The Oscar Show has finished and I again did not watch it. So it’s business as usual.

Well, almost.

Turns out that while I was sleeping soundly Avatar got seriously pwnd. And for once I applaud the men behind the scenes for having the guts to do what they did.

Because instead of honoring some big bullshit effect spectacle with characters so flat you think they’re 2D animated, the Oscar jury gave the most important Oscars to The Hurt Locker. A small independent flick about the Iraq with bombing and some serious message. It was a truly brave move – and it was about time.

Although I don’t really care for the rest of the bunch it is a nice feeling that the most successful movie of all time doesn’t get all the Oscars just because of this fact. I really hope this puts some reality back into James Cameron who – judging by the reports – seemingly didn’t expect or like this outcome.

Good effects don’t make a good movie. Period!

And who’d have thought that one actress not only would win the statue of shame but also the statue of honor. Way to go, Sandra Bullock. Both of your movies are now on my Have-To-Watch-List.

So how about you? Did you like the outcome of the show? Where there any big surprises for you or didn’t you care at all?

Just when I didn’t open my feed reader for two days Disney bought Marvel for a whopping 4 billion Dollar. I really don’t want know what happens when I don’t open my reader for a whole week…

Regardless of the wrath I might bring upon the world this deal is quite something and even comes close to the “legendary” acquisition of Pixar. But why did Disney buy Marvel and what are some consequences of this deal?

Marvel, compared to some of the big players on the media market, is not that a big player at all regarding its gross revenue of about 700 million Dollar in 2008 (Disney reached almost 38 billion Dollar). Net income was about 200 Million Dollar. Compared to the year 2007 the gross revenue increased by almost 200 million Dollar but that increase is due to the start of the production division which accounted for 255 million Dollar. Licensing and went down, publishing kept the same. So what does that mean for Disney?

Basically two things:

1. Marvel can make a lot of money if it produces its movie itself. But
2. Disney needs to increase net income drastically so its investment pays off

The second point is especially important I think. If you take the 200 million Dollar net income, it would mean that Disney needs 20 (!) years until the 4 bn mark is reached. That is quite some time. Of course Disney thinks in long terms, but this time frame is quite something considering that in ten years the whole business might look quite different.

Let’s take the movies. At the moment superheroes movies make tons of money. But I am absolutely sure that this era will come to its end sooner or later. We had screwball comedies and we had our 80s action movie stars. This hype is not any different from the ones before. In other words: Disney needs to produce many movies fast. If done well, they make money and go on, if done badly it will ruin the Marvel brand and its “properties”.

Of course, Disney will also go for Saturday morning cartoons, Disneyland stuff and merchandising, possible in Star Warsy-epic dimensions. But lest not forget that the production of such media and rides also costs money. Before Disney can think of accounting or offsetting those earnings against the investment done, it needs to think of earning enough money to get their production specific investments back.

It’s no question that Disney bought some cool stuff with Marvel. 5000 characters is quite a number to milk money from. The problem? The Long tail if you can call it that way. Only a handful of superheroes and supervillains are well known and I’d dare to say for the better.

Therefore, I’d that the big chance for Disney in my eyes lies within this vast world of possibilities and ideas brought by those characters, not necessarily the characters themselves. Think of TV series or cartoons or movies that are produced for DVD as Bambi 2 or other sequels.

What’s also important is the fact that Disney long struggled to go for the older, teenage male audience and as proved by Treasure Planet an Atlantis it didn’t work out quite well. By buying Marvel Disney now not only own a bug universe but also big talent to go for this very audience. How need the stories to work, what’s cool and not so cool for young male people? I think that Marvel knows way better than Disney and personally I believe that this was the main reason to buy it.

What are your thoughts?

Further reading:

Paul Young from ScreenRant agrees that Marvel is a big chance to reach the young male audience

John presents us some fantastic artwork of well-known Disney characters that got Marvelized (well, Pocahontas looks more like an anime character to me, but that’s okay)

And Vince Mancini adds that milking the cow is indeed the way of Hollywood-Zen (accompanied by his hint of a little detail you could call a rush of white lines).

Initial Thought

Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

Second Thought

Q: How many Nazis do you need to overcome Indiana Jones?

A: It doesn’t matter! He beats them all to brown pulp!

Third Thought

Why didn’t all movie fans out there pirate this movie off any torrent site, letting it bomb silently so Hollywood spares us this agony…?!

Yep, that’s my brain working night and day to keep me and you entertained…

OK, let’s get serious again…

The Serious Stuff

You know, it’s not the first time I’ve mourned about the massive numbers of sequels, remakes and prequels lately. And if nothing else, this new movie entry proves again that Hollywood is eager to milk any movie franchise until it’s lying death on the floor.

Indiana Jones – on the other hand – is a somehow special case.

If you compare this world with, for example, Star Wars you can see that Indiana Jones is predestinated to be a ongoing series of movies (James Bond comes to mind here, too). Because basically you have a cool character with amazing deductive and sportive skills who goes on adventures to find legendary treasures and more. the adventures aren’t that connected, heck, if you look at the second movie entry, you get thrown in characters never to be seen again, so the only constant here is…Indiana Jones.

But why am I so against it, you might ask.

Well, on a business level the producers made one big mistake: they have let the franchise sleep for some months too many. In that regard they took the exact opposite steps compared to James Bond.

Not only did that franchise called James Bond flood the world with its iconic character but the producers also managed to take one important step: they disconnected the character from the actor. James Bond became James Bond, played by… But Indiana Jones? To me Indiana Jones always will be Harrison Ford playing Indiana Jones and not Indiana Jones played by Harrison Ford.

Perhaps the creative guys in Hollywood felt that problem, which over the years turned out to be catastrophic as the next entry never came to be and Ford never found some time to reprise his role.Now it’s almost too late and they desperately seem to try to pass on the torch to a new actor and a new character.

As we all know, IJ4 made tons of money (a little too much for my taste, but ok) and perhaps that’s really the beginning of the “franchise” Indy.

But to me they not only made that crucial step many years too late, but also did some mistakes too much in this fourth entry. Besides the refrigerator it’s Shia LeBouf. I really don’t hate the guy, despite being seen sometimes too often in Steven Spielberg movies, it’s just that I simply cannot imagine him as a good “sequel” to our much beloved iconic Harrison Ford.

Perhaps it would be the best to put Indiana to rest. But there’s the money which is just too glittering.

Yay for true, unstoppable creativity!!! Hollywood finally hit the eternal heights of creativity from which they cannot be thrown down anymore. They’ve done it. Seriously. Because….fasten your seatbelts…because they have decided to make a movie out of a bubblegum comic called Bazooka Joe.

Somehow I have the feeling Hollywood is testing us or seriously mentally unstable. I cannot decide which is it from the current situation but I tend to both: they’re testing us because they’re mentally unstable.

Or they have too much money they need to waste to get some loot out of Uncle Sam. Or is there something else?!?!?

Well, it doesn’t matter how I look at this scoop, it sounds like an absurd idea that is meant to fail horribly. If that story would be a comedy I’d think the writer has gone crazy and would enjoy the show tremendously.

But this is reality. Something got seriously mixed up here, guys.

Firstly, you have the story…that stems from some comic strips in a bubblegum called Bazooka Bubble Gum. Then you have Mark Hammer (a name perfectly fitting for a comedy) who once wrote a different spec script which never made it to something remotely similar to celluloid or a hard drive. And last but not least you have Michael Eisner, former head of Disney and thus accountable for the rise and fall of the animation department, who decides that this newcomer has everything to pull off a script about a bubblegum character as deep as a strip of candy, wearing an eye patch.

…I herewith declare that ten years ago we were beamed into the Matrix which now is crumbling to dust, causing severe malfunctions in its logic processor.

…

Update: As it turns out, the logic processor seems to be still in a quite good shape. In fact, it works better than ever before. Thanks to the unlimited knowledge of the Wikipedian swarm and the internets, I (and probably hundreds of other bloggers) found out that Michael Eisner has more up in his sleeve than a bad taste of movie making. As it turns out, in 2006 he (or better: his Tornante Company) bought The Topps Company, Inc. which is producing the bubblegum and thus created the character (and has a website with too many colors and much less content). The price? As it seems around $400 Million.

In other words: Eisner isn’t making a movie, he is making a big and massive commercial, probably to get his (and his friends’) massive investments back. Since the company seems to be one of the biggest seller of sports-related trading cards (there’s no equivalent here in Germany, so sorry for my lack of knowledge), I expect some huge merchandising as soon as the first image of the movie gets spilled out.

So, sorry my beloved Matrix. You are still working quite well.

Is it just me, or is the number of sequels rising constantly?

I know, I am the first one writing that money has to be made and a movie production is risky. Just some posts ago (which feels like ten years in real time) I stated that sequels are a wise investment decision. Yet it is getting out of hand, isn’t it?

At least it seems to be this way because by looking through the movie news site we learn that we not only get SPIDERMAN 4 and TERMINATOR 4 with a good slice of The Wrath of Bale©. No we even get a sequel of the sequel sequel called TERMINATOR 5, in which a Robert Patrick will *somehow* revive his role of the awesome-ly cool T-1000.

But it is getting even better than this, because we already get a supposed STAR TREK sequel of the prequel, before the prequel itself is out in the movie world. This is only topped by the fact that TERMINATOR 5 got green-lit before the production of the fourth installement even got finished!! Talk about being in a hurry.

But they cannot stop there either. They are on steroids, on drugs because we also learn that we even get another MEN IN BLACK sequel in the year 2011. Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones will rejoice as it seems. Perhaps in a wheelchair? I don’t know! But it will be…great??

No, it will be great, because I know they need to make money, so it has be great. I just have to believe in the force or whatever else there is…It will be great!

And it will be a great movie making machine for the industry…

God dammit! Although I know they need to make money to survive I sometimes miss the times when a producer told the world he has something up in his sleeves the world has never seen…

Do you know someone who cannot decide on something and stick with it? And do you know what’s worse than that? A company that does the exact same thing.

I have to admit that I hate those moments when I ask someone about something and s/he simply cannot decide. Like where we should go for dinner. He starts to think for minutes, and finally says “to the Steak House”, only to change it seconds later to “the Pizzeria”, going through this loop until the food is served and the decision is final – although in the end he wished for everything, like a Steak Pizza Deluxe.

I really hate those moments, so it’s no wonder my personal volcano went off when I read the news that Universal will release FEARLESS with Jet Li in three different versions on a single Blu-Ray.

I don’t care if it’s to milk more money and I don’t care if they think it is great for movie geeks (those guys with the special Star Wars glitch). For me it is simply plain stupid because it shows indecisiveness and marketing thinking on an epic level.

Moreover it is a sign that Blu-Ray might finally kill the movie.

“Kill the movie?” Am I finally becoming crazy? Well, perhaps.

But what I mean in this context is that Blu-Ray is not killing movies in general but the movie, which means the one, definite movie. The first and final version. You know, the version the director (and the production studio) is most proud of. The version in which everything is shown, told and done. The version about which both partner say “We did our best to make it the best thing possible.” The version which you can watch in cinema without having to think “Is that all, or is there something added later on?”

Some years ago I bought the trilogy of Lord of the Ring and watched all making-ofs they could offer. In one of last ones for the third movie they filmed the crew burning all those unused reels. At that time I thought they were crazy.

Now I would do the same.

It is truly mind blowing what the latest installment of the Bat achieved in the last few days. Only some days after I reviewed the animated part of the movie franchise, the second movie came and won big time. And boy, this one really sneaked up on me, I really didn’t see that one coming – in many ways.

I knew this movie would make some big money. This was no hard guess at all. Spiderman 1 to 3 (which could have been saved by some changes in the script), X-Men, Hulk and all the others movies/franchises managed to earn some money – most of the time big money. While The Incredible Hulk only gained some 130 Million, BATMAN  BEGINS made 200 Million. So, my guess was something between 150 Million to 200 Million.

Boy, I was sooo wrong!

THE DARK KNIGHT managed to nuke everything that came before in terms of box office. On the opening weekend alone the movie made 158 Million Dollar! Wow. To understand this dimensions you have to compare this opening weekend with the one of BATMAN BEGINS which “only” made some 48 Million. The producers must be rolling on the floor of excitement and joy.

But it is even getting better. When you take the percentage of weekend box office in relation to the whole gross you get for BATMAN BEGINS something about 24 percent. Ok. 24 percent is about one fifth. So, when you multiply the opning grosss of DARKN KNIGHT (158) by 5 you get a mind melting 790 Million Dollar. Even none of the Star Wars Episodes (*shiver*) didn’t achieve that.

But whether or not THE DARK KNIGHT manages to reach that number will have to be seen. Perhaps this one might stunble and get in the realms of the Hulk franchise in which both opening weekends accounted for round about 50 percent.

But you know what? I don’t really think this will happen because the second, in my eyes much more mind blowing thing, comes into play: IMDB. You know, as a good movie geek the first thing I did after reading those numbers was to go to IMDB and check the ratings of this behemoth as this is a good indicator for how worthwhile a movie really is. Again, I predicted something fairly high, something between 7.5 and 8.5 which is really good in terms of IMDB. And you know what? This movie, as of 22 July, has a rating of 9.5!

With this number, DARK KNIGHT already took the crown on the site. It went past Star Wars, past Seven Samurai, past Matrix, past Scorsese, simply put past everything. It is, for now, the best movie ever made. At least according to IMDB. And with this number it means that this movie will get a perfect word of mouth because every geek loved it which could mean, that the droves will continue.

158 Million and 9.5. Mind blowing. Truly mind blowing.

And I have to wait til 21 August.

Dammit!

And here’s the surprise: although the final result (the movie) is absolutely the same, the trailer workers in Russia managed to create something completely different out of it. I don’t understand one single word they say but in the Russian trailer I get the impression that this guy hates is job, hates his colleagues, hates his life and is in need for a change. And the change is coming. But there is more: this guy doesn’t run, this guy learns to stand up and fight. From the beginning. And this guy kills.

One trailer can make this major difference.

And now it is time for you to compare them for yourself. You can watch the US Version here and the Russian version here.

What do you think?

Back to topic: judging by the first two teaser trailers released so far I certainly start to believe this movie could become Pixars best movie to date. The ideas shown in those two short “movies” are remarkable. The repairing of the Pixar Logo by Wall E. The fun stuff he does all the day. The hillarious and upbeat music which wonderfully contradicts the wasteland atmosphere we see. And the very robotic voice at the end.

The guys at Pixar certainly did their job.

The only small letdown on an atomic level (hence, really small. No Atom Bomb image here at work) is the third trailer they released because I got some”hey, we are funny” and “hey, we can render big sets” vibes. But I am not too concerned about this as they always went beyond this stuff.

Oh Dude. Slowly but surely I really want to work there. Working as a Director (me? at pixar? *rofl* (Note to me: stop dreaming, bastard)) of course would be a one way ticket to HeartAttackLand with the little help of StressBeyond 2000, your only true car on this planet. But I wouldn’t care. Because…

Imagine what you (that is to say I) could learn from those guys…

Today I read this article about a FRIDAY THE 13THh revival and I immediately had to think about my old post again. Because some months ago I wrote some thoughts about remakes after hearing of the “revival” of METROPOLIS by Fritz Lang.

I am not quite sure how this remake will turn out but I start to get remake fatigue. Even more because it is very likely that for each remake created one good script a promising writer has created doesn’t. Of course a remake of a well-known franchise is an easy bet. But please, dear producers, don’t build your studio future around this business plan because it can backfire horribly when overdone.

And by the way: slowly but surely it starts to wreck my nerves that I have to think about the YEAR in which a movie was released just to be sure I got the right one in the search engines (and everywhere else). Please, Mr. Producer-san, spare me with this in the future.

photo credit: Cayusa