Box Office Analysis: Why the 'Ghostbusters' Reboot May Haunt Sony
hollywoodreporter.com/news/box-office-analysi...
hollywoodreporter.comPosted Jul 18, 2016, 2:33 PM UTC
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hollywoodreporter.comSony executives were in full spin mode as they declared Paul Feig's all-female Ghostbusters reboot a triumph, pointing out that the $46 million opening was the biggest launch for a live-action comedy since Pitch Perfect 2 took in $69.2 million in May 2015.
What kind of mental gymnastics is that? They're claiming it's the biggest comedy opening weekend since a film that's only a year old, and it's still shy of ~$25m to be a good comparison anyway! And even then, that's ignoring that freaking Deadpool happened earlier this year, opening to a whopping $300m.
I've never seen so much denial in my life.
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Same, even puts this to shame.
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(Pssst. The Nile river is highlighted. The Nile. Denial.)
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(Shhhh. Don't tell him. It's more funny if you don't explain it.)
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Even if you ignore Ghostbusters' advertising budget, which far exceeds Pitch Perfect 2, it still costs FIVE times as much to make.
Five times the budget + 23M less revenue on opening weekend = success?
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Pitch perfect 2 only grossed like 280m, which was great for their budget but would be really bad for GB
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Deadpool was a romantic comedy, son. Get yer genres straight. Proof
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Deadpool's advertising campaign was straight up trolling in some areas and I loved it. It's what Wade would do if he was in charge of marketing his own movie!
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"If foreign grosses don't pick up the slack, this will go down as another big disappointment for Sony, who based their entire summer on this brand," says Bock. "More of a rip-off than a reboot, the new Ghostbusters plays out more like a gimmicky video game than a movie, and that doesn't bode well for staying power, or for future installments."
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This is the thing people don't seem to be getting into their brains. This was supposed to be a tent-pole block buster for a major studio. A domestic opening weekend in the #2 spot and bringing in under $50 million dollars is not a good thing.
No one on the Sony board looked at this movie and said to themselves. "If we can just make our money back, this movie is a success!"
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Yep. The curiosity value alone of bringing back a really well known movie 'brand' after nearly 30 years should have created a big bang of ticket sales on the first night or two. That didn't happen, and now they can't get a second shot at that.
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Yeah, tt makes me think, nevermind the talk about gender/sexism, it being a reboot, or Paul Feig at the helm, it ultimately all comes down to Sony, and they haven't exactly been the best caretakers of their franchises. Because while every big corporation focuses primarily on the bottom line, the good tentpole movies still have to deliver some measure of quality, like any other product.
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I think it was hurt too much by the bad press. My wife dragged me to the theater to see it (I didn't have high expectations) and I really enjoyed it. It was nothing like the originals and it certainly wasn't a cinematic masterpiece, but it was very enjoyable. There were a few flat jokes, but there were way more good laugh out load chuckles. It was easily worth the $7 I paid.
I realize there is always subjectivity involved, but I think think movie would have done much better if they had produced better trailers. The movie itself is a 6 or 7 our of 10. The trailers were easily 3/10 or worse.
EDIT: NVM
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I don't think you need to be downvoted for your opinion, but I don't agree with it much like those downvoting you.
I saw it for free thanks to a friend at the theater, and I felt like I wasted time and a favor. It was very cliche and poorly put together, with stale jokes. It felt like I was watching a cartoon made into live action, a bad cartoon.. the 2D transforming logo boss didn't help that overall feeling.
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I don't know? It reminded me a bit of Spy, but less funny. I wasn't really a huge fan of the original Ghost Busters, so maybe that comes into play? I thought the original was a decent film, but not spectacular. The new one was more...cute, which I kind of like.
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One of the reasons this is getting such mixed reviews is because of how differently it can be interepreted. So far it seems people who say it was good/okay are looking at it as a summer release comedy, or a Paul Feig film. For those audiences, this is probably about right. People who are calling it bad/terrible are looking at it as a Ghostbusters movie, and have expectations based on what that means. Their best advertising would have been word of mouth, and that would have been excited Ghostbusters fans, but they created the reverse instead.
Basically, done well this could have had a massive opening if they'd made a movie that excited the fans and interested the general audience. What they've done is alienate fans and provide a middling summer comedy to general audiences, with the budget of a massive blockbuster. The math here has never made sense to me from the very beginning.
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you aren't on r/movies and are telling Ghostbusters fans that you aren't a huge fan of Ghostbusters and the reboot is "more...cute." Whaddya expect?
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My thoughts exactly when he got all butthurt about being downvoted.
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Oh, I thought I was on a different sub, my bad. And I did like the original Ghost Busters, it just wasn't a masterpiece. It was just a different type of movie.
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Besides that, solla, I'm thinking that this movie would done a bit better if Sony didn't attack the HUGE majority of the fans, especially James Rolfe. Since most people would've gone by the "Bad trailers doesn't equal bad movie." Maxim. The smear campaign will cripple this movie.
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In one of the comments they mentioned Feig's pitch for Wonder Woman, so I looked it up:
Two thoughts: How can Feig understand when DC fans are protective of their series, but not GB fans? Also, if they thought had stirred a hornet's nest with us, the DC fans would've roasted them alive.
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JESUS H. COX! That somehow sounds worse than Feigbusters! He CLEARLY has an agenda. Fine. Lots of filmmakers do. Whatever. But they create their OWN work to forward said agenda rather than bring it to established franchises. This was a HUGE sticking point with this movie and it keeps coming up in reviews when people say "as a Ghostbusters movie it's not good."
Why would he not just make a new movie with a new character that may be LIKE Wonder Woman but isn't? I wouldn't be surprised if he tried to go to the Broccoli family with what would eventually be Spy.
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few realize Feig does not really do wholly original material. he does Parodies. he takes an existing idea and slots his "Grrl Power and Poop" spin onto it. Bridemaids was a spun buddy comedy ala the Hangover and any number of similar Bachelor Party'esque raunchy comedies. The Heat was a standard buddy cop movie gender flipped. Spy was a Spy genre parody.
The problem is it is real hard to parody something that is a comedy and is already a mild parody. and on top of that Parody's need something to in fact parody. You need the straight up action adventure Wonder Woman movie or modern property before you can parody it. People need to recognize the original in your parody in order for the joke to work. Bridemaid's work because the intended audience understands the tropes of the genre and what it is playing against. But you can't create the tropes in the parody product. When you try you get stupidity.
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Even Joss Whedon wasn't able to bring a decent version of her to the screen. Wonder Woman has been notoriously difficult to make either a movie or TV show with after the 1970s. You have to juggle the feminist ideals that have been instilled in her character while catering to male fans, who are largely going to be the ones who make or break the film. It's a difficult line to tread, and you can't fault Paul Feig for trying to make a feminist movie out of a feminist icon. That's like being mad that someone is making ice cream with ice and cream. And salt.
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call me old fashioned, but what about a female making a feminist movie out of a feminist icon? Just as a crazzzzzy idea. Instead of a male light comedy merchant. Wanna break the glass ceiling? Less Feigs, more women.
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I mean, yeah. I don't disagree. The problem is that there are a LOT more men than women who are directing. And the women who ARE seem to be more about Oscar Winning movies than Comic Book movies. Kathryn Bigelow probably wouldn't be caught dead making a superhero movie. Sofia Coppola doesn't seem like she'd be interested, either. Julie Taymor is the only one I could think of that MIGHT, and it would be visually stunning, but she seems like she'd rather work in Theatre. Though, her movies tend to be super theatrical anyway (Frida, Across the Universe).
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I've been saying this since the beginning
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You have to juggle the feminist ideals that have been instilled in her character while catering to male fans
Or you know, just stick to source material and stop pandering.
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Just because some feminists who don`t even read comics try to claim her as their icon, does not make her the default feminist icon that is for everything that modern feminists espouse, regardless of even fools like Gail Simone. This "glass ceiling" myth does not belong as an everyday struggle for Wonderwoman, turning Batman and Superman into misogynist strawmen to even push this stupid idea. To hell with Feig and his tiny dick sub/dom fantasies.
Joss Weldon having trouble making a movie is not convincing enough when before Marvel, every movie he made was rightfully an epic fail, for sucking. Buffy the Vampire slayer, Alien Resurection, Serenity. All shit to be honest. It took Marvel Studios putting a leash on his bad decisions, to be able to crank out anything halfway decent on the big screen, something Whedon lamented.
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Joss Whedon didn't direct the Buffy movie: he wrote the first draft that was then endlessly contorted into the film. The show was in line with what he originally intended.
Serenity was awesome, so I have no idea what you are complaining about there. Critic response was overall really positive. And Hell, the whole story of how it even came to be is a testament to how good the material was.
He also script-doctored a ton of popular films, co-wrote Toy Story, and wrote Cabin in the Woods. None of these constitute "epic fails for sucking."
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Go read "The Secret History of Wonder Woman" and come back, because you have no idea what you're talking about.
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After what happen with Girl! Rebootbusters, I wouldn't trust Feig (and Dippod, Pascal, and the PR guys) with Wonder Woman.
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"It's impossible to determine whether the naysayers hurt the movie because the opening weekend demographics were inconclusive. Men didn't exactly stay away, but women didn't show up in compensatory numbers either.
In fact, while Ghostbusters didn't play like a chick flick in North America, it didn't perform like an all-audience summer tentpole either. Instead, it landed somewhere in between. Females made up about 56 percent of the audience — versus 75 percent or more for a Pitch Perfect or Bridesmaids — while more than 60 percent of the audience was over the age of 25."
Dang.
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In other words, It's dead in the International Market. Just looking at those demos it will do maybe half what it did domestically internationally. No China, no target audience, bad word of mouth from what should have been the embedded audience thanks to studio and director. Yeah this is a disaster that they are rapidly trying to keep quiet about with all the talk of "well it's not a bomb!" Yeah, yeah it is. From Sony's investors perspective it's a bomb.
But it still might see a sequel or reboot. Just because Sony is desperate for a franchise to hang Summer's on. And they have nothing left on the shelf. Marvel will save them financially with Spider-Man. But they really don't have much else.
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Also, Star Trek Beyond (very positive reviews) is opening this week which will deliver a massive blow.
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You've gotta consider the other piece, too: licensing. The royalties from licensing could potentially far outweigh the loss from a single movie. While this property was never destined to make Star Wars money or Cars money, it still has the potential to bring in crazy revenue.
Consider Sony's strategy with the Playstation: take a loss on the hardware to get it into people's homes and sell the games. They are thinking the same thing with this franchise. If they end up making a sequel, it's because they are counting on this revenue.
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It's almost as if no one gave a shit that it starred women, and they just thought it looked shitty.
Maybe that's what happens when you make a movie that looks like it's meant for 5-year-olds to laugh at, but add queef jokes to it.
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I'm so glad young women didn't take the bait for this, and the movie had, in the end, no significant turnout for either genre. To the extent that anyone saw it, it was the audience Sony insisted on antagonizing: slightly older types with a fondness for the original films. When online pundits act like we're shitting on little girls in proton packs loving "the new generation", it should be pointed out that this demographic cannot be said to exist in significant numbers. That's just not who went to see the movie.
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For the past two years, Sony and Feig have had to ward off criticism from some outspoken male fans who were unhappy with Feig's decision to go with a female cast
Overall good article, but when are people going to give up on this gender wars crap? Male and female Ghostbusters fans alike were critical of this reboot and not just because of the cast.
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Ideally, they say, it should have opened to $60 million or more.
"If foreign grosses don't pick up the slack, this will go down as another big disappointment for Sony, who based their entire summer on this brand," says Bock.
"I know Sony is crowing about it being a great opening for a comedy, but the entire Ghostbusters legacy is what's at stake here, and it's not looking good. This was supposed to be a blockbuster," he continues. "Sony definitively did not launch a franchise
So it clearly under-performed, may very likely be another big disappointment (no yuan to bail them out), and the "endless franchise" isn't very likely either.
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the "endless franchise"
Perhaps what they mean is that if you go see the movie it feels endless.
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mediocre movie spawns mediocre reception
this movie will not spur the pop cultural phenom that was the original ghostbusters.
it just wont
if at all itll be remembered as a femenist comedy/ ghostbusters satire
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"Was ‘Ghostbusters’ Too Expensive to Launch a New Franchise?" - Variety
‘Ghostbusters’ Is No. 2, Behind ‘Secret Life of Pets,’ but Sony’s Giddy - New York Times
"Scary opening weekend for ‘Ghostbusters’ reboot" - Wall Street Journal
Meanwhile Sony has everyone on message (except co-writer Dippold).
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I think Dippold knows the poor writing has been identified as one of GB16's main problems and her chances of writing any future GB movie are jack and shit....and Jack's left town.
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The entire Ghostbusters legacy is what's at stake here, and it's not looking good.
This is what makes this whole situation a damn travesty. I enjoyed the new movie way more than I thought I would. However I can see where others who hate it are coming from. Fact of the matter is this may be the last Ghostbusters movie we see and that's sad
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There should have been exactly 0 ghostbusters movies after Ivan Reitman died.
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Uh, do you mean Harold Ramis?
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Yeah. Ivan Reitman is alive.
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The most honest take I've read so far, refreshing.
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Remember from the Sony email leaks that Feig was boasting that his approach was a 'billion dollar idea'? Lol
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Before people start chiming in on this thread about how 'its the highest grossing comedy!' how about we do comparisons to similarly budgeted movies -- comparing this movie to ones a third or less of its budget is disingenuous at best.
Misogynist!
The fairest comparison: Deadpool.
Action-comedy with an emphasis on action. New spin on established IP. "Raunchy" sensibility.
Deadpool had a way smaller budget and an R rating and it opened with 130 million.
Calling Ghostbusters the best comedy opening since Pitch Perfect 2 and ignoring Deadpool is incredibly disingenuous.
I honestly think that if Ghostbusters had been an R movie, it would have been better.
I'm not a huge fan of Paul Feig's comedy, but the people I know who do like his stuff have said that everything in Ghostbusters is so towned down that it's lame.
It's like they created a movie that is the worst of both worlds - turns off hardcore fans of both the IP as well as the directors other work.
Agreed. Part of the problem is that Feig was out of his element. The change to an all female cast was most likely to make it more Feig's element but it just didn't work. I'm gonna break it down the best I can.
The man does R rated parody comedies that don't take themselves all that seriously. There is nothing wrong with that! That's the kind of thing he does and it's made several successful movies. But that doesn't lend itself to Ghostbusters in the slightest. And I don't think he understood what made Ghostbusters such a success.
Ghostbusters may have been a bit of a parody on a level, but it went and took itself seriously in scenes like hunting Slimer, which added to the humor. Even the cinematography and music evokes a horror movie feel. Not to mention Dan Aykroyd's spiritualism meant a lot of what was said in the movie lined up what's actually believed about the paranormal, most obviously the scene with Dana being exactly what you should do when dealing with a possessed person. Really, while being a silly movie, the subject of the paranormal is treated with more respect in Ghostbusters than it is in most horror movies.
Really, the opposite of Feig's style of relentlessly mocking the genre the movie crosses over with. This is a bit of a problem since Ghostbusters doesn't really have a genre you can nail down and many consider it it's own genre, meaning what Feig is gonna end up mocking is his own source material. He might have gotten away with it had he focused on mocking horror, but it looks like he ended up mocking the movie he was making instead.
The original Ghostbusters was PG (although I have no doubt they would have gone PG-13 had it been around) and was aimed at adults. The comedy is mature in both senses. Kids were an unexpected demographic that they ran with, and the second movie suffered because it tried to appeal to kids more. The new one seems to be mainly aimed at kids, forgetting that having parents also enjoy it should be a goal, the original movie's intention to be an adult movie and the fact that adult fans that remember and love the old one is very much a viable market. I haven't seen the 2016 one yet (gonna wait for cable there) but the trailers hint at less mature comedy with the more "adult" humor leaning towards raunchy.
All this leads to the new movie having no identity of it's own, which is painfully obvious in the trailer. And it's really Feig's fault here. He let himself be talked into doing a movie outside of his style and comfort zone. And while he could have made it work had he tried to modify his style to fit the franchise, he didn't. He did not try to make a Ghostbusters movie, he tried to change a Ghostbusters movie into something he'd write. And it just doesn't work with the property. Feig fucked up.
Sony would have been better off just dropping the Ghostbusters name and telling Feig to go wild with his usual style and parody Ghostbusters and horror.