper) and also the super-powered CGI related stars (RDJ, Tobey MacGuire, etc.) of the comic book films….but I digress. What was my point? Oh, yea, comic book movies are just a fusion of Sci-Fi and Action genres that happen to come from the funny-books with a very devoted fan-base…
I should also be clear about the nature of my post. I’m not saying that all comic book movies will fail, or that some risk will pay off while others will not, but rather 20 years from now, when we look back at box-office and cultural conversation, I think that 2012 will be the “PEAK” year. We’re probably in for at least a decade of these…
And as Matt points out above, how much time does Cinema have left in it? 25 years at most?
Still: 130 years is a good run for anything.
“How much time does Cinema have left in it? 25 years at most?”
That is a sad thought. Do you really think is a possibility?
If the theatrical experience dies out — in my opinion, it will be the death to cinema. It too easy to pirate stuff, which will make it hard for studios to fund mulitimilion dollars projects without theatrical revenue.
Its hard to say.
Cinema, has survived in part because it gives you something you can’t get at home. Earlier access to movies, it has a communal or public element, and its generally better than your home system. Even if your home system has a great screen and sound, I doubt the screen is bigger than your local theater. There is an immersion there that can’t be replicated at home. People also like destinations. Friday night at the movies is more appealing than Friday night at my couch (although my couch is pretty nice).
If cinema, can maintain these advantages over home theater systems, I don’t see why it would go away.
Then again, I like physical books. It amazes me that independents and chain book stores can survive in the e-reader and internet age. I wouldn’t bet on book stores being around in any major way after 10 years. Maybe cinema is the same.
Movies like Avengers make so much money and only by appealing to such a large bloody audience, it’s hard to predict what *that* many people will do in the future.
So 2012 could very well be the peak of the box office potential of superhero movies with Avengers, The Amazing Spider-Man & The Dark Knight Rises making a ridiculous amount of money between the 3 of them.
Will Iron Man 3 make more than the other 2 Iron Man movies? Will Avengers 2 make more than Avengers 1? Since new superhero movies continue to break box office records, I wouldn’t be surprised if they continue do so in the future. Even if nothing tops having 3 big superhero movies out in the same summer.
That said, I really don’t think we have reached the peak in the creatively. The future looks interesting and there are still a lot of great stories to mine in the future. As I mentioned before, now that they have set up these characters and people are familiar with them, they can approach some of the interesting storylines like the X-men is doing with Days of Future Past. With Bryan Singer & Matthew Vaughn in control for a good adaption, rather than Brett Ratner not giving a damn and making a complete mess of the Dark Phoenix Saga & Joss Whedon’s Astonishing X-Men storyline in X3.
So when is Row Three going to bemoan the constant reboots of Anna Karenina, Pride and Prejudice, The Great Gatsby, Shakespeare et al?
Oh wait, you like those movies so you don’t complain about it, but the moment someone else gets something they enjoy you lay on the floor and throw a temper tantrum.
I do enjoy your projections into a future of this website seemingly going soft on things because the source was classic literature instead of comic books.
They already do.
In the OP, Kurt is making no assumptions about any genre other than Comic Book Super Heroes.
The question isn’t whether we like them or not, it’s whether they will be viable in 10, 15, 20 years.
And I said they will continue to be made and they will continue to make money. I just don’t think the content will ever be of anything new or interesting outside of an exception here and there.
That sound like you are describing all of film, not just Superhero film.
He is, he just chooses to ignore it. Which is my entire point.
No, actually I’m not. That’s a completely different conversation.
I’m not taking aim at sequels and reboots. The question is whether people will continue to see them. And the answer is yes.
“All of film” is not remakes or reboots and if you want to compare Another Earth or Bernie within the same conversation about the viability of super hero blockbuster films, like Iron Man 3, be my guest.
Actually Andrew, you are taking aim at sequels and reboots when one of the examples you cite as the dearth of quality for the Superhero genre is a remake of Spider-man 10 years after the first film came out.
Extending that rationale/argument to other genres, then musicals/stage adaptations aren’t viable because Les Mis is being remade again, dramas/book adaptations aren’t viable because The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo was remade two years after the original version and so on and so forth. It’s a reductive fallacy you’re citing and you’re subjectively applying it to a genre that you personally don’t find interesting while failing to apply it to the genres you do enjoy.
“I’m saying that the entire genre as whole is made up of entirely old ideas and characters and there is no evidence that is going to change that groundwork it has laid for the past thirty years.”
This is an absolute argument that you can’t possibly make with a straight face as it can only hold any merit if one has watched every comic book film and read every comic ever written. Plainly stated, you can’t claim that an entire genre is _____ unless you actually have examined the entire genre. Also, when arguing in such absolutes then it only requires one single example and the entire argument is rendered invalid. Conversely, if you really want to stick to your guns with that argument then anyone can apply it to any genre.
“I’m saying that (animation/musicals/westerns/sci-fi/etc) as whole is made up of entirely old ideas and characters and there is no evidence that is going to change that groundwork it has laid for the past thirty years.”
It sounds ridiculous in any context.
Actually no, if you’ll remember I was openly against Fincher’s Dragon Tattoo and wasn’t real fond of its remake. I’ve never seen any version of Les Mis so this will be new to me and I’m excited for it. And at the risk of digging myself into a very deep hole, I would apply it to any genre. So yes, if every single big budget drama/comedy was a remake or sequel year after year, I would label the genre the same way and would probably stop spending so much time at the cinema. I try to stay away from remakes and comedy sequels as I know I probably won’t enjoy them (Funny Games, Hangover 2, Insomnia, Dragon Tattoo, True Grit, etc.). Of course there are exceptions to that rule from time to time (I like some trilogies and a remake from something very old now and again), but that’s because there are 50 dramas that I can choose from during the summer and only about 3-4 super hero movies.
I never said “adaptations” are not viable; not sure where you got that notion. And while we’re at it, I also didn’t say super hero movies wouldn’t be “viable“. In fact, I said just the opposite. People will continue going to super hero comic book movies and they will continue to make a shitload of money, ergo extremely viable.
“This is an absolute argument that you can’t possibly make with a straight face as it can only hold any merit if one has watched every comic book film and read every comic ever written.”
First off, I’m not really arguing anything; I’m prognosticating towards what I think the future of super hero comic book movies will be as presented by OP and evidence I’ve looked at – which is that they’ll do just fine. Secondly, I have to watch every single super hero comic book movie ever made to have an opinion about them? Ludicrous. And once again, we’re not even talking about every single comic ever made, we’re talking about the big tent-pole releases that carry the box office every year – so in that case, yes, I worded my phrasing poorly when I said the genre as a whole. I should’ve said the genre as related to what we’re talking about based on OP. So the statement holds true in that case (just look at the releases slated for 2013 alone; yikes!). Third, no I don’t need to have read any actual books (comic or otherwise) to have an opinion about any movie ever made.
If you think “all of film” is never new or interesting outside of an exception here and there, then why on earth are you watching them!? Because I don’t think that at all.
How best to explain this…….
Superhero films have existed in the public consciousness as they do now since X-Men in 2000. That is 12 years of movies and depending on who you ask there is a handful of assorted ones that stand out among the pack to them.
If you extrapolate that to all film, and you asked people to pick all the movies that stand out from the pack to them, I would bet on average the RATIO of standout to total is the same between Superhero films and film in general.
I am not saying film is rarely interesting, I am saying film has more chances to be because there are proportionately more films that come out.
Yeah that’s maybe a fair and true point and I agree to some extent. But isn’t that kind of the problem considering the movies we’re talking about here make up a very significant amount at the box office?
I mean there are 1000 dramas that come out each year and I can go see 20 of them and feel good about 19 of them (A Separation, Magic Mike, Bernie, Moonrise Kingdom, Seeking a Friend, etc.). I can skip the others. With super hero movies, “everyone” sees them all each year because there are only about 4 or 5 of them. And the ratio of anything new or interesting is maybe 1:5 if you’re lucky. Next year it looks like it will be about 1:10.
I’m not sure how to explain it other than to say I don’t think the ratios matter much. At the end of the year, I can say I saw 50 movies that were terrific with new and interesting stories and characters. None of those were super hero movies. Yet if you add up box office numbers, the super hero movies add up to 50x the box office numbers of all the other movies I saw in the year combined. That’s a problem.
There will continue to be bad superhero movies, bad reboots and bad sequels. That doesn’t mean at the same time there won’t be some good movies in there.
Looking at the creativity side of things, if there was a peak, I’m not sure I would called 2012 it. I didn’t like the Amazing Spider-Man and though the Dark Knight Rises was the weakest of the Chris Nolan Batman’s. I didn’t get around to see Ghost Rider 2, but it didn’t look that great. So to me the only solid superhero movie of 2012 was the Avengers.
2011 was a better year with: Xmen: First Class, Thor, Captain America, Batman: Year One animated, All-Star Superman animated.
That said, I expect better superhero movies in the future, but that doesn’t mean we won’t have bad superhero movies. That say Man Of Steel with their “grounded” Superman won’t suck or that Marvel won’t drop the ball with Iron Man 3.
However, I still think there will be some good superhero movies to come and others that will knock it out of the park. That doesn’t mean Warner Brothers will be successful in making a new Batman movie.
Andrew why is that a problem? Box Office isn’t tied to your enjoyment. Tentpole Blockbusters that make all the money in the sweltering summer are only someones cup of tea for a short period of their lives. The current trend is those movies right now have become superhero affair.
I think the films are at their peak for exposure, however I don’t link that with quality or interesting ideas because as it stands 2 of the Super Hero films of the past two years are films I will have any desire to go back to or remember any part of.
Gamble: I don’t think it’s fair to even compare your silly little comic books to classic works of literature. Of course Anna Karina, The Scarlet Letter and Bill Shakesepare get a free pass and every adaptation of their works is almost flawless.
I think we should always be critical of those made-for-kids printed on pulp silliness of men in tights beating each other up and posing in costume.
/trolling.
Well that is because for you it is easier to make the ridiculous claim that studios are going to stop making Blockbusters because they cost too much. Please Halfyard, provide some actual evidence that studios are, in fact, cutting back on the cost of tent poles due to financial constraints. Of course you won’t find it, but I’m sure you subscribe to the Hollow Earth “Theory” as well. Lack of evidence just proves how deep the conspiracy run, amiright Halfyard?
Then, you correlate that because of that comic book movies (oh wait,
you mean “superhero action in tights fantasy blockbuster movies”) are doomed to fail. But correlation is not causation, and far be it for you to actually research anything about comics and the movies that might actually come of them. It simply is easier for him to argue from a point of ignorance than, you know, apply some effort.
Kurt, do you even like movies? Because for someone who supposedly does you really do know nothing about them. Like, at all.
/countered
You know you can’t keep this up, Halfyard. You don’t have the stones to be an asshole for any length of time.
First, I never ever claimed that studios would stop making blockbuster films. Did I? If so, where? But I think putting a 30 year cap on the Studios as a viable Multi Billion $ Industry is not too far off base. Attendence in terms of bums in seats has been on the decline for years in North America, it’s only through increased ticket prices and tech premiums (IMAX / 3D / AVX, etc.) that the numbers are continually rising…What are TV systems going to look like in 20 years and how is theatrical distribution going to compete. Piracy will only get worse unless someone stumbles on an iTunes like happy middle, which will insure that films have to reign in costs.
furthermore…
“Do you even like movies” is the funniest most ill informed thing you’ve ever ‘said’ to me in this forum. If you only knew how much of my life I’ve willingly spent watching, talking and writing about film….who would do this if not out of love?
As more and more things compete for attention and the world economy continues into its funk, it seems quite reasonable to deduce that these massive tent-pole movies (and really it’s only Superhero comic book movies and Pixar-Dreamworks animation films at this point that regularly cross over $200M budgets) will have to be trimmed.
Movie attendance has declined for over 70 years in the US. How exactly has that effected output or quality of films? Or the budgets of films? Wait, it hasn’t? Counter that with the absolutely massive growth in the International market which is still very much in its infancy. Taking an assumption that this industry can’t be sustained is both unimformed and wildly off-base to the point of gross ignorance. Or, to use a movie quote that you as a non-viewer probably don’t recognize, “How can you be so obtuse?”
Comic Book Super-Hero films for the past decade are the primary tentpoles of the industry, just as Summer blockbusters have been since Jaws. To claim Comic Book Superhero movies are too expensive and can’t be sustained is an argument that tentpoles can’t be sustained, which simply isn’t true. These movies make such obscene profits and increase the studios brands but such large margins that they are an empirical requirement of the industry. If you don’t have a blockbuster on your schedule than your studio can’t survive.
Fascinatingly enough, once studios reach certain sizes, even the failures earn them profits. Take John Carter for example, which Disney smartly wrote down to a loss of $200 million even before it had finished its theatrical run. A run which essentially broke even, and doesn’t include the massive haul it eventually made in VOD, rentals, cable, streaming, rentals and the home video market. But by claiming it was a loss before the quarter ended Disney was able to successful negotiate a potential loss into a financial windfall. Then Avengers came along and now Disney can pretty much laugh its way to being the highest revenue studio for the year. Which allows it to lower the cost of ad buys, demand more for licensing and in general increase their bottom line. But Kurt, in his infinite ignorance, seems to think losing money on a movie cripples studios, which simply isn’t the case. But that won’t stop him from barking at the moon either way.
I mean really, do you want to listen to a man who blindly thinks a full 87% of the movies released in 2010 occurred in the protagonist’s mind?
Top 10 most expensive movies, adjusted for inflation (as of January of this year)
War and Peace (1968) – $685m
Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End (2007) – $332m
Cleopatra (1963) – $331m
Titanic (1997) – $286m
Spider-man 3 (2007) – $285m
Tangled (2010) – $273m
Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince (2009) – $267m
Waterworld (1995) – $263m
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest (2006) – $256
Avatar (2009) – $253m
King Kong (2005) – $243m
I’m relatively certain all earned a profit, even War & Peace. I think the case can also be argued that since the huge bloat of the 60′s that studios have been pretty good at hedging bets on films and really only going all in on sequels of franchises, where the chances of making their returns are far greater. Their was certainly some scaling back on the budgets of blockbusters but those have increased in size at a pretty steady pace, and certainly not at one that seems as if it is unsustainable, primarily due to the fact that studios can actually show some fiscal responsibility.
BTW, how many Superhero spandex adventure slinging blockbuster action movies are on that list?
I count one.
Fuck you, Halfyard, I win.
“Comics are words and pictures. You can do anything with words and pictures.” – Harvey Pekar
One of the most award winning comics is the Sandman’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, where Neil Gaiman makes Shakespeare a character in the DC universe. Gaiman also makes Shakespeare a bit of a hack who didn’t write any of his plays. He makes a “deal with the devil” with Morpheus (aka the Sandman) for inspiration and Morpheus is responsible for Shakespeare’s genius.
I never understood the fascination with Gaiman, he makes decent comics but they tend to be mediocre and skew heavily to the written word over the art.
Yeah that isn’t at all what this post is about, Matt Gamble.
Oh, gee, aren’t you getting tired of all these Leo Tolstoy adaptations? God, we get like 7 every summer. I just wish the studios would stop spending so much money on them. Do we really need to see “War in Peace” in 3D? Why are they even making Pride and Prejudice 2?
(Things No One Says)
While, yes, we are getting a lot of classic literary adaptations this year, to pretend like it’s become a trend is certainly a stretch. I can’t even name one classic literary adaptation from the last two years or so. Coriolanus? That might be it?
The Tempest
Beastly
Jane Eyre
Of note should be the fact that their was another Beauty & the Beast adaptation a full year earlier. Or should we bring up The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, also made just two years earlier?
Then this year we have adaptations of Anna Karenina, The Bell Jar, Oz the Great and Powerful, The Great Gatsby and Les Miserable. Then of course their are working projects like Fahrenheit 451, Paradise Lost, and 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, all of which have been previously made.
And just so people realize this is hardly a new trend, the Judy Garland version of The Wizard of Oz was the 5th film version of that story at the time it was made and since then has been remade 7 more times (not including the 6 TV series based on it) with an 8th planned for 2014.
On the Subject of Superhero films and what not. The Days of Future Past thing for the First Class sequel was surprising because I have NO IDEA how you do that in one movie.
You guys do realize that everything in every genre has been done to death, right? It’s not just the comic book genre. I can’t tell you how many indie dramedys I’ve seen over the last few years that seemed like the exact same movie. Yet I still enjoyed some of them because of performances or direction.
Similar themes and tropes are NOT the same as the same exact character doing the exact same stuff over and over. I agree that there are many many movies that feel like rehash and garbage, but they’re far outweighed by the fact that A) I don’t see them and B) there are dozens more that are awesome. We’re talking about a very specific sub-genre that drives the box office.
Gamble’s point about Anna Karina or the Les Mis comparison is fair though. I just think he’s talking about what we like and don’t like – which isn’t the question. OP is about whether people will still go see these things in the future; i.e. are they a viable commodity.
I will give you a very recent example.
The main character in the new Andrew Dominik movies is a cliche, a trope.
The reason you want to see that movie is for the cast and the director. Why not apply the same things to all movies. (Like rational people.)
Because that would make too much sense. And that is not allowed in the rowthree comment sections.
Once again I’m not talking about cliches, tropes, themes, tone. There are hundreds of hitman movies and each one is different. If the Brad Pitt character from “Killing them Softly” makes three sequels, then we can talk.
A guy by the name of Peter Parker getting bit by a spider and turning into a dude who can climb buildings is not the same as a character TYPE.
And anyway, you’re kind of proving my point. Andrew Dominic’s movie won’t make any money.
I’m talking about an entire sub-genre that essentially drives the box office from April-late August.
In the world of film I would argue Spider-Man is as much a type as Hitman sent in to fix up a situation.
Both are roles that can be played by different actors directed differently in separate films. You just feel the need to connect the two because the name is the same or there is a number at the end of the film, the most superfluous of details.
Well I guess we’ll just disagree on this point. I don’t think Hanna and Bourne are at all the same. I don’t think The American and The Matador are the same thing just because they’re both aging hitmen. Timothy Olyphant’s hitman and Brad Pitt in Dominic’s new movie are completely different with different stories and ideas and themes.
However, I do think that whether it’s Michael Keaton, George Clooney, Val Kilmer or Christian Bale, it’s pretty much the same dude.
Yea, but Indie Dramedies are not marketed and forced into the conversation with the full public with the Mega$$ ad campaigns.
When I see a movie like Tree of Life or We Need to Talk About Kevin or Kotoko, the last thing I’m thinking of is that “EVERYTHING HAS ALREADY BEEN DONE.”
PROJECT Nim
Monsieur Lazhar
Cafe De Flore
Melancholia
Certified Copy
Carnage
ALPS
Page Eight.
It should be noted that every film in this post was released 2011…
This thread is so galldarned bromantic.
Also I find it hilarious that in a lot of ways I agree with Mr. James but I am coming at it from the reverse of having read the “great” original stories and realizing that the movies will never have the balls or the go ahead to capitalize on them.
The potential is definitely there. The application we shall see.
Films need to lower their budget. Except for a few exceptions, films should not cost more 100 million dollars. I predict that the average salary of working actors/actress in Hollywood would go down in the upcoming years.
Speaking of comic book films, one of the problems is that studios aren’t interested in making the smaller movies. Case in point, Neil Gaiman’s Death The High Cost of Living, with Gaiman directing and Guillermo del Toro producing and a $15 million budget. Warner Independent Pictures was interested and then possibly as a New Line movie, but unfortunately both those studios are dead now.
Warner Brothers doesn’t want to make this movie because Death The High Cost of Living anymore because they aren’t in the business of making $15 million dollar movies. The studio is into making these huge big tenpole movies, which is a shame.
My greatest lament is actually the loss of the $40-60M movie. That is a pretty sweet space to do a handsome highly produced noir, thriller or risky adult oriented drama, but that space is almost entirely eliminated in the Hollywood Studio system.
I totally agree with this. And keeping with the comic book movie theme, it seems like the perfect space to do the smaller characters’ individual stories in a $40-50m film, saving the $150-$200m budgets for the major crossover films. Do a Black Widow spy movie for $50m, then make Avengers 2 for $150m. I don’t get why studios don’t see this as a viable option.
Probably because a Black Widow spy movie would just be derivative of just a straight Spy movie.
There is no need to do one when you can straight to the other and not even get Marvel involved. (Marvel themselves doing it is another story).
If you not doing SUPERHERO movies or incredibly small things like Super, there isn’t any point ATM especially after how something like Scott Pilgrim turned out.
It would be Marvel doing it in this case; I thought that would be obvious. I’m talking about Marvel saving tentpole-level movies for Avengers, and maybe one or two other big-name characters like Iron Man, and doing the other in-between ones (Black Widow, Hawkeye, Antman, etc.) on a mid-level budget range. I would love to see some of these other characters in movies that fit their specific qualities, hence I suggested Black Widow in a spy movie. The current comic run of Winter Soldier (with Bucky Barnes and Black Widow) is basically a spy story. Other series tend more toward action, or sci-fi, or horror. I’d love to see the movies take on similar generic distinctions, instead of all being funneled into a single “superhero” style product.
These characters already have more name recognition than Scott Pilgrim, thanks to The Avengers. It’s not a fair comparison. At this point, if you can make a $140m Captain America film and make $350m BO on it, why couldn’t you make a $50m Captain America film and expect to make at least $150m-$200m BO on it, which is a greater return on investment? I don’t buy the idea that people will only go to see films with $150m+ budgets. People go to see stuff they’ve heard of. They’ve heard of Captain America.
I think people would be aware if the film is cheaper than the original or if it looks market ably cheaper than the others connected too it.
I think Uniformity is a large part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe moving forward.
Joss Whedon in one interview said that if he was going to do any solo Avengers movie it would be a Black Widow (which surprised a few that thought he would want to take on the Hulk). He mentioned that the opening scene in Avengers where beats up a bunch of Russians is one of the few scenes that survived untouched from his first draft of the script.
Only problem is Whedon has a crazy number of his own projects that he would like to do, so he doesn’t have time to do Black Widow.
This is what I’m talking about: http://www.esquire.com/blogs/culture/j-hoberman-new-hollywood-stars-0912
This. This is why I’ve said everything I’ve said above. A studio isn’t going to invest in smaller films or films that aren’t going to make any money (i.e. the creatively interesting ones).
There you go again generalizing about how smaller movies are automatically more interesting.
When it comes to the Super Hero sub-genre, yeah I think the bigger they get, the less there is for me to personally invest in; so yeah, absolutely. More dollars = better looking landscapes, bigger explosions and bigger star power. To me that doesn’t automatically equal interesting of fresh. They may very well be entertaining, but it usually just means, “here we go again.”
So at this point, I’m not saying they’re “automatically more interesting,” but at least they have the potential to be more interesting. Personally I’d much rather see Quentin Tarantino do Wonder Woman with $30 million rather than a studio throwing $200 million at Brett Ratner or Len Wiseman and saying go crazy and then run the whole show by committee. I’m saying give Michel Gondry or Spike Jonze or Wes Anderson (if he wanted to) $50 million TOPS and then give them full creative control. Just the idea of that happening is more interesting than the prospect of Iron Man III. Am I alone in thinking that or is another Tim Story $100 million production more interesting? Maybe it’s just me.
All that said, I can’t think of any super hero movies that are “small” or low budget (that I’ve seen). Punisher from the late 80s maybe. Don’t know what the Blade movies cost – I like the first one in that franchise.
Aren’t you stacking the deck even in your scenarios by giving Tarantino the fictional small budget on a character who will never have that and automatically a director you dislike on the 200m budget?
Interesting people make interesting movies regardless of Budget. Nolan’s Batman movies are in my opinion the most interesting of the Comic Book films we have gotten and they are the biggest, grandest, most expensive out there.
The response will be that they are the exception to the rule, but so are great movies to everything else that comes out in a given year.
Fair enough, but interesting people don’t always make interesting films. I think Gondry is one the most talented and interesting directors we have working today. Except for Green Hornet was a P.O.S. because he was given too much money to play with and the film was probably run by committee. I would LOVE to see what he would do with a super hero movie with his usual budget and full control.
As for Dark Knight, I would use the “exception to the rule” argument for sure. However, personally I don’t find them to be all that interesting so if they’re the most interesting we can get to, then that isn’t saying much for the genre. I find them to be giant messes of a spectacle. So we’re sort of at an impasse there, since it’s totally personal preference and perspective. I would concede that most people would agree with you however and it proves big movies can be good.
From the sounds of it Edgar Wright is getting a smaller budget for Ant-Man. That it seems like Marvel is interested in making smaller movies with their characters. Unfortunately, Warner Brothers doesn’t seem to have attitude having killed off their smaller studios. Since Neil Gaiman’s Death character is own by DC Comics / Warner Brothers, it’s hard to shop that property around.
Also I’ll add to my argument that Marvel having their one-shot short films that seem to be increasing in size and scope.
I think their first one “The Consultant”, had a bit of footage added to what was already filmed for the Incredible Hulk. The second one “A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Thor’s Hammer”, was all original and being a bit of a short film for their character Phil Coulson.
Their latest, “Item 47″ looks to be longer, with some new characters, it even got it’s own poster. I wouldn’t be surprised if Marvel uses these short movies as a way to introduce new characters in the future.
13 Assassins cost 6 million dollars.
If you ever get the chance to see the 4.5 hour WARRIORS OF THE RAINBOW (roadshow version), you’ll see just how much piles of AWESOME that a mere $20M can buy. Holy Shit, what a wonderful piece of classic EPIC cinema. Certainly one of the best things I’ve seen this year.
I’m a huge comic book fan.
I don’t care about 99.9% comic book movies. They feel very lazy and formulaic to me. Hollywood discovered around Spiderman and X-men that their was a treasure trove of IP that they could tun into profit. For the most part its been systematic filming of the best comic books. It feels like what it is, a systematic cash in. There are passion projects here and there, but the net effect of the mass of comic book movies feels very lazy and very uncreative (the exact opposite of their source material).
I think when studios approach Dan Clowes about making Ghost World but ask “Where are the ghosts,” there is a problem.
With the announcement that they are doing The Days of Future Past as the next X-men movie, the trailer for the Dark Knight Returns animated movie, I was thinking: “DAMN! Now we are getting to the good stuff!”
Because there is so much money there, we will getting boring stuff simply to keep the money machine running like a Spider-Man movie that redoes the origin. A new Superman movie that is in danger of doing the same thing, or could be something new, we will have to wait and see.
That said, I do think there is room to do some things that are new and interesting, adapting some of the better superhero stories. I don’t think we have reached the creative peak, as it looks like Marvel is interested in taking a few risks and moving things forward. We will have to see what Warner Brothers does in kind.
I am actually less interested the more they go towards the established stories.
That history should be utilized but never completely adapted. Justice League Unlimited is still better than all the Direct to DVD adaptions they made because they took the existing stories and twisted them into telling interesting films.
Nolan did the same thing with his Batman’s never directly one comic or another they were instead of a cornucopia of reference and inversion built to make a new story.
While I wouldn’t mind seeing some original stories from DC Animated, I really have been enjoying seeing the classic stories translated into animation.
Also stories like “What’s So Funny About Truth, Justice & the American Way?” that was adapted into “Superman vs. The Elite” I was completely unaware of. Public Enemies, Apocalypse and Doom were all new to me, however, these seemed to some of the weaker entries.
That said, Young Justice has turned out to be an interesting series. Perhaps not as good as Justice League Unlimited, but still quite good.
Joss Whedon has just been confirmed for Avengers 2 for a Summer 2015 release. My expectations for Avengers 2, both creatively and how much well it will do at the box office.
Once again, no where close to the peak.
Also Joss Whedon worked on the script for Captain America and I have to wonder how involved he will be in other Marvel movies to make sure things are lined up for Avengers 2.
$1.4Billion and a heap of audience good-will from this first-of-its-kind experiment is one heck of a mountain to climb and surpass the second time around. Good luck Joss!
Also Whedon will apparently be involved creatively with other Marvel movies. No idea what exactly his involvement is right now in each, but one site wondered if he will almost be a sort of showrunner for the Marvel Cinematic Universe. It’s known that Whedon had a talk with Edgar Wright about Ant-Man. Will it be just that kind of thing where he gives notes and advice, or will he be re-writing scripts?
Also Whedon will be helping with a Marvel tv series, but once again, no details how involved he will be.
I thought Whedon did a great job with Avengers and it’s a really great and fun movie but a lot of it was required set-up. So my expectations is that Avengers 2 will be a lot better. Also if movies are defined by their villains, Loki was great but the aliens were kind of generic. I think Thanos, a guy who is obsessed with a personified version of Death, makes a great villain, especially in Whedon’s hands.
From: http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/movies/news/a370020/joss-whedon-on-avengers-2-it-needs-to-be-smaller-more-personal.html
Asked how Avengers 2 could top next month’s superhero blockbuster, Whedon responded: “By not trying to. By being smaller. More personal, more painful.
“By being the next thing that should happen to these characters, and not just a rehash of what seemed to work the first time. By having a theme that is completely fresh and organic to itself.”
Whedon joked that a sequel could take heed from crime classic The Godfather II “by having flashbacks to young Michael Andolini escaping Sicily to come to New York, where he will be called Corleone”.
“Sequels are always better when that happens,” he quipped.
Whedon added that he has strived to give each character in The Avengers, which brings together Iron Man, Captain America, Thor and Hulk, enough screen time to see “what makes them awesome”.
“I want to know what makes them tick, what makes them flawed, what makes them fight – and ultimately, what makes them awesome,” he explained. “I go to these movies for those moments when the heroes define themselves, either through action or deliciously overwritten speeches.”
William Friedkin:
“I don’t want to see them! I couldn’t possibly stay awake on the sets of any of these Spandex movies. I couldn’t do them with a straight face. You know, really. I’m not putting them down—it sounds like I am—but I’m not, they’re just not for me. I don’t care how much this one or that one pushes the envelope. It’s not something I’m interested in.”
“I don’t want to see them! I couldn’t possibly stay awake on the sets of any of these Spandex movies. I couldn’t do them with a straight face. You know, really. I’m not putting them down—it sounds like I am—but I’m not, they’re just not for me. I don’t care how much this one or that one pushes the envelope. It’s not something I’m interested in.”
http://www.avclub.com/articles/william-friedkin-talks-killer-joe-and-shares-some,83023/