Near the end of June, Ratatouille opens. As usual, the look of the film is pretty impressive. Leave it to Pixar to keep pushing the visual boundaries. I'm on the fence on how I think the general populace will accept it. I think it will do okay, but nothing near Shrek numbers.
Weinstein continues to try and dominate the animated feature world by making an agreement with the [sarcasm] animation juggernaut that is Exodus[/sarcasm]. I've got to hand it to Weinstein. They are really trying to make this lower budget animation business work. The deal calls for Weinstein to finance and distribute a slate of CG films from the company that will first finish "Igor" in 2008. This is another one of those films that has been going on for so many years. We are not talking Foodfight, but you get the idea.
Speaking of juggernauts, Shrek 3 just pimp slapped a million haters out there. All of the people that despise this franchise for whatever reason have got to be unhappy about its success. Face it, the movie going audience loves Shrek. Personally, I think it is funny. Not the movie, just the fact that so many people want to see it and DreamWorks fall on its face. Get over it, Shrek is a success and will continue to be so for a while.
Anyone catch that Cannes stunt that Jerry Seinfeld did to promote Bee Movie? That is pretty funny. An even better way to get the attention of the world would of have been if that contraption failed and sent Jerry belly-flopping into the water. Sorry, but I find this guy annoying and a pure distraction when it comes to the voice of an animated character. Unlike my dream of Jerry making a painful splash, this film is going to do the flopping for him. Maybe all you Shrek/DWA haters out there feel a little better after that Shrek BO dominance.
3 comments:
Hi,
I am the anonymous #1 in your previous post. As you said, "Surf's Up" did not well. ($17,640,249 in its 1st week release.) Even worse than their previous one, "Open Season" did. (around $23,000,000)
I enjoyed a lot viewing "Surf's Up" and I heard lots of good from many movie critics. However, the BO result dissapointed them very much, I think.
What did they missed in their marketing for making the movie success in your opinion?
Thank you.
I'm not sure what SPA spent on marketing. However, I have a feeling that it wasn't that large based on the limited marketing I personally witnessed. However, that could just be my experience.
Animation producers have a couple of choices when making an animated film. Either throw big wads of cash at marketing like Disney and DreamWorks and Fox do... or have a lower budget that doesn't require huge BO returns.
Both Surf's Up and Open Season had big production budgets and assumed moderate marketing budgets. Personally, I think you have to do one (huge marketing budget) or the other (low production budget).
The good news is, even though these films are just doing "okay" in the theaters, they will end up fine after home video release and broadcasts.
Hi Staloren,
Thank you so much for your answer to my question.
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