The Reason Why Voyage Home was most profitable Star Trek movie.

[Captain Zog]

It appealed to the same people who had comsumed Back to the Future the year before. Seriously, just look at the similarities:

1. Made in 1986, a year after BTTF and clearly feeding off its success.

2. Similar typre plot - time travel.

3. BTTF is a science-fiction adventure comedy.
Star Trek IV is a science-fiction adventure with strong doses of comedy.

 

[Maurice]

Trek IV was arguably the moat profitable film because it made the most money in relation to its budget, as opposed to TMP which made more money (adjusted for inflation), but which cost more.

Do you mean profit or total box office? They're different things.

 

[JoeD80]

Total profit for each movie adjusted for inflation to today's dollars (well 2007 dollars), factoring in world ticket sales and budget:

Motion PIcture: $293,427,967
Wrath of Khan: $179,956,744
Search for Spock: $136,037,098
The Voyage Home: $203,563,930
The Final Frontier: $66,424,549
The Undiscovered Country: $105,165,044
Generations: $113,340,800
First Contact: $136,158,472
Insurrection: $60,565,396
Nemesis: $8,386,818

 

[cardinal biggles]

I'm curious where you're getting your numbers from.

 

[JoeD80]

I'm curious where you're getting your numbers from.

The numbers are from this web-site:

http://www.the-numbers.com/movies/series/StarTrek.php

and then I used the inflation calculator here:

http://www.westegg.com/inflation/

 

[Maurice]

^^^That's overall grosses, not PROFIT, as I mentioned previously. Get the terms straight, please, as they're not interchangeable.

 

[JoeD80]

^^^That's overall grosses, not PROFIT, as I mentioned previously. Get the terms straight, please, as they're not interchangeable.

No, I SUBTRACTED the budget from the gross!!!!!!! THAT IS THE PROFIT! Why do you think I listed Nemesis as only $8,000,000?

 

[Stardate]

Overall no matter how we look at it Motion PIcture made more profit then the Voyage Home.
Motion Picture worldwide grossing adjusted for 2008 inflation is $398.4 million minus $100.3 million budget. Profit is aprox: $298.1 million.
Voyage Home worldwide grossing adjusted for 2008 inflation is $253.8 million minus $47.7 million budget. Profit is aprox: $206.1 million.
Motion Picture made over $90 million more profit then Voyage Home.
p.s. i uses this site for adjusting for 2008 inflation http://www.leesmovieinfo.net/Adjuster.php

 

[JoeD80]

Motion Picture worldwide grossing adjusted for 2008 inflation is $398.4 million minus $100.3 million budget. Profit is aprox: $298.1 million.
Voyage Home worldwide grossing adjusted for 2008 inflation is $253.8 million minus $47.7 million budget. Profit is aprox: $206.1 million.
Motion Picture made over $90 million more profit then Voyage Home.

Yep, this agrees very closely with the numbers I posted previously . That's good you found a 2008 inflation calculator. That one I used only went to 2007.

 

[Maurice]

^^^That's overall grosses, not PROFIT, as I mentioned previously. Get the terms straight, please, as they're not interchangeable.

No, I SUBTRACTED the budget from the gross!!!!!!! THAT IS THE PROFIT! Why do you think I listed Nemesis as only $8,000,000?

Ah, well, I hadn't noticed that, sorry.

But here's the problem...you're still not showing actual profit (nearly impossible for an outside to calculate). Here's why:

The theaters don't cough up every penny they take in on ticket sales to the studio, and the studio typically has to pay interest on the budget until it's paid off, AND there's marketing costs. As such, most films have to make at the box-office between two and three times their budget to break even. So, if Nemesis cost $60 million, it would have had to make at least $120 million to even have a chance or breaking even.

 

[JoeD80]

The theaters don't cough up every penny they take in on ticket sales to the studio

I didn't think about the theaters themselves, that is a good point.

and the studio typically has to pay interest on the budget until it's paid off

Why would a studio charge interest on its own money? Presumably the studio has plenty of money to provide for the budget.

AND there's marketing costs.

I always thought the ad budget was part of the overall budget. I may be wrong, but that was my impression.

 

[Maurice]

Most studios get financing. They don't happen to have $40 million laying around.

Marketing and promotion is separate of the cost of the film. The "budget" includes all costs from starting the project until it's in the can. Marketing's a separate thing.

Oh yeah, and I forgot "participation", which means the percentages sliced off for savvy deal-making directors, stars, etc.

 

[JoeD80]

They don't happen to have $40 million laying around.

Sure they do. Have you seen the studios around here? Those large lots and studio buildings didn't pop up from having no money.

Marketing and promotion is separate of the cost of the film. The "budget" includes all costs from starting the project until it's in the can. Marketing's a separate thing.

Well as I said I wasn't sure about that.

 

[NCC1968]

TMP had the benefit of years of build-up from the old show and the fanbase growing. I would have gone to see it (I was 11) just to see it......no matter what it was.

TWOK had the benefit of just being damn good and I'm not sure what Voyage had ......cute whales

 

[KSullivan76]

I'm guessing it made such a profit because it didn't have much special effects.

 

[cardinal biggles]

Just because they didn't have a big space battle didn't mean there weren't lots of visual effects shots to complete.

 

[RobertScorpio]

Total profit for each movie adjusted for inflation to today's dollars (well 2007 dollars), factoring in world ticket sales and budget:

Motion PIcture: $293,427,967
Wrath of Khan: $179,956,744
Search for Spock: $136,037,098
The Voyage Home: $203,563,930
The Final Frontier: $66,424,549
The Undiscovered Country: $105,165,044
Generations: $113,340,800
First Contact: $136,158,472
Insurrection: $60,565,396
Nemesis: $8,386,818

Well..as I have always said...TREK V beats out both NEMESIS and INSURRECTION..and is also a better film ..so THERE!!! All you V nay sayers...BOW to the Shat...Bow to the shat!

Rob

 

[Cky]

Wait wait wait, so you're basically saying that because of the figures Star Trek V is better than Nemesis? With the massive success of Star Trek IV, the logical thing to say is that V will run off the back of that. And looking at those figures it really didn't match up to it's predessor and sucessor.

Now Nemesis annoys me, theres a lot of the film I hate, but V is well down the pile, even below Nemesis.

 

[NCC1968]

My fav V line:

"Double dumbass on you!"

 

[cardinal biggles]

Which, of course, was a line from Star Trek IV.