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Why is the new film doing so terribly outside the US..???

Really? do you have actual numbers? I worked in a theater when Nemesis was released and it performed very poorly. My impression from the premiere was a different one. Also two weeks later on my second viewing of the not-dubbed version was quite crowded.
Anyway it seemed to perform better the Nemesis.
This goes into more detail regarding the numbers of Star Trek versus Nemesis. (It's in German, though.)
Here it is, mangled by GoogleTrans into something which more or less resembles English.

Though the film is doing great in the US, only 29.5 % of its entire box office gross comes from overseas... That's ridiculously low I think....
Is that really that far out of line with how previous Trek movies have performed, though? What did those do overseas, as a percentage of the total?
 
Star Trek went underground after the BBC lost out to Channel 4 in 2001. So the new film has a lot of ground to make up, since the franchise has been mismanaged for almost a decade.

In Britain, Star Trek plays a huge part in the survival of niche Freeview/Satellite channel Virgin 1. It runs ENT, TNG, DS9 & VOY to audiences in the tens of thousands.

Mainstream channels like the BBC and ITV (who get audiences in the millions) haven't shown Star Trek for ages. Probably a year ago, 1 or 2am on a Saturday morning, BBC2 finished with TNG. Showing it in a coffin slot with Malcolm in the Middle, old reruns of Phil Silvers and the stray horror movie...

What would I like renewed interest coming off this film to achieve? Sci Fi shows back on BBC2, in an early evening weekday slot like back in the 90's. They should get the rights to the so far unseen Star Trek Remastered and perhaps Enterprise too. It would nice to see both without all the endless commericals, opposite the 6pm news and Channel 4's endlessly recycling of the same Simpsons episodes.

Dont be daft Christopher, that would require the BBC actually fulfilling its mandate to show programmes that inform, enrich and entertain. Why would they want to show programmes that people want to watch, when they can put on such wonderful shows as 'Great British Menu'.

I too miss the days of a Star Trek episode three nights a week. As for Channel 4, they can sod off if they think i will tune in on a sunday to watch Enterprise, only to have their imbecilic presenters insult both the show and its audience. I lost patience with that after they did it one too many times with SG-1 and MGM took the show off them.
 
Here in Austria, the new Star Trek's done much better than X-Men Origins so far and it gets a lot of support from the media. Most of the critics and reviews highly praise it.
 
Here in Austria, the new Star Trek's done much better than X-Men Origins so far and it gets a lot of support from the media. Most of the critics and reviews highly praise it.

Glorious! Austria is a serious country!!! :bolian:
 
I don't really think you can judge the international takings until two or three months, they never seem to accurate until the end.
 
As for Germany, correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't this film actually perform worse than freakin' Nemesis at the box office? I couldn't believe it when I heard this. I'm not sure, but I guess the reason for this is the lack of advertisement the movie got around here.

Oh, and I think it has nothing whatsoever to do with the fact that Star Trek is American centric. Almost 100% of the movies in German theatres are from the US. So I think this argument is pretty moot.

Please check out websites like Box Office Mojo for example.

Nemesis did $8.3 mil in its entire run in Germany.

Star Trek has already done $7.5 mil and its still climbing.

:techman:
 
I can't say much for how TOS was recieved here in Australia (I wasn't born at that point)

ST was a moderate Australian success for the Nine Network in first-run in the 60s, and they virtually ignored it until color TV was introduced in 1975. About ten eps were selected to be aired in primetime, and TAS was rerun in popular breakfast TV slots.

The rights to TOS switched to the Seven Network in the lead-up to ST II's cinema release, and TOS was thus run in prime time, and for the first time the whole series in color, and in production order. Then it went to repeats on weekends: the 40 eps that were rated "G", anyway.

I can remember watching TOS in the mid to late 70's at primetime, just after dinner. At the time for me and many people it was must-see TV.
 
As for Germany, correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't this film actually perform worse than freakin' Nemesis at the box office? I couldn't believe it when I heard this. I'm not sure, but I guess the reason for this is the lack of advertisement the movie got around here.

Oh, and I think it has nothing whatsoever to do with the fact that Star Trek is American centric. Almost 100% of the movies in German theatres are from the US. So I think this argument is pretty moot.

Please check out websites like Box Office Mojo for example.

Nemesis did $8.3 mil in its entire run in Germany.

Star Trek has already done $7.5 mil and its still climbing.

:techman:

It should be much higher, let me put it into perspective:

Germany opening wkd attendance/final attendance:
Star Trek: 570,790 / ?
Nemesis: 659,124 / 1,274,837
Insurrection: 1,172,000 / 2,430,844
First Contact: 957,126 / 2,415,883
Generations: 735,832 / 1,806,000

In terms of people who actually went to watch the movie, Star Trek opened less than Nemesis and it will most probably finish less than Nemesis and less than half of Insurrection and First Contact.

Very, very, very bad showing for Star Trek in Germany.

If it had equalled Insurrection in Germany it would make $22 Million dollars, it will probably finish up at $10 Million at the most.
 
Also, please, have in mind that in most countries, admittance price is not as ridiculously high as you are used to. For that kind of money you Yanks pay for one ticket, I get two tickets here.

Isn't it possible this could be a factor in lower box office numbers as well?
 
It should be much higher, let me put it into perspective:

Germany opening wkd attendance/final attendance:
Star Trek: 570,790 / ?
Nemesis: 659,124 / 1,274,837
Insurrection: 1,172,000 / 2,430,844
First Contact: 957,126 / 2,415,883
Generations: 735,832 / 1,806,000

In terms of people who actually went to watch the movie, Star Trek opened less than Nemesis and it will most probably finish less than Nemesis and less than half of Insurrection and First Contact.

Very, very, very bad showing for Star Trek in Germany.

If it had equalled Insurrection in Germany it would make $22 Million dollars, it will probably finish up at $10 Million at the most.

As of week 3 (preliminary numbers):

Germany opening wkd attendance/final attendance:
Star Trek: 570,790 / 881,137
Nemesis: 659,124 / 1,274,837
Insurrection: 1,172,000 / 2,430,844
First Contact: 957,126 / 2,415,883
Generations: 735,832 / 1,806,000

So, it's not doing that bad. But I think it's being hurt by opening in the summer instead of around Christmas like the other movies in that chart (except for Generations).
 
Someone once claimed that the international public tends to g for more intellectual films instead of the big hollywood action blockbusters, but that's not true. Wolverine has almost 48% overseas gross, and Fast & Furious even 54%!
The movies that tend to have a large proportion of foreign vs domestic box office are the ones that are simple and require little or no backstory to understand. Americans might be reading X-Men or watching TOS but you can't expect that to be as common elsewhere. Star Trek is a very complex story that traditionally has required some serious backstory to grasp.

Something like Fast & Furious does extremely well overseas because there's no backstory worth mentioning. But to Americans, that's not a big brand name they already recognize and know the backstory for, so they aren't going to be unusually motivated to go see it, versus Star Trek, where they've already invested a fair amount of time and understanding, or at least know of it from pop culture references. Being immersed in the culture probably does make the difference here: Americans know who Kirk and Spock are, even if they don't care about Star Trek.

Oh, and I think it has nothing whatsoever to do with the fact that Star Trek is American centric. Almost 100% of the movies in German theatres are from the US. So I think this argument is pretty moot.
I have a hard time seeing how Star Trek is more American than say Terminator, which is about a bunch of Americans fighting killer robots who technically speaking, are also Americans since that's where they were manufactured. ;) What the hell could be more American than a bunch of grubby people in foxholes battling gigantic robots in a noisy and explosion-filled manner?

Last year's Indiana Jones movie was unusually heavily skewed towards foreign BO, 40/60 (usually it's more like 50/50 for summer blockbusters) and that was about a retro Cold War scenario pitting heroic Americans vs eeeeevil Russkies that would make Boris and Natasha Badanov look subtle by comparison.

Compare that with with Star Trek and its no-money, no-religion, no-national-divisions, let's-all-sing-kumbayah hippie commie shit. :D Downright un-American!

Who in Asia or Europe has heard of "Lost?" or J.J. Abrams?
Can't speak for Asia, but I'd say you greatly underestimate the success of Lost in Europe. ;)

Lost
is one of the most popular TV shows in the world, right up there with CSI: Miami, or so I've heard.

With all those viewers maybe somebody can figure out what the frak is going on. :rommie:
I'm going to say that only the USA (and Japan for their local stuff) have populations of nerd/geeks large enough to sustain a success for a science fiction film.
Sci fi films tend to do very well globally (which is why we get so many of them). From last year, The Dark Knight was 53/46 and Iron Man was 54/45. Hancock was 36/63 (someone explain that one to me!) Wolverine is 53/47. Yet Star Trek is now at 71/29, way out of step with other movies in its genre. Maybe the foreign BO will come up, but so far it's not following the same trend as you'd normally expect.

Also, please, have in mind that in most countries, admittance price is not as ridiculously high as you are used to. For that kind of money you Yanks pay for one ticket, I get two tickets here.

Isn't it possible this could be a factor in lower box office numbers as well?
Why is only Star Trek affected by the price of tickets and not all the other movies?
 
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Being immersed in the culture probably does make the difference here: Americans know who Kirk and Spock are, even if they don't care about Star Trek.

Most Dutch people know who 'Mr. Spock' is as well. It's part of popular culture around the world I think.
 
As of week 3 (preliminary numbers):

Germany opening wkd attendance/final attendance:
Star Trek: 570,790 / 881,137
Nemesis: 659,124 / 1,274,837
Insurrection: 1,172,000 / 2,430,844
First Contact: 957,126 / 2,415,883
Generations: 735,832 / 1,806,000

So, it's not doing that bad. But I think it's being hurt by opening in the summer instead of around Christmas like the other movies in that chart (except for Generations).

That's true. And Nemesis didn't even open here until January 2003, so it didn't have the LOTR/Harry Potter competition it had in the US. Right now, big movies are opening left and right, meaning the attention on one film is pretty much gone by the following week. Wolverine wasn't that successful either. And Star Trek, AFAIK, beat it.
 
Dont be daft Christopher, that would require the BBC actually fulfilling its mandate to show programmes that inform, enrich and entertain. Why would they want to show programmes that people want to watch, when they can put on such wonderful shows as 'Great British Menu'.

Great British Menu is great. And British. And it has food. What's your problem? Why not pick on programming that does not inform, enrich or entertain?
 
I can remember watching TOS in the mid to late 70's at primetime, just after dinner. At the time for me and many people it was must-see TV.

As I said, it made a return for colour TV, which Australia didn't get till 1975. In Sydney it meant we got about ten selected episodes, but the ones they showed were pretty good. I recall loving "What Are Little Girls Made Of?" and "Devil in the Dark". Other states got more eps, perhaps.

ST's big problem in Australia was that only 40 episodes of TOS were originally rated "G" (for General audiences), in the 60s, and 39 were the equivalent of the old "NRC" (Not Recommended for Children). In fact, in Sydney, "The Man Trap" was never screened till the 80s run, because the monster was deemed too scary, although it did air in the 60s in other locales.

When ST finally started showing in kids' weekend timeslots, the network of the day was unwilling to pay the required fee to have the show re-vetted by the then-Australian Censorship Board, to pass muster for "G" timeslots.
 
Great British Menu is great. And British. And it has food. What's your problem? Why not pick on programming that does not inform, enrich or entertain?
He's not knocking the show per say. Probably annoyed like most, because there are far too many shows of that type as it is. If I'm not mistaken, the early evening schedules on BBC2 just repeat primetime viewing from BBC1 or continue daytime dross (for the retired/unemployed) anyway. Great British Menu has its place but sometimes it seems every other show is exactly the same, with drama marginalised. Only The Wire and Heroes at the moment, the latter losing viewers to Ashes to Ashes on the other side... presumably positioned just so their argument for less U.S. imports is justified.
 
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The problem is that the BBC have just about the only British TV channels commissioning new serial drama because they're the only ones a) with an assured income and b) not actually losing revenue. Either they have to bail out some of the other channels or our choices are going to be limited when it comes to home-grown drama. That said, when was the last really new series to appear? By that I don't mean an ill-conceived remake (Reggie Perrin) or a continuation of an existing series.
 
I can't remember the last program I watched on the BBC. I tend to catch up with HIGNFY on iplayer, but I never watch the BBC live aside from a few minutes of news bulletins and weather.

I too miss Trek at 6pm on BBC2 on Wednesday evenings, but now that most people have access to Virgin 1, which is now all day on Freeview, there's no point in the BBC showing Trek.
 
Trek is doing shit down here in Kent. It really is not popular. I here people slating in the street when they see a poster or advert in any shape or form.

The cinema on the Isle of Wight where i saw the preview was packed to busting. They all loved it, even when walking out the cinema they were full of praise for what a job they had done. Obviously either sci fi fans or Trek fans, or just movie fans in general.

but back up here in kent areas, it is not really accepted that well. Dont know about other regions, but its shit here.

Hopefully, the toy and DVD sales will help bump it up a little.



Star Trek went underground after the BBC lost out to Channel 4 in 2001. So the new film has a lot of ground to make up, since the franchise has been mismanaged for almost a decade.

In Britain, Star Trek plays a huge part in the survival of niche Freeview/Satellite channel Virgin 1. It runs ENT, TNG, DS9 & VOY to audiences in the tens of thousands.

Mainstream channels like the BBC and ITV (who get audiences in the millions) haven't shown Star Trek for ages. Probably a year ago, 1 or 2am on a Saturday morning, BBC2 finished with TNG. Showing it in a coffin slot with Malcolm in the Middle, old reruns of Phil Silvers and the stray horror movie...

What would I like renewed interest coming off this film to achieve? Sci Fi shows back on BBC2, in an early evening weekday slot like back in the 90's. They should get the rights to the so far unseen Star Trek Remastered and perhaps Enterprise too. It would nice to see both without all the endless commericals, opposite the 6pm news and Channel 4's endlessly recycling of the same Simpsons episodes.

Dont be daft Christopher, that would require the BBC actually fulfilling its mandate to show programmes that inform, enrich and entertain. Why would they want to show programmes that people want to watch, when they can put on such wonderful shows as 'Great British Menu'.

I too miss the days of a Star Trek episode three nights a week. As for Channel 4, they can sod off if they think i will tune in on a sunday to watch Enterprise, only to have their imbecilic presenters insult both the show and its audience. I lost patience with that after they did it one too many times with SG-1 and MGM took the show off them.

A-Fucking-Men. :techman:

I get fed up of E4 slating certain classic eps that are actually good, they really knock your confidence in the netwrok showing it, even Virgin1 is guilty of the occasional slating in its episode blurbs or voiceovers.

I remember Trek 3 nights a week. At 6pm at dinner time just after either Neighbours or Fresh Prince or Ren and Stimpy or whatever pish we used to watch back then. TNG on tuesday, DS9 on a wednesday and VOY on a sunday evening. The occasional TOS episode when they run out of things to show or randomly on a sunday afternoon.

now we only get the random Trek ep so stupidly late at night or during the day when we cant watch it. thats how Trek was killed over here, on TV at least.

The BBC are so politically correct now, and have such a thing for 'educational' programming or 'real life' that it pisses me off, i cant watch BBC anymore, i prefere the less by-the-book BBC4 and 3.

I miss those days, i really do.
 
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