Movie Biz Myopia
It drives me CRAZY… all the time… when smart writers who have been around forever get involved in trend stories that so utterly miss the point they are trying to explain. I just don’t f-ing get what the major malfunction is.
Well, maybe I do… a bit. Hollywood’s journalistic corps have a very bad tendency to get sucked into believing the bullshit being fed to them by studio execs, agents, and idiot financial analysts and then, when something happens, they see the story in the reflection of the bullshit, unable to get any real perspective on what’s happening.
And so, Michael Cieply writes a story like, “The Skinnier Look of Studio Management,” which somehow takes the various firings and reductions of The Seismic Industry Economic Destruction of the lack of anticipation of the DVD downturn by the studios and turns it into some silly (and essentially inaccurate) bit about head count at studios.
Can a guy who has been around as long as Cieply really believe that John Lesher was dumped by the man who hired him as the result of the studio making a strategic choice to make fewer movies? Is he kidding? The absolute failure of John Lesher as big studio chief followed directly on the heels of significant, but not absolute failure of Lesher as Dependent chief. But the reason he was fired was the same reason he was hired… to provide cover for the boss. And why hasn’t Paramount ramped up production under Brad Grey in the ENTIRE time he has been in the job? Well, good question. But it’s not a strategy of 2009.
Disney is a completely different thing. Bob Iger has decided on a major shift in corporate strategy. But getting rid of Dick Cook was most certainly NOT about getting rid of a salary or head count. Like Lesher and Universal’s Shmuger & Linde, there will be massive payouts for years to come to get rid of these guys… if there is any financial malfeasance, it would be in how recklessly the post-firing deals are made and how many tens of millions are thrown away on execs that studios either no longer wish to follow or who are massive failures.
And about Universal… again… the notion that dumping Linde & Shmuger was some sort of $ issue is just plain stupid. For one thing, both of the jobs that Langley and Fogelson had will be filled… and on down the line. But moreover, the idea that firing the co-chiefs was about their salaries in any way… really… are you kidding? Does the NYT know how little money their salaries are in the big picture? Let me put it this way… NYT is bleeding more red ink quarterly than double the combined annual salaries of those two men… and life goes on…
And was I clear enough? The move to move two top execs up, much like the same exact move that brought in the regime that this new one is replacing, is about covering Ron Meyer’s ass. It is not like the LA Times making Betsey Sharkey (and I really don’t mean to be picking on you, Betsey) a film critic because she already had a job slot with TribCo and so they didn’t need to manipulate a way to hire from outside. (This is also how Turan’s previous partner, Ms Chocano, was slotted in as film critic, having already taken a slot as TV critic.) This is Meyer, in a time of pressure, dumping his familiar old guys to bring in some new familiar slightly less old guys to show that they are not going to make the same mistakes again. That’s what the top dogs do.
And the New Line dump… again… not about dumping bodies… about a short-sighted idea of how to tighten things up as the division was having a couple of rough years after being an absolute cash cow for the previous five. And as it turned out, was a major profit center in 2009 for WB – with films made by the old team – after the company was absorbed into the bigger studio.
And this crazy irrelevance about whether Horn and Meyer will be replaced by one person instead of two… Cieply has been around long enough to know that the guys they replaced, Semel & Daly, were the only two man show in their day. It worked. And WB maintained the tradition when they left. But the idea that it will or will not continue based on payroll considerations is just plain dumb.
Seriously… Fox is the fattest studio in town by this standard, not just with a two-man crew leading the studio, but with divisions below and across. Is Cieply going to theorize that Peter Rice was not replaced, as such, at Searchlight because they didn’t want to pay someone? Crazy. He was not replaced because the machine was built so that it could keep going and going effectively without him and with the team he worked with and showed complete respect to during his tenure. And if it ever crashed and burned… guess what… they would go find their next Peter Rice.
Vantage was shuttered because it lost a shitload of money. Warner Indie was shuttered because it was never a serious interest of the larger company and it lost the big studio in-house talent that needed a Dependent platform. Miramax is going small because the “middle business” is not anyplace anyone wants to be and Battsek can do 90% of what he’s been doing without that part of the business in place. And the definition of what Focus will continue to be is being defined daily now.
Studios are shrinking because they got FFFAAAATTTT. But people, even very expensive people, are the cheapest commodity in the movie business. If your movie studio is going through $1.5 billion in production and marketing a year, a $5 million salary is NOT going to change the dynamic or the bottom line much.
Yes, it matters a lot to the people who have those salaries and are dead afraid that those jobs will be going away. (Well, mostly THEIR jobs going away scares them. Fuck everyone else.) The same overhype is true when studios push back against out of control agents demands and want to pay huge, but almost reasonable prices for talent. “Woe is us… the whole business is collapsing…” Silly. A $8 million payday against only 6% of the gross instead of $20 million plus 8% is not the end of anyone’s world, even if it means that someone who is already too wealthy can’t buy their 4th vacation house in cash this year.
None of the big executive salaries cut end up trickling down to people who work for a living… under $400k. Never!
You know, ass covering and tap dancing and fear of losing the platinum diamond-studded ring is part of the game and really, I don’t mind it that much. It is what it is. But using that whining to distract NYT readers from the very real change that is coming/here that does/will have a major impact on everyone and the general disposition of movies that reach the public just pisses me off.
There was nothing shocking about The Hangover getting made… except that studios were making so many similarly dumb comedies for twice and three times the budget! Why?!?! I’m not taking anything away from the success of that film. But that is why they have always done cheap comedies. When they pay off, they are massive successes. (Todd Phillips personal payday will be over $45 million on the film.) But the question is not about trying to make more films like that one, but why any comedies are made for more than the $38 million that one was made for.
But media so often gets distracted by the wrong question. The idea of Hangover 2 being made is a no-brainer. That ship has sailed. It’s a distraction. Imitation is death. But what steps will studios take to put themselves in position for the next one… the one they don’t see coming… because no one can see them all coming, just as no one can see all the ones that miss.
It will not be about how much the person in the job makes or how many persons are in the job slot. And that you can take to the bank.
you’re dead on. it’s nutty how even in a complete shit economy at the end of a 20 year inflation of production and budgets that people can still see cutting back as a sign of failure.
Americans in general have an issue with growth. Everything has to be on an uptick. If it’s not higher than last year, something’s gone horribly wrong.
And why not make more 40 million dollar comedies? Why not make animated films that don’t cost 150 million dollars to produce? How about a Summer blockbuster made for less than 100 million?
The weight has become too heavy, and the studio knows it. When your romantic comedies cost 90 million dollars, you have to realize something has gone horribly, horribly wrong.
20 Years ago the most expensive movie ever made was Batman at 55 million. Waterworld came along soon after and donkey punched that number.
This year seems kind of fitting, like some kind of harbinger of what’s to come. Cameron took a huge gamble 12 years ago spending untold fortunes on Titanic. That hand came up a winner. Now he has doubled down with the 300 million dollar Avatar. If it doesn’t do well, you can hang the albatross squarely around his neck. It will be the blockbuster to break them all and will be furry blue example of the overspending dynamic.
“…Turan’s previous partner…”
“Partner” would seem to imply that KT/Carina, or KT/Betsy, review(ed) an equal number of movies.
Lately it seems like Kenny T. reviews about four movies a year. Betsy and Whipp and whoever’s syndicated reviews they can run seem to make up 95% of the Times’ film-review output, while I assume Turan just waits in giddy anticipation for his yearly Eastwood interview.
I remember people losing their minds over Rambo III‘s budget – $45 million. That wasn’t that long ago.
I’m sorry, but did anyone see MOON besides me? that dang thing cost 10 mil!!! If I were a studio, I’d be showing that flick to ALL filmmakers and tell them to slash their budgets. If you can make a gorgeous looking sci -fi pic, the best since SS’ SOLARIS for so little, than surely you can make dopey little comedies for the same or less.
Kudos to TP for gambling on TH and setting himself up for life. As he has said, it’s his “STAR WARS.”
Someday I’d like to see the 100M budget broken down into items line by line. Like: SFX: $40M, Costumes: $5M Salaries:$25M, and so forth. If anyone can oblige I would love that.
I remember also the press surrounding the budget on Evan Almighty and wondering why would you go from Jim Carrey to Steve Carrell (a talent in his right), and spend more money doing it.
And on the weekend before Halloween, its the cheap horror producers that keep leading by example. Cheap to produce, small risk. I also always wonder why some studios produce movies where you MUST break a box office record in order to be profitable. How can District 9 with a budget of $30M, look as effectively produced as bigger budgeted movies? Why does Wolverine need to cost $175M? Aren’t computers making better effects for cheaper these days?
And as for Jim Cameron..well $300M on a movie isn’t his fault, its the movie studio’s stupidity. If someone was giving me $300M to make a movie, I’d take it.
If someone gave me $300 MILLION to make a movie, I’d spend $299,987,134 on blow, booze, and endless vagina, then turn in some 10-cent camcorder shit I filmed in my living room with a Frisbee on a string and say, “Oh, well. Hope you like it!”
“300 million dollar Avatar”
don’t believe everything you read, anghus
I’ve heard $230 million for Avatar. If true, this is the first Cameron film since at least Terminator 2 (if not The Abyss) to not break the record for ‘most expensive movie ever’. It IS, however, I think the biggest budgeted non-sequel, non-franchise flick ever.
In defense of Cameron, he’s always trying to push the crazy edge of the envelope in terms of technology and scale and because of his overall success, the studios are willing to gamble on that. When you see when of his movies, it always looks like the movie’s up there on screen.
It’s the mid-level budgets that have gone insane. Comedies that cost well in excess of $100 million, something like WATCH-MEN costing $150, something like STAR TREK (which I enjoyed tremendously) costing $200 million? That’s crazy. G-FORCE costing $175? Insane.
Argh. Typo caught too late… that should read:
“When you see when of his movies, it always looks like the money’s up there on screen.”
Agreed, Telemachos (and Bulldog68). Cameron always delivers no matter what the cost, and he’s earned the right to burn money at this point. And the issue isn’t Spider-Man 3 costing $300 million, it’s State of Play (which I loved) costing $80 million or Marvel expecting Thor to match the performance of Iron Man and spending accordingly. You can’t budget according to a director or star or genre’s all-time best performance every time out of the gate.
Eh, it looks like it cost a zillion dollars BUT it still has that FILMED IN THE FOREST look.
How come they’re not having those big-ass battles in the HEART OF MANHATTAN with 200,000 extras with big buildings and shit?
It has that X-MEN foresty look. URBAN, SPACE, or WATER beats DRAB FOREST every time for a big-budget look.
Yes, filmed in the forest… a forest with GIANT FLOATING MOUNTAINS and FREE-FALL WATERFALLS thousands of feet up.
Just like X-MEN.
I’m continuously baffled by the budget figures that get released. As everyone is saying, how on Earth does a comedy cost over $100m if it has no effects. Hell, even effects-heavy movies costing $100 is absurd given what independent films have shown you can do with a much smaller budget a computer.
Pixar movies costing nearly $200mil sounds ridiculous too. It’s animation for crying out loud!
@bulldog68: “District 9” was financed like an arty overseas movie with individual territories sold bit by bit. Sony acquired the pic for the US.
That said, can we carry on a commentary without Mr. Potty Mouth turning this blog into a toxic waste dump?
In an sign of fiscal sanity, looks like FURY ROAD has been budgeted around $100 million, which seems very reasonable.
You are discussing the financing Chuck in Jersey, but did District 9 actually cost $30M to make, or was $30M the acquisition figure that Sony paid?
I’m not looking to defend the insane budgets of Hollywood…but at the same time of course The Hangover was cheap. No one was in it that anyone has heard of! It’s safer to cast Will Ferrell, and right away your budget is pretty big. Even still, how did they spend 60 mil or whatever on Step Brothers? It was all on one set!
Pixar movies will always be expensive because of man hours…you can’t get away from that. They hire profesionals to work on a movie that takes YEARS to produce.
Sure indies can be cheap…as someone who has produced my fair share, I have tons of ways to save money. The number one is, pay people shitty wages. A lot of times if someone’s going to work on Moon, they’re doing it as a labor of love and they’re willing to take a cut. Who’s willing to work on Wolverine as a labor of love?
I’d definitely rather see more small films. They’re usually more interesting, so don’t get me wrong.
Could this be the year that the Golden Globes show is more fun than the Oscarcast?
http://movingpictureblog.blogspot.com/2009/10/rick-gervais-to-host-golden-globes-no.html
“Pixar movies will always be expensive because of man hours…you can’t get away from that. They hire profesionals to work on a movie that takes YEARS to produce.”
One of the dumber comments I’ve read on here in awhile. So because they take several years to make and use “pros”, they need to cost upwards of $200 million these days? I think of other expensive CG movies, like Final Fantasy, Dinosaur, and Avatar, and typically they were quite expensive because of all the costs in developing new software and hardware to break new ground in terms of technical advances. The Pixar movies are always particularly well made, but I wouldn’t say that there’s been an obvious technological leap from one to another. Certainly Wall-E or Up are way ahead of Toy Story 1/2, ABL, etc. but it’s more of a gradual improvement from film to film. I would be interested in hearing how these CG films can cost so much to make. I doubt very much that it’s simply the man-hours and the paychecks for the animators. Because there are many non CG films that have also used top end animators over long periods and have not cost a ton to make.
While I’m not sure top-line animated films *need* to cost $200 million, remember that the production pipeline can be up to 4 times longer than a regular film. A big-budget live-action film will shoot for a few months and then have about a year in post (sometimes less). T2 went from script to release in about 14 months. The Harry Potter movies have lengthy shoots but still only take 16-18 months. The Pixar movies take several years.
That amount of time, with hundreds of union animators working away, and considering that every major release has tons of R&D that go into refinements in the animating/rendering process, means they’re gonna be very expensive.
“The Pixar movies are always particularly well made, but I wouldn’t say that there’s been an obvious technological leap from one to another. Certainly Wall-E or Up are way ahead of Toy Story 1/2, ABL, etc. but it’s more of a gradual improvement from film to film.”
One of the dumber comments I’ve read in a while. Pixar makes major advances in most of their films and spends an enormous amount on R&D every year. That’s why the fur in Monsters Inc looks better than Ice Age 3, which was released 8 years after the former film. Each film presents them with unique new technical challenges and problems to be solved.
And yes, animation is the most labor intensive process of filmmaking, most animated films have hundreds of people working on them for two-four years. And that’s just the above the line, so to speak, animator talent. You also have to consider all the support staff that goes along with your animators: coordinators and supervisors, HR and Accounting, tech support and craft services. Hell just your electric bill when you’re running server farms like Pixar does probably eats away 20 million over the life of a film. Additionally Pixar animates on proprietary in house software they write and develop themselves, on machines built to custom run to their requirements–they don’t just buy a workstation package from dell or apple. What pixar does, no one else in the world can replicate and that’s not even talking about them artistically, that’s talking about them technically. And that costs money.
martin, please enlighten us by letting us all know what a union animator makes weekly. Since you seem to know what you’re talking about. Thanks bud!
“Could this be the year that the Golden Globes show is more fun than the Oscarcast?”
I could probably count on one shop teacher’s hand the number of years in my lifetime in which that statement couldn’t be answered “yeah”.
I have no idea how much a union animator makes, and neither do you. What I do know is that The Lion King didn’t cost $200 million to make. It (at least according to Box office Mojo) cost $45 million to make. The Lion King is about as beautiful and high-production value an animation as I’ve ever seen, 2d or 3d, and it certainly used top end animators for many years on end. What’s the difference between that, and a 2009 Pixar? That it’s 3D versus 2D? I’ll grant that Pixar films look great, but I haven’t heard a convincing argument as to why it needs to cost $200 million. I know Dreamworks anims cost a ton to make as well, so I know it’s not just Pixar throwing money at it. But I don’t think we’ve hit upon where that money is going exactly.
And movielocke, as an animation geek, maybe going from fake fur to real looking fur in Monster’s Inc was a huge tech improvement to you, but I don’t look at it from that perspective. As a CG animated film, it looks better than ABL/TS films and is actually one of their best looking films IMO, but it is not a gigantic leap from one to the other. I think some of the leaps make in the FF film and Dinosaur were much more significant than from one Pixar film to another. I guess the argument could be that subtle animation improvements cost a ton of money and time to develop as well.
it took 8 months + just to animate ‘kong’, with teams of cg artists working months on end on just the hair, or eyes, or musculature/fluidity of motion, all the while adapting to innovations in technology along the way
i don’t know about ‘union’ animators but here the pay scale for cg artists ranges widely according to experience, skill, and the willingness to work one’s fingers to the bone for long periods of time without cracking up and going mental
Martin: the celebrity voices get paid a small sum on these animated shows. So that adds to the amount. You also have to throw in there that almost every one of these films utilizes some innovated tech on each picture. Each film from Sony, Fox, DWA, and PIXAR features some technology in it, that has never been used before. Which, again, adds to the cost.
So you add in first gen cutting edge tech along with all of the voice talent, that gets build as if they are physically starring in these films, and you’ve got yourself one hell of a budget. It all adds up.
IO, I still say that from an outsider’s perspective, the “tech” hasn’t evolved as much as the budgets would suggest. Maybe it’s a situation of diminishing returns with the software design, but I look at clips for films like FF and Dinosaur, and the visuals for the most part still hold up pretty closely with CG films coming out now.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GnE64DbnUzY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SHZ3vwX9Fuc
I know some people will say, oh, they’re not stereoscopic, or they are clearly inferior as far as the textures, palettes, lighting, physics, etc. but from a regular viewer that doesn’t know much about CG, I’d say they still look pretty good and not say 10 years behind the curve.
martin, you do indeed prove yourself to have an outsider’s perspective…uninformed.
We haven’t determined where the money is going? Everyone’s telling you! Salaries for employees for YEARS of work. These guys are skilled, it’s not like hiring some dude to bring you a pizza. And do you have any idea how much the computers cost for that shit? I have friends in government and they just spent two million dollars in a system that they’ll use for the next year or so, and then will need to upgrade.
The tech has hugely improved and if you watch those movies and can’t see that, then you should get some thicker glasses. And I’d say a movie like Ice Age doesn’t compare visually to any Pixar movie.
And are we assuming the other animation companies aren’t lying about their costs?
Look, I’ve been on indie shoots where we blew through 100 grand in a few weeks…and this was with a relatively small crew on a few locations and some people were being paid like 30 bucks a day. But then you get to long hours, and equipment, and overtime…and soon you’re spent a lot of money.
So you don’t seem some strange discrepancy between The Lion King $45 mill., and Up, $175 mill.? Even going with inflation, technical/production costs, etc. I still see a major difference between the cost of the two that isn’t easily explained away. To me Lion King should cost more, I mean look at the long list of well known actors in that, plus the music/score could have not been inexpensive. And that film also had some cutting edge CG in that stampede sequence. So why is today’s Pixar costing so much more than yesterday’s Disney? Computers?
“I have no idea how much a union animator makes, and neither do you.” oh, come now, that info is easy to discover, unions publically post their minimums
http://www.animationguild.org/_Contract/wages_pdf/TAG_Minimums_2006-2009.pdf
Start at about 1000-1100/week and go up (a lot!) from there.
Say you’re paying 200 people 1000/week and you have a 150 week production schedule. that’s 30 million just presuming that an entire feature’s staff is unskilled and earning low level entry pay.
Martin: if your eyes do not detect a difference between Dinosaurs and UP. Well, your eyes, may need some fine tuning. Heck. I will go as far as to disagree with people that state ICE AGE 3 looks like shit compared to a Pixar film. Bollocks. Everyone of the big four operating at the moment in this field, have all featured technological leaps and bounds between each movie. The vastness in technology between Toy Story, Toy Story 2, and Toy Story 3 is huge. Again, if your eyes do not see it, then that’s on you.
Oh yeah, let’s go one step further in all of this. Do you look at the credits of these films Martin? Do you notice a little credit they all have titled “PRODUCTION BABIES”? If not, do so the next time, and realize how long it takes to churn one of these films out.
What’s the difference between Lion King and UP? The time. The time it takes to make one compared to the other is immense. You also need to realize that Pixar, Sony, DWA, and FOX are all right now planning films that we may not see until 2012 to 2014.
If you fail to grasp the whole TIME ISSUE, then again the problem is yours. Not ours.
From what I can tell, production on Lion King started in 1988/1989, and production on Up started 2004/2005. So they both took about as long to physically make. You seriously saying that Hollywood-size animated films today, take a lot more time to make than animated films of 10 or 20 years ago?
“…blah blah … still say that from an outsider’s perspective, the “tech” hasn’t evolved as much as the budgets would suggest.”
Martin, I can’t figure out if you’re just baiting people here by acting dumb, or you really are this obtuse. I worked in the tech field before I got into the film writing game, and I can tell you from that experience that the person with the “outsider’s perspective” knows jack shit about the amount of work, investment and man hours it takes to make even small technological advancements, much less ones that seem BIG to someone like yourself.
Others here have already broken down much of this for you, and either you are not reading carefully or just not grasping the point, which is: Technology costs. Advancements are often in technological areas that YOU cannot see because you don’t work in the field. Building a server that will render an animated sequence in half the time. Developing software that makes realistic fur. These things cost money, money, time and more money, and it matters not whether you see, or think you see, the end result or not.
And for what it’s worth, it’s not “their” job to to explain to “you” the ins and outs of why developing this or that takes x man hours and costs x amount of money. I doubt whether anyone at Pixar particularly cares whether you grasp it or not.
Martin: yes. Again, Kim explained it, but the money it takes to do these films is immense because the tech involved. Everything you see on screen has a team. Seriously, go watch a special feature on any Pixar DVD. It will give you an education that you apparently need. HAIR has it’s own RENDERING FOR ZEUS’ SAKE! Seriously man, come on! JUST COME ON!
it’s all about the eyes
kong’s eyes = alive
zemeckis/SPI eyes = dead. like a doll’s eyes. lights on, nobody’s home. creepy
Just to be clear, Pixar does NOT employ union labor. Much to the consternation of the guild.
What martin is missing (deliberately, I suspect) is that Pixar literally pushes itself with every single project. Their shorts program is as much about developing new technologies as it is about fostering new talent. Example: Pixar released a cute animated short called Lifted a few years back. A main focus of the production was to create the semi-solid “jiggle” of the interior of the alien bodies. This was, like, a huge deal that took a long time to perfect. Now, to an untrained novice like martin, this new technology is nothing worth noting. But to Pixar, it was an expensive but necessary step to keep raising the bar. Pixar always is striving for more, and that costs mucho cash. As long as they keep delivering at the box office, Disney will let them spend whatever they want.
Telemachos, in regards to Fury Road. I’m not sure $100mil is such a good number for a film that will probably have limited appeal in America, I will add that the producers will likely get the 40% rebate for the Aus government and $60mil sounds far better.
KC, shut the fuck up, you queenie COUNT FROM SESAME STREET-looking toolbox.
You’re boring and stereotypical as fuck.
Can;t wait till you and your “partner” (HAHAHAHAH Bet he’s a prize) BREAK UP and you mature a little, you away-from-home-for-the-first time douche.
Oh, and, yeah, Martin, don’t argue with Big Perm on this subject:
He works on MOVIE SETS.
In Bumfuck, D.C.
MEGA PRODUCER (and Jeff’s gay crush) Big Perm, titan of industry.
I know, I should be a whiny fuck who produces videos for Youtube by himself since he doesn’t have any friends. Who’s pleased as punch with his laziness except for all the times he’s whining about it. But instead I guess I’ll talk to people and make stuff I like and make money, and hang out with models and hot actresses instead.
Better not get cocky fatty, or I’ll get you to erase the rest of your unfunny videos.
Kamikaze, with G-FORCE costing $175 million and WATCH-MEN costing $150 million (to use 2 random examples), $100 million for a new picture in a franchise that’s quite popular worldwide seems totally sane. Yes, it’s an older franchise, but still, these days $100 million seems a bargain for an action-heavy stunt-oriented film.
I mean, someone put up $200 million to make a Terminator movie without Arnold or Cameron.
For the record, when Dinosaur was made, it was easily the most expensive animated film in history.
er… wtf?
OK: Just to be clear: When you folks refer to Dinosaur — do you mean Ice Age 3? Or the 2000 Disney film?
Joe, we’re talking about Jurassic Park.
I thought you were talking about the animated film Dinosaur. There’s a difference with a movie that’s all animated, such as Dinosaur…and a movie that has special effects, like Jurassic Park.
what the fuck, we’re talking about Dinosaur. Why I would call Ice Age 3 let alone Jurassic Park that I can’t even imagine.
And even though I was done with this discussion that went nowhere, I’ll point out that the conclusion, if there was one, was that the primary reason for huge budgets on Pixar or Dmworks CG movies is due to the technical achievements and improvements made in the process. As we’ve all discussed, there have been countless beautifully made animated films in the last 20 years with major production values that did not have gargantuan budgets. Typically these were 2D animated films though (with some 3D elements here and there). So what I can glean from this is that the technology is a huge reason for the budget, not the animators/long production times, etc. because all those are the same if not more so on 2D animations.
Well, The Lion King had an 80 million budget from what I can tell, and that was 15 years ago. A few years earlier Terminator 2 had the biggest budget ever at 100 million. So Lion King was twenty percent less to make than the most expensive movie ever made. It wasn’t cheap.
I saw The Lion King listed as $45 million budget, according to Box Office Mojo, and Aladdin is listed as $28 million. Not saying these are totally accurate figures, but from what I can tell animated films prior to 3D/CG were simply not some of the biggest hollywood budgets of the year, like they are now. They were in the mid to high end in some cases, but when we’re regularly seeing 175-200 million budgeted animations I think that it’s clear there’s been a change in price.
BOM posts the numbers the studios give ’em. Not really their fault, but those aren’t necessarily the actual budgets (which, let’s face it, we’ll never really know.)
There was an article in the LA Times awhile pointing out some details about this sort of thing, like how Dreamworks happily told everyone that SHREK’s budget was $70 million when it was actually $130 million.
Basically, a high-profile animated film is gonna cost relatively close to the same amount (maybe 10-20% less) than an comparable big-budget live-action film.
” But instead I guess I’ll talk to people and make stuff I like and make money, and hang out with models and hot actresses instead.”
TOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL.
Holy fuck, dude, it’s called IRONY, look into it. Are you really THIS much of a fucking rod?
Who is the Tool, the dude doing what he wants with his life, or the guy whining about never getting to do what he wants because he never had the balls to try?
I’m a fucking High School teacher in New Mexico Lex – and not even the part of the state with a lot of productions going on – I’m in the extreme po-dunk part, and I work on sets on a semi-regular basis. Hell, we just cast a Playboy model for an upcoming production, and I got to hang with her for the whole weekend. Probably the only Playboy model within a 300 mile radius of me, and I was hanging with her. You could probably throw a rock out your front door and hit one – and would never have the nerve to say hello.
Because I actually do things, rather than just constantly demanding others do it for me. No, none of the productions are big, or even very good – but it’s better than whining on youtube.
So there ya go, a rural School teacher in the ass end of the southwest is doing a better job of living your dream.