Big Budget
Superman Returns cost roughly 250 million to produce (rumors are circulating that it cost much, much more).
250 million dollars.
Can you imagine- because I can't.
How does one spend 250 million dollars making a movie? One quarter of one billion dollars. Isn't the point of a movie to make money, and lots of it? Starting off that far in the red can't be that great of a business idea.
At some point it must be cheaper to just blow up real stuff than use computers to make us think it just blew up.
I'm not saying that movies should be made cheaply, only that movies should be based on plot elements. When people gather around a campfire, they want the storyteller to make them believe the house burned down, not actually watch it happen. A cheaply made movie with a well-developed plot will inevitably make more money than an expensive movie that bores the audience to tears.
By comparison, The Blair Witch Project cost about $25,000 to make, and earned over 248 million dollars for its effort. Why? Because it was different and interesting- something an overly expensive superhero movie at the turn of the century isn't.
Oh, Superman will make money, but it won't be terribly profitable. Those souls who are always drawn to Aristotelian spectacle will flock to the thing in droves. But it could have been made better with less money and more intelligence.
250 million dollars.
Can you imagine- because I can't.
How does one spend 250 million dollars making a movie? One quarter of one billion dollars. Isn't the point of a movie to make money, and lots of it? Starting off that far in the red can't be that great of a business idea.
At some point it must be cheaper to just blow up real stuff than use computers to make us think it just blew up.
I'm not saying that movies should be made cheaply, only that movies should be based on plot elements. When people gather around a campfire, they want the storyteller to make them believe the house burned down, not actually watch it happen. A cheaply made movie with a well-developed plot will inevitably make more money than an expensive movie that bores the audience to tears.
By comparison, The Blair Witch Project cost about $25,000 to make, and earned over 248 million dollars for its effort. Why? Because it was different and interesting- something an overly expensive superhero movie at the turn of the century isn't.
Oh, Superman will make money, but it won't be terribly profitable. Those souls who are always drawn to Aristotelian spectacle will flock to the thing in droves. But it could have been made better with less money and more intelligence.
posted by Yorick at 12:15 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home