STID "tracking" for $85-90 million opening [U.S. box office]

Discussion in 'Star Trek Movies: Kelvin Universe' started by RAMA, Apr 26, 2013.

  1. Admiral Buzzkill

    Admiral Buzzkill Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    That "ballpark x2" is meaningless, referring to nothing in the current reality of producing, marketing or distributing movies.

    It's been repeated authoritatively numerous times on the Internet, though, so it must be right. ;)
     
  2. MacLeod

    MacLeod Admiral Admiral

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    If you not I used the word IF, I made no comment on if it was right or not.
     
  3. Opus

    Opus Commodore Commodore

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    It's not.
     
  4. M'Sharak

    M'Sharak Definitely Herbert. Maybe. Moderator

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    Enough. Warning for trolling. Comments to PM.
     
  5. BillJ

    BillJ The King of Kings Premium Member

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    It seems Hollywood has been playing a shell game with production costs and revenue for years in order to short-change the various people who would see more money from higher profits...

    http://www.aceshowbiz.com/news/view/00045706.html

    So I'm not sure how anyone can really take anything associated with Hollywood numbers as gospel. :techman:
     
  6. Out Of My Vulcan Mind

    Out Of My Vulcan Mind Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Steven Soderbergh applied the rule of thumb of needing to gross 2X your costs to reach theatrical beakeven in his interviews this year when he was talking about the current financial state of the industry, so it's not an outdated rule of thumb, nor something that only box office sites talk about.

    That's not to say you can't achieve overall profitability while falling short of grossing 2X your costs. You might make up the difference and go into profit from other revenue streams. Many films do so. And there are other potential complicating factors, like how many participation points are being given away, equity splits, etc. Plus one would have to know what the real costs are and not just the ballpark public figures to have a really accurate view of the theatrical breakeven point. An outsider observer can usually get a decent sense of whether a film is a success or not on a macro level, but not in a detailed, granular way.
     
  7. BillJ

    BillJ The King of Kings Premium Member

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    But I've seen other film makers talk about needing 2.5 times the production budget to break even. So which is it? It doesn't seem like even those in the know really agree on how much a film needs to make to be successful.

    It seems the only thing we know is that we really don't know much.
     
  8. Out Of My Vulcan Mind

    Out Of My Vulcan Mind Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Soderbergh was talking about 2X total costs, i.e. production budget and distribution and marketing costs. Other filmmakers will sometimes talk about 2.5X production budget alone.
     
  9. Belz...

    Belz... Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    Posting numbers is fact. Interpreting those numbers and drawing conclusions while not privy to the whole deal is not.
     
  10. Nerys Myk

    Nerys Myk A Spock and a smile Premium Member

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    Soderbergh probably got that number from a studio executive.;)
     
  11. Out Of My Vulcan Mind

    Out Of My Vulcan Mind Vice Admiral Admiral

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    I'm sure he knows better than to take their word for anything. :)
     
  12. Spock/Uhura Fan

    Spock/Uhura Fan Captain Captain

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    Well, I guess it's time to check my PMs. :)
     
  13. thumbtack

    thumbtack Commodore Commodore

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    Inflating the budget for tax purposes is an industrywide practice. It's also useful for playing games with profit participants. Forbes had pegged the true and correct budget for ST09 at 120.5 million. I haven't seen anything on STID, but my personal, uneducated guess would be 145-165 million.

    Note that World War Z, from the same studio, has an identical reported (i.e. false) budget of 190 million. It's global run is projected to conclude about 20 million below STID. I believe its sequel has also been greenlit.

    Our canon enthusiast had neglected to mention that.
     
  14. Out Of My Vulcan Mind

    Out Of My Vulcan Mind Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Can you provide a link for that?

    What projections are you referring to? That seems on the low side. World War Z looks likely to have a worldwide gross a little higher than STID.
     
  15. Dream

    Dream Admiral Admiral

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    It's all about expectations.

    WWZ was went way over budget due to bad planning, and everyone expected it to flop, but it looks like it is going to be a small hit now. They've learned what not to do, and the next movie should have a much more reasonable budget. That is the reason why it looks like WWZ will be getting a sequel.

    STID was expected to blow the roof off and make way more than the original move, of course that didn't happen. I blame the moronic choice of keeping Khan a secret in all the trailers. I still expect a sequel, but Paramount will be thinking twice before giving the next movie a very large budget.
     
  16. Out Of My Vulcan Mind

    Out Of My Vulcan Mind Vice Admiral Admiral

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    World War Z is on track for a good return, the kind of return that usually leads to a sequel, even against its inflated budget, though they can hedge against any potential drop-off for a sequel by bringing it in on a lower budget.
     
  17. Noname Given

    Noname Given Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    Given your facts are always something like:

    "If you take away X mount of money that STID made because of <insert ridiculous arbitrary reason here> then STID is a failure..."

    I wouldn't put much stock in your analysis.

    As for ST:ID - It's brought in the most money of any Star trek feature film to date; and that is a fact. Further, no one is saying it's the best movie ever; but they are saying it's a good and very successful Star Trek film.
     
  18. Spock/Uhura Fan

    Spock/Uhura Fan Captain Captain

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    ^Untrue. But I'm not putting any stock in your posts, either.

    And I’m not sure that anyone can take what’s said in a complaint as gospel, either. There are 2 sides to the story, and no one on the sidelines really knows.

    Rather than just going off of the complaint, I wanted to see what the result was. I expected some sort of out-of-court settlement, and that’s what happened. To be fair, I think it’s only right to see what Paramount had to say about it:

    http://www.deadline.com/2013/01/paramount-settles-melrose-2-lawsuit-mission-impossible-transformers/

    We don’t know what the financing agreement was or what happened with it, but no one here can know enough to say that it’s all Paramount. Don’t misunderstand me, I’m personally not a fan of the studio, but that’s neither here nor there. I also don’t know anything about Melrose 2, and so I can’t say if they’re on the up-and-up or not with their claims.

    One thing I did find interesting is that they got their case against Paramount in California thrown out (essentially, because they were told they had to "amend" it), seemingly because they were trying to sue the studio at the same time for the exact same thing in New York, or at least that’s what I got from this:

    http://www.deadline.com/2012/07/melrose-2-suit-vs-paramount-trimmed/


    Take from it what you will…

    Yeah, it might get there. We'll see... :)
     
  19. BillJ

    BillJ The King of Kings Premium Member

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    All you have to do is google "Hollywood Accounting" and you'll find some interesting reading. It simply proves that we really know absolutely nothing as far as whether a film is financially successful or not.
     
  20. Spock/Uhura Fan

    Spock/Uhura Fan Captain Captain

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    Kind of like Nielsen ratings, but definitely not exactly, if all of Hollywood is doing their "accounting" in the same way, then at least they have the same baseline, so to speak.

    Anyway, I'm happy to say that we don't know if the film is a success/failure or somewhere in between, but it seems like that's not the case with everyone.