JOHN CARTER (Trailer ) (1 Viewer)

[Richard--W]

Disney should have called it JOHN CARTER OF MARS, like the books.
The proper title would make all the difference in the world at the box-office.
It's a no-brainer.

 

[Malcolm R]

I agree. I thought it was a really foolish move to adopt the generic title "John Carter." They could have called it "Bob Smith" or "Fred Brown" and got the same reaction.

 

[Sam Favate]

I see that Amazon already has this title up for pre-order. I didn't see it in the theater (although I wanted to, just didn't get to it), but may make a blind buy of the title, as I like the source material and Andrew Stanton. And heck, buying the blu-ray is cheaper than my wife and I going to the theater to see it and buying a soda.

 

[smithb]

I don't go to the theater anymore, but the fact that this has received some positive vibe from fans makes it an automatic purchase for me when released on blu-ray. As a kid I read many of ER's books/series. In fact, I still have several in a box down in the basement (e.g. Mars, Tarzan, Venus). Frankly, I can't envision how a credible movie would have been possible without the CGI capabilities of today. It would have been great if they could have at least made a trilogy, but something is better then nothing.

 

[SilverWook]

Maybe the final overseas box office will be enough open the door to a sequel? Disney seems to be in a big hurry to turn this into a tax write off though.

 

[Malcolm R]

With a reported production cost of $250 million, and probably another $100 in marketing costs, it'd have to gross about $600 million worldwide to come close to breaking even (the studio generally splits the total gross roughly 60-40 with exhibitors). Not out of the question, but also probably not likely.
Plus they'd be starting in the hole, as they'd have to overcome all the negative press about what a bomb the first film was (whether it ends up being true or not) in order to convince audiences to even give a second film a chance.

 

[Aaron Silverman]

I took my son to the Saturday matinee. In retrospect, that's the obvious time to see this! We both enjoyed it a lot, although some of the plot lines were over Junior's head (age 6). The violence was a bit toned down from the book and there was a little more humor, making it a relatively family-friendly film, especially for PG-13. I think it could be shown uncut on broadcast TV. It still felt true to the source, though.
It struck me afterward that not only was the advertising terrible, there are NO product tie-ins! Not one toy on store shelves. From Disney, no less?!?!?! And with all those alien warriors and flying battleships? They couldn't even throw together a couple of Happy Meals? Good grief, I knew they'd botched the marketing, but I hadn't quite realized how badly. Were these the same people who ran Firefly on Fox?
I want a Woola toy!!!

 

[Aaron Silverman]

Bada-bing!

http://www.forbes.com/sites/carolpinchefsky/2012/04/02/john-carters-trip-to-mars-is-finally-profitable/

BoxOffice Mojo reports that John Carter has grossed $254.5 million, a $4.5 million over its budget—currently not technically a profit, considering its advertising budget, but it’s far better than the epic loss that many had feared.

Unsurprisingly, most of this coin has come from overseas. While John Carter earned over $66 million here in the United States, international markets have pulled in over $188 million. Film Buff Online writes that John Carter was #1 in box office receipts for two weeks in a row in China. This profit will keep increasing, as John Carter has yet to be released in Japan, where it will surely put the movie several million dollars in the black.

Then there are DVD/Blu-Ray sales. Film Buff Online said,

f we need any more proof of the true popularity of the film, we have to look no farther than Amazon.com. Amazon shoppers who signed up for e-mails to alert them of DVD & Blu-Ray new releases were informed that they were able to pre-order John Carter on video today. As of this writing, the Blu-Ray 3-D/Blu-Ray/DVD/Digital Copy was the #1 selling item in Amazon’s Science-Fiction Movie list, and ranked #2 in the Action & Adventure and Fantasy Categories…. It ranks #13 over all in the Movies & TV Blu-Ray list.

Imagine if they'd sold some action figures. . .

 

[Malcolm R]

And Forbes obviously does not understand the movie exhibition business, as the studio does not receive all of that money. The exhibitors get to keep a good portion of the overall gross. As I'd noted above, the film would need a worldwide gross of about $600 million before it even comes close to breaking even in theaters, let alone making any profits.
You cannot make a direct comparison of the overall gross vs. budget to determine the financial "success" of any film.

 

[Aaron Silverman]

The headline is misleading (shocking!), but the basic point stands that the film is not going to end up the financial disaster that many have been predicting -- it's still playing everywhere, hasn't even opened yet in some large markets, and after one day of pre-orders is making noise on the disc sales charts.
Not to mention the fact that I think this is the first time that anyone (meaning the masses, not HTF types) has gotten particularly worked up about the actual cut of box office that a studio receives. Articles have always simply compared a film's gross receipts to its budget. (And, frankly, in Hollywood Accounting-Land, the stated budget probably resembles the actual expenditure on a film as much as the box office gross resembles the studio's take. . .)

 

[Edwin-S]

Yeah, it makes you wonder how many of the budgets from films that never see a theatrical release somehow get worked into the budgets of potential "blockbusters"?

 

[SilverWook]

I took my son to the Saturday matinee. In retrospect, that's the obvious time to see this! We both enjoyed it a lot, although some of the plot lines were over Junior's head (age 6). The violence was a bit toned down from the book and there was a little more humor, making it a relatively family-friendly film, especially for PG-13. I think it could be shown uncut on broadcast TV. It still felt true to the source, though.
It struck me afterward that not only was the advertising terrible, there are NO product tie-ins! Not one toy on store shelves. From Disney, no less?!?!?! And with all those alien warriors and flying battleships? They couldn't even throw together a couple of Happy Meals? Good grief, I knew they'd botched the marketing, but I hadn't quite realized how badly. Were these the same people who ran Firefly on Fox?
I want a Woola toy!!!

Funny thing is, there were some John Carter action figures in the 90's as part of a Tarzan line. It wasn't tied to anything I was aware of.
There are figures coming out aimed at the high end pricey collector's market, but not based on the movie.

 

[SilverWook]

With a reported production cost of $250 million, and probably another $100 in marketing costs, it'd have to gross about $600 million worldwide to come close to breaking even (the studio generally splits the total gross roughly 60-40 with exhibitors). Not out of the question, but also probably not likely.
Plus they'd be starting in the hole, as they'd have to overcome all the negative press about what a bomb the first film was (whether it ends up being true or not) in order to convince audiences to even give a second film a chance.

The sad part is the SciFi channel will probably crank out a sequel to their cheapo version.

 

[SilverWook]

Is this still playing near anyone? It's totally gone from every theater in my area.

 

[TravisR]

Is this still playing near anyone? It's totally gone from every theater in my area.

Yeah, it's still playing at multiple theaters near me (though one of those theaters doesn't have any night time shows).

 

[SilverWook]

It seems the more multiplexes we have, the fewer movie choices we actually get. Two theaters near me actually kept "Casa De Mi Padre" on one screen.
I hope JC makes it to the bargain theater here so I can see it at least one more time.

 

[cineMANIAC]

This film was a ton of fun - better than I expected. Can't wait for the Blu-ray