In the arguments over climate change it has been common for the press to refer to those rejecting the longstanding and overwhelming scientific consensus that anthropogenic climate change is a reality as "climate skeptics."
The term "climate skeptic" implies people who are honestly and seriously considering the evidence for climate change and rejecting it. Some of those rejecting the consensus may fit this description--but hardly all.
The person who rejects the science without really having done the homework--whose answer may simply be "What the hell do scientists know?"--would seem more remote from the characterization. Of course, one may generously allow that perhaps they are skeptical of science broadly. However, after dismissing climate science, we may see them point to a study that correlated low IQ scores with poverty as evidence that economic and social outcomes are a matter of personal failings and not societal failings and confidently underline their position by adding "It's science!" with Ron Burgundy-like assurance.
Rather than any real skepticism there was just denial--and to call it "skepticism" with all the brain-work the term implies dignifies it excessively. But that is what the mainstream media does, and can be expected to do, given that its business imperatives and professional culture, its ideological inclinations, and much, much else, bias it toward extreme deference toward those interests and groups which champion climate denial, and their representatives. The readiness to "both sides" the issue when on so many other points they acknowledge only one side is one way in which this has been the case. The use, down to the present moment (just do a keyword check of recent news stories and you will see this for yourself), of the term "climate skepticism" when they should be saying (as only occasionally they say) "climate denial" is another.
Wednesday, May 15, 2024
The Politics of "Epistemological Nihilism"
All across history the view of those who sought a more just and flourishing world have, like the protagonist of a recent Oscar-winning film, said that "If I know the world, I can improve it."
Those threatened by the prospect of such change, not only its failing but even worse its succeeding, have always had as an important weapon in their intellectual arsenal the counter-assertion that "You can never know the world"--and therefore cannot improve it; what I call "epistemological nihilism."
The result is that, as Carroll Quigley makes clear in his flawed, at times tiresomely pedantic, but still worthwhile The Evolution of Civilizations; and as one sees when working their way through the tradition of Western philosophy themselves; skepticism has overwhelmingly been utilized by those on the side of "things as they are" against those desirous of what we would call progress. And it says everything of just how muddled intellectual life has been that in recent decades postmodernists, even as they cite Nietzsche and Heidegger(!), think themselves espousing not the darkest of the Counter-Enlightenment, but some kind of progressive philosophy.
Those threatened by the prospect of such change, not only its failing but even worse its succeeding, have always had as an important weapon in their intellectual arsenal the counter-assertion that "You can never know the world"--and therefore cannot improve it; what I call "epistemological nihilism."
The result is that, as Carroll Quigley makes clear in his flawed, at times tiresomely pedantic, but still worthwhile The Evolution of Civilizations; and as one sees when working their way through the tradition of Western philosophy themselves; skepticism has overwhelmingly been utilized by those on the side of "things as they are" against those desirous of what we would call progress. And it says everything of just how muddled intellectual life has been that in recent decades postmodernists, even as they cite Nietzsche and Heidegger(!), think themselves espousing not the darkest of the Counter-Enlightenment, but some kind of progressive philosophy.
Of "Skepticism": A Few Words
In a consideration of David Hume I recently ran across one writers, considering Hume's notorious extremism in this respect, he asked "How much skepticism is enough?"
I am not sure that I would think of the issue in terms of "how much"--of an appropriate quantity or proportion of skepticism.
Rather I would say that there is a world of difference between the skepticism of those who think the world is knowable, and are trying to work their way toward such knowledge, and the skepticism of those who deny the possibility altogether--the more in as, as is so often the case with the latter, their purpose is sabotaging someone else's search for fear of where it will lead.
Indeed, the "skeptic" who denies the possibility of knowledge altogether strikes me not so much a skeptic as an epistemological nihilist--and like all nihilists in the sense I am talking about when it comes down to it, a bullshitter in the philosophical sense. After all, one cannot get out of bed in the morning--or decline to get out of bed in the morning--without acting on assumptions about what will come from that (overwhelmingly, correct ones), and anyone who is a "skeptic" for long always does so, while one might add the skeptic never hesitates to inflict their opinions about this, that and the other thing on the world with that very self-assurance their supposed skepticism should make impossible.
Hume, of course, was no exception to that, the philosopher famed for his attack on induction never worrying about his own conclusions about it when engaging in induction himself on matters such as the inferiority of one race to another. His outsized reputation today (and for that matter the extent to which criticism of Hume has been so limited to relatively narrow aspects of his legacy) is no testament to the vitality or rigor of thought in our time.
I am not sure that I would think of the issue in terms of "how much"--of an appropriate quantity or proportion of skepticism.
Rather I would say that there is a world of difference between the skepticism of those who think the world is knowable, and are trying to work their way toward such knowledge, and the skepticism of those who deny the possibility altogether--the more in as, as is so often the case with the latter, their purpose is sabotaging someone else's search for fear of where it will lead.
Indeed, the "skeptic" who denies the possibility of knowledge altogether strikes me not so much a skeptic as an epistemological nihilist--and like all nihilists in the sense I am talking about when it comes down to it, a bullshitter in the philosophical sense. After all, one cannot get out of bed in the morning--or decline to get out of bed in the morning--without acting on assumptions about what will come from that (overwhelmingly, correct ones), and anyone who is a "skeptic" for long always does so, while one might add the skeptic never hesitates to inflict their opinions about this, that and the other thing on the world with that very self-assurance their supposed skepticism should make impossible.
Hume, of course, was no exception to that, the philosopher famed for his attack on induction never worrying about his own conclusions about it when engaging in induction himself on matters such as the inferiority of one race to another. His outsized reputation today (and for that matter the extent to which criticism of Hume has been so limited to relatively narrow aspects of his legacy) is no testament to the vitality or rigor of thought in our time.
David Hume's Criticism of Induction
There is nothing so cheap as nihilism--and in philosophy, nothing so cheap as epistemological nihilism. The reality is that, as any even slightly serious student of the scientific method knows, even the most well-grounded knowledge claims come with qualifications, with fine print. What the epistemological nihilist does is to pretend that this fine print is a discovery new to the world as they scream about it so loudly and at such length that eventually those of weaker mind can think of nothing else, while a certain kind of pseudo-intellectual does not even have to have their minds broken down that way before falling into line with such nonsense. These persons, after all, are, to use Eugene Earnshaw's choice of phrasing, "sadistic contrarians" who delight in "making people feel stupid" by appearing to prove that false propositions are true.
Alas, the weak-minded and pseudo-intellectual are no rarer in this time than any other, and frankly, probably more common. Indeed, in certain corners of academia and culture being such a person is probably a career requirement.
David Hume's attack on induction has always struck me as exemplary of that sort of screaming that so impresses the weak-minded and delights the pseudo-intellectual. And it was thus refreshing to see Dr. Earnshaw point out the obvious--which is that, if far too few card-carrying philosophers paid attention to them, remind us that over the years many have debunked Hume again and again in many different ways (pragmatism, mathematical probability, and best of all for he was thus "hoist by his own petard," a subtler grasp of induction than Hume ever displayed), to the extent that his "argument" ever needed to be debunked at all. It is all the more refreshing in as this particular bit of such screaming gets such a ridiculous amount of respect, and in turn makes Hume's one of those names with which those who prefer to drop names rather than actually read books like to beat their opponents over the head with in argument.
Alas, the weak-minded and pseudo-intellectual are no rarer in this time than any other, and frankly, probably more common. Indeed, in certain corners of academia and culture being such a person is probably a career requirement.
David Hume's attack on induction has always struck me as exemplary of that sort of screaming that so impresses the weak-minded and delights the pseudo-intellectual. And it was thus refreshing to see Dr. Earnshaw point out the obvious--which is that, if far too few card-carrying philosophers paid attention to them, remind us that over the years many have debunked Hume again and again in many different ways (pragmatism, mathematical probability, and best of all for he was thus "hoist by his own petard," a subtler grasp of induction than Hume ever displayed), to the extent that his "argument" ever needed to be debunked at all. It is all the more refreshing in as this particular bit of such screaming gets such a ridiculous amount of respect, and in turn makes Hume's one of those names with which those who prefer to drop names rather than actually read books like to beat their opponents over the head with in argument.
Saturday, May 11, 2024
The Fall Guy in 2024 vs. Mission: Impossible in 1996
Remarking The Fall Guy's "playing like a deflated balloon" Anthony D'Alessandro raised, and dismissed, the faintness of pop cultural memory of the show the film adapts. Up to a point he is right--correctly observing that he does not "think Universal sold the movie on that"--but he also struck me as superficial, and wrong when pointing (with an obnoxious "Hello") to how Mission: Impossible became a franchise-launching hit in 1996. "What Gen Xer had actually watched Mission: Impossible back in the late '60s?" he asked, implying the brand name's irrelevance to the critical youth market.
It was indeed the case that the young had not seen the show during its '60s-era original run. But they had chances to see at least some of it in the reruns that were a rather bigger part of our TV consumption (I specifically remember the cable channel FX airing the show before Mission: Impossible hit theaters), while there had been a two-season revival of the show in the late '80s (1988-1990) which actually brought back Peter Graves as Jim Phelps. All of this helped sustain the brand name in pop cultural memory even among those who never saw an episode of the show. The memory was, as I remarked last year, hazy, but that was probably an advantage in its way--enabling the audience to associate "Mission: Impossible" with cool spy-fi adventure, heralded by celebrated composer Lalo Schifrin's famous theme, the burning fuse graphic, the exploding tape recorded messages, sufficiently for reports of a Mission: Impossible movie to catch their interest at least a little, while keeping them from being purists who would get mad about what the film did with the characters. ("Jim, how could you!")
Rather than being recalled in that hazy but plausibly intriguing way The Fall Guy was simply not recalled at all by most, denying it the advantages that I do think Mission: Impossible managed to derive then, even among the young.
One may add that the market at the time was less crowded with action blockbusters generally and contemporary American spy-fi blockbusters still a comparative novelty (that boom just getting underway), and the audience less tough to bring to theaters (on average making four to five trips per year to the theater then, as against two now.) And I dare say that circa 1996 Tom Cruise's star power was considerably greater than that of Ryan Gosling, and perhaps anyone else in this post-star era. (Indeed, it seems telling that writing the prior sentence just now I had to look up Ryan Gosling's name just to be sure I remembered it correctly--again, proof that, contrary to how that stupid "Everything" trailer had it, Ryan Gosling does not "warrant introduction as RYAN M@TH?RF#*&!NG GOSLING.")
The result is that what we are seeing with The Fall Guy is, in part (but only in part), a lesson in what happens to a franchise when its movie stays in development hell for far too long--so long that people forget the franchise ever existed, and the cinematic market at which it is aimed changes profoundly. Indeed, this seems to me so important as to moot the other ways (gambling on a May opening for a sub-May opening movie, the handling of the protagonist and broader tone, etc.) in which Universal mishandled the release of the film.
It was indeed the case that the young had not seen the show during its '60s-era original run. But they had chances to see at least some of it in the reruns that were a rather bigger part of our TV consumption (I specifically remember the cable channel FX airing the show before Mission: Impossible hit theaters), while there had been a two-season revival of the show in the late '80s (1988-1990) which actually brought back Peter Graves as Jim Phelps. All of this helped sustain the brand name in pop cultural memory even among those who never saw an episode of the show. The memory was, as I remarked last year, hazy, but that was probably an advantage in its way--enabling the audience to associate "Mission: Impossible" with cool spy-fi adventure, heralded by celebrated composer Lalo Schifrin's famous theme, the burning fuse graphic, the exploding tape recorded messages, sufficiently for reports of a Mission: Impossible movie to catch their interest at least a little, while keeping them from being purists who would get mad about what the film did with the characters. ("Jim, how could you!")
Rather than being recalled in that hazy but plausibly intriguing way The Fall Guy was simply not recalled at all by most, denying it the advantages that I do think Mission: Impossible managed to derive then, even among the young.
The result is that what we are seeing with The Fall Guy is, in part (but only in part), a lesson in what happens to a franchise when its movie stays in development hell for far too long--so long that people forget the franchise ever existed, and the cinematic market at which it is aimed changes profoundly. Indeed, this seems to me so important as to moot the other ways (gambling on a May opening for a sub-May opening movie, the handling of the protagonist and broader tone, etc.) in which Universal mishandled the release of the film.
How Much Money Did The Flash Really Lose?
Back in June 2023 when the promised "greatest superhero movie ever!" instead crashed and burned at the box office, the reports were that the lousy gross for The Flash meant the movie possibly losing the studio $200 million.
However, that was back when people thought the production budget was in the vicinity of $200 million. A little while later we were told that it was $300 million--implying the possibility of much more than $200 million being lost.
Yet, even as the budget appeared larger than first reported, Deadline reported a mere $155 million studio loss on the film during its "Most Valuable Blockbusters" tournament.
Odd, isn't it?
Well, when you take a closer look at the numbers you see that Deadline went with the $200 million production budget figure, not what we heard later.
At the same time, where in June we heard the marketing campaign was running $150 million, Deadline claims just $120 million were spent on prints and ads.
All of this allows the number to make sense--all as one could find still more room for it to do so if these were gross rather than net figures (if subsidies and the like offered offsets to the numbers then being thrown about).
However, if we go with those higher numbers things move in the other direction. A $300 million production budget, a $150 million marketing campaign, work out to an addition of $130 million+ in extra expenses. Tacked onto the $155 million loss Deadline reported, in fact, the loss nearly doubles, approaching $300 million.
It may well be that the lower numbers Deadline used are the correct ones. Still, given what we previously heard, doubt seems far from implausible here--and I would not be shocked by later revelations calling the Deadline numbers into question.
However, that was back when people thought the production budget was in the vicinity of $200 million. A little while later we were told that it was $300 million--implying the possibility of much more than $200 million being lost.
Yet, even as the budget appeared larger than first reported, Deadline reported a mere $155 million studio loss on the film during its "Most Valuable Blockbusters" tournament.
Odd, isn't it?
Well, when you take a closer look at the numbers you see that Deadline went with the $200 million production budget figure, not what we heard later.
At the same time, where in June we heard the marketing campaign was running $150 million, Deadline claims just $120 million were spent on prints and ads.
All of this allows the number to make sense--all as one could find still more room for it to do so if these were gross rather than net figures (if subsidies and the like offered offsets to the numbers then being thrown about).
However, if we go with those higher numbers things move in the other direction. A $300 million production budget, a $150 million marketing campaign, work out to an addition of $130 million+ in extra expenses. Tacked onto the $155 million loss Deadline reported, in fact, the loss nearly doubles, approaching $300 million.
It may well be that the lower numbers Deadline used are the correct ones. Still, given what we previously heard, doubt seems far from implausible here--and I would not be shocked by later revelations calling the Deadline numbers into question.
Is The Flash Really the Biggest Box Office Flop of 2023?
Previously considering the numbers Deadline presented in the course of its "Most Valuable Blockbusters" tournament I mentioned that I was surprised that the figures for the film that was ranked the biggest money-loser of the year, Captain Marvel 2 (aka The Marvels), did not include the reported subsidy that cut the net production cost from $270 million+ to $220 million.
I also noticed that the budget for The Flash last year was reported as over $200 million, and then $300 million later, in a tone of scandal.
Had Deadline gone with the net production cost of $220 million for Captain Marvel 2 they would have shaved $50 million off the loss--and had they gone with the $300 million figure for The Flash's production budget they would have added an extra $100 million to its loss. The result of these two changes would have been to lower the loss on Captain Marvel 2 from $237 million to $187 million--and raise the loss on The Flash from $155 million to $255 million. The number would still be terrible for Captain Marvel 2, but even worse than it is now for The Flash, with the result the two movies still being at the top of the "biggest" flops list, but switching places to make The Flash #1 in this unenviable category (all as a fuller accounting could easily translate to an even worse picture for The Flash).
I also noticed that the budget for The Flash last year was reported as over $200 million, and then $300 million later, in a tone of scandal.
Had Deadline gone with the net production cost of $220 million for Captain Marvel 2 they would have shaved $50 million off the loss--and had they gone with the $300 million figure for The Flash's production budget they would have added an extra $100 million to its loss. The result of these two changes would have been to lower the loss on Captain Marvel 2 from $237 million to $187 million--and raise the loss on The Flash from $155 million to $255 million. The number would still be terrible for Captain Marvel 2, but even worse than it is now for The Flash, with the result the two movies still being at the top of the "biggest" flops list, but switching places to make The Flash #1 in this unenviable category (all as a fuller accounting could easily translate to an even worse picture for The Flash).
Is Hollywood Becoming More Careful With its Movie Budgets?
Last year, considering the ways in which The Flash and Indiana Jones 5 in particular flopped I predicted massive losses for each--rather more massive than those films actually suffered according to Deadline, which reported losses of around $150 million for each of those films.
There seems ample reason to be surprised by this, starting with the budgets on which Deadline bases the calculation. In spite of a more than 20 percent jump in prices according to the Consumer Price Index since 2018-2019, and the spiking of interest rates raising the cost of borrowing, the reported production costs do not seem much higher than before, big superhero films, for example, still commonly reported as $200 million productions. The constancy of the budgets is the more surprising given how what we were given in 2023 at least appeared to be gross, not net, figures; and how many major releases of 2023 suffered from cost-raising pandemic-related disruptions.
I am even more struck by the expenditures on prints and ads, which for the films identified as the biggest failures were low relative even to their reported budgets and to what was spent on other comparable productions--$110 million for Captain Marvel 2, $120 million for the Flash and Indiana, whereas the expenditure was $160 million for Disney's Guardians of the Galaxy 3, the $150 million and $175 million for the much cheaper Super Mario Bros. and Barbie. (The figure for The Flash is actually lower than the $150 million we were told was budgeted for the marketing campaign last June--while if the figure for Captain Marvel 2 is correct Disney-Marvel spent a third less, adjusted for inflation, to promote Captain Marvel 2 than it did to promote the original Captain Marvel back in 2019.*)
One might conclude from the lower-than-expected numbers that Hollywood has become more astute financially, with the low figures for prints and ads perhaps indicating that studio heads who knew they had losers on their hands cut their losses. (Indeed, there was speculation about this in the case of the surprisingly low profile Aquaman 2.) Yet, even if we take the numbers presented as absolutely reliable (and one cannot know that), a handful of films made in these chaotic times tell us only so much, and may be slight grounds for claiming any great shift in the way Hollywood funds filmmaking.
* The figures are $110 million for Captain Marvel 2, and $140 million for the first film (which is more like $170 million when early 2019 prices are adjusted for late 2023 prices).
There seems ample reason to be surprised by this, starting with the budgets on which Deadline bases the calculation. In spite of a more than 20 percent jump in prices according to the Consumer Price Index since 2018-2019, and the spiking of interest rates raising the cost of borrowing, the reported production costs do not seem much higher than before, big superhero films, for example, still commonly reported as $200 million productions. The constancy of the budgets is the more surprising given how what we were given in 2023 at least appeared to be gross, not net, figures; and how many major releases of 2023 suffered from cost-raising pandemic-related disruptions.
I am even more struck by the expenditures on prints and ads, which for the films identified as the biggest failures were low relative even to their reported budgets and to what was spent on other comparable productions--$110 million for Captain Marvel 2, $120 million for the Flash and Indiana, whereas the expenditure was $160 million for Disney's Guardians of the Galaxy 3, the $150 million and $175 million for the much cheaper Super Mario Bros. and Barbie. (The figure for The Flash is actually lower than the $150 million we were told was budgeted for the marketing campaign last June--while if the figure for Captain Marvel 2 is correct Disney-Marvel spent a third less, adjusted for inflation, to promote Captain Marvel 2 than it did to promote the original Captain Marvel back in 2019.*)
One might conclude from the lower-than-expected numbers that Hollywood has become more astute financially, with the low figures for prints and ads perhaps indicating that studio heads who knew they had losers on their hands cut their losses. (Indeed, there was speculation about this in the case of the surprisingly low profile Aquaman 2.) Yet, even if we take the numbers presented as absolutely reliable (and one cannot know that), a handful of films made in these chaotic times tell us only so much, and may be slight grounds for claiming any great shift in the way Hollywood funds filmmaking.
* The figures are $110 million for Captain Marvel 2, and $140 million for the first film (which is more like $170 million when early 2019 prices are adjusted for late 2023 prices).
What 2023 Teaches Us About the Film Business
1. The cinematic market has shown considerable evidence of having shrunk significantly and over the long run. North Americans went from making 4-5 trips to the theater before the Great Recession, to 3-4 in the 2010s, to from 2022 on making just a couple of trips a year--this "the new normal." Meanwhile the foreign markets offer no chance of rescue as others similarly go to the movies less (and the China market that looked so promising a few years ago becomes increasingly closed to American fare).
2. The genres and brands that were long the foundation of Hollywood profitability--sci-fi action-adventure spectacle of the superhero, space opera and spy-fi types, and the splashy family-oriented animated adventures; Marvel and Star Wars and Pixar and the rest--are offering rather less return on investment than before within the shrunken market, partly because filmgoing is less casual, the threshold for getting people to the theater higher (at least partly because they have been so heavily exploited for so long).
Of course, registering this is comparatively easy (much as it seems to have eluded much of the commentariat). It is harder to say what can be done about it, but the list of films that were profitable in particular offers some hints, not least in how relatively low-grossing films managed to be very profitable. Specifically, with the general audience tougher, it seems that the bottom line-minded studio has more than ever before to look for film projects that have a deep appeal to portions of that audience big enough to be worth bothering with, especially where they can offer more than the ticket sale to the bottom line (i.e. buy merchandise), and keep costs down as they go about it. Thus did the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie, which was ranked only #34 in gross, end up the #4 profit-maker on Deadline's list, with the strategy similarly working for movies from Five Nights at Freddy's to Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour. Here it seems no accident that the list is dominated by movies aimed at the young (more susceptible to such enthusiasms), and by tie-ins to video games and other toys, with these indeed the basis of the top full-blown blockbusters in a year in which a Super Mario Bros. movie got the #1 spot and a film about Barbie ranked just behind it at #2 (with nostalgic appeal likely helping with older persons here). One can see Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse as to some extent benefiting from the same logic--a cartoon as a way of telling such a story a tougher sell than the live-action films internationally, but the first film won a loyal following, and animation helped keep costs down (the "mere" $100 million spent on it enabling this movie to rank at #3 on Deadline's "Most Valuable Blockbusters" list even as the significantly higher-grossing Guardians of the Galaxy film ended up at only #9).*
Does this betoken a revival of cinematic art? Alas, no. Rather it seems to me an evolution of the high concept model of filmmaking so long in decay--albeit one more demanding than the strategy of just buying up brands like Star Wars and Marvel and pouring money into them, the canny studio executive now having to select their projects more judiciously, and do more such selection given the proportion of the disposable capital to the number of projects to be funded, than when circa 2019 Disney seemed capable of mass-manufacturing billion-dollar hits.
* Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse had a production cost of $100 million, and with prints, ads, interest and overhead counted in outlays a bit over $200 million in these categories--whereas for Guardians of the Galaxy 3 the comparable figures were $250 million for production and north of $450 million for the equivalent outlays. The result was that Spider-Man's $690 million gross permitted it a "studio net" of $328 million according to Deadline's calculations, whereas Guardians' nearly $850 million gross left it with a net of just $124 million (not quite two-fifths as much in a poorer rate of return and smaller overall mass of profit).
The First Third of 2024, Again
Deadline's Anthony D'Alessandro recently reported that in the four month January-April period the cinematic box office in 2024 ran 21 percent behind the preceding year--and that the summer was likely to see 2024 continue to run well behind 2023 that way. (Last summer the box office took in over $4 billion; this summer it may be lucky to get to $3 billion.) The result is that, with January-April over a half billion behind the preceding third for the year, and summer likely to mean the season being another billion short of last year, the $8 billion projection for 2024 we had at the end of last year.
And that, of course, is while remembering that 2023 itself was a very disappointing year, seeing as it did not the return of the box office to pre-pandemic levels but finishing up a third of the way down from the 2019 level that itself reflected a decade of erosion. The result is that 2024 is only confirming what last year seemed to suggest, namely the box office's stabilizing at a lower level, the pandemic-era collapse more or less enduringly reducing theatergoing--such that North Americans might now be expected to go to the theater just a couple of times a year now, as against the 3-4 times a year before the pandemic (never mind the 4-5 times that were the norm before the Great Recession).
And that, of course, is while remembering that 2023 itself was a very disappointing year, seeing as it did not the return of the box office to pre-pandemic levels but finishing up a third of the way down from the 2019 level that itself reflected a decade of erosion. The result is that 2024 is only confirming what last year seemed to suggest, namely the box office's stabilizing at a lower level, the pandemic-era collapse more or less enduringly reducing theatergoing--such that North Americans might now be expected to go to the theater just a couple of times a year now, as against the 3-4 times a year before the pandemic (never mind the 4-5 times that were the norm before the Great Recession).
David Walsh Looks Back at the New Hollywood
This year can seem a fairly good time to look back on the history of film, and especially the film of the past half century. After all, the model of "high concept" filmmaking that emerged from it, long in decay, seems to be in the last stages of its breakdown amid a protracted, structural crisis in the cinematic market all too tied to the bigger crises through which we have been living these past many years. (It seems no accident that American theatergoing slipped importantly in the wake of the Great Recession, continued to erode in the years that followed, and collapsed after the pandemic only to stabilize well below the pre-pandemic level.) This can seem underscored by the extraordinary commercial success of Christopher Nolan's Oppenheimer, a film that from the high concept standpoint was an exceedingly unlikely hit--and may suggest a return to "adult" cinema making for big hits in the way that we saw before high concept, in the New Hollywood era of the late 1960s and 1970s.
As it happens, David Walsh recently announced just such a look back, marking the 50th anniversary of what he considers the peak of New Hollywood in 1974 with a series of articles about the films that made that year what it was. To date he and his colleagues have published three of those promised pieces, remembering Roman Polanski's Chinatown, Hal Ashby's The Last Detail (both of which films, not coincidentally, were written by Robert Towne and starred Jack Nicholson), and Robert Altman's Thieves Like Us. Critical to Walsh's interest, and for many others looking at the New Hollywood's output, these were socially critical films, making for a sharp contrast with what we have got out of a Hollywood whose neoliberalism was evident not just in the structure and functioning of the business, but the politics of its content (as Walsh, of course, has remarked just about every year in his annual Oscar coverage). However, for critics like Walsh the limits to New Hollywood's more critical work also seem significant. If more than was to be the case later (as in this era in which wealth, power, status, traditional institutions and values, etc. are treated with so much respect by "artists") the makers of those movies looked at the world around them and saw much wrong in it and said so, they were also pessimistic about anything being done about the evils they identified--even though this did not wholly deny their criticisms force, or the richness their feel for and about the world brought to the films.
As it happens, David Walsh recently announced just such a look back, marking the 50th anniversary of what he considers the peak of New Hollywood in 1974 with a series of articles about the films that made that year what it was. To date he and his colleagues have published three of those promised pieces, remembering Roman Polanski's Chinatown, Hal Ashby's The Last Detail (both of which films, not coincidentally, were written by Robert Towne and starred Jack Nicholson), and Robert Altman's Thieves Like Us. Critical to Walsh's interest, and for many others looking at the New Hollywood's output, these were socially critical films, making for a sharp contrast with what we have got out of a Hollywood whose neoliberalism was evident not just in the structure and functioning of the business, but the politics of its content (as Walsh, of course, has remarked just about every year in his annual Oscar coverage). However, for critics like Walsh the limits to New Hollywood's more critical work also seem significant. If more than was to be the case later (as in this era in which wealth, power, status, traditional institutions and values, etc. are treated with so much respect by "artists") the makers of those movies looked at the world around them and saw much wrong in it and said so, they were also pessimistic about anything being done about the evils they identified--even though this did not wholly deny their criticisms force, or the richness their feel for and about the world brought to the films.
Back to the Planet of the Apes
Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes hits theaters this weekend.
Boxoffice Pro, which only this week returned to the issuance of long-range forecasts (of a more limited nature than we were accustomed to in the past), predicted a $40-$50 million opening weekend for the film, and a $100-$140 million overall run, back in early April.
Their prediction this week is for an opening in the $40-$45 million range--not much different, save that the ceiling has fallen a bit.
Given what I argued about the film's prospects this does not bode well for the film. The preceding film in the series, which made rather more money domestically and globally than this one seems likely to do, failed to make Deadline's list of the more profitable films of its year--such that if 2024's film is budgeted the same way the backers will have a tough time breaking even, let alone turning a profit on this extension of what seemed to many an already concluded series.*
* War for the Planet of the Apes made $490 million in the summer of 2017, which is $600 million+ in 2024 dollars, whereas my prediction was for a much lower range of $250-$450 million globally for Kingdom.
Boxoffice Pro, which only this week returned to the issuance of long-range forecasts (of a more limited nature than we were accustomed to in the past), predicted a $40-$50 million opening weekend for the film, and a $100-$140 million overall run, back in early April.
Their prediction this week is for an opening in the $40-$45 million range--not much different, save that the ceiling has fallen a bit.
Given what I argued about the film's prospects this does not bode well for the film. The preceding film in the series, which made rather more money domestically and globally than this one seems likely to do, failed to make Deadline's list of the more profitable films of its year--such that if 2024's film is budgeted the same way the backers will have a tough time breaking even, let alone turning a profit on this extension of what seemed to many an already concluded series.*
* War for the Planet of the Apes made $490 million in the summer of 2017, which is $600 million+ in 2024 dollars, whereas my prediction was for a much lower range of $250-$450 million globally for Kingdom.
The High Concept Model of Popular Filmmaking and its Decline
Look for my thoughts on that in an upcoming post.
Thursday, May 9, 2024
Deadline's "Most Valuable Blockbusters" Tournament, 2023 Edition: Eight Observations
Deadline has wrapped up its latest "Most Valuable Blockbuster" tournament--rounded off its lists of 2023's most profitable, and least profitable, films.
As sophisticated box office-watchers know, the tournaments are an imperfect source of data. Just consider how in the past the production budgets they reported proved understated in the wake of later revelations (the more significant in that some of these figures are lower than we were told they were before, as with the $100 million rather than $150 million figure for Spider-Man), the inconsistent use of information about the part subsidies played in the making of the bottom line (we were told the net production cost of Captain Marvel 2 was $220 million after a significant subsidy, but this is not acknowledged here), the similarly inconsistent use of merchandising data, the ambiguities involved in the related-party transaction that is a studio selling the streaming rights to its own movies to its own platform, etc.. However, for lack of any comparably systematic round-up it seems well to go with this report's findings for now, reading which I was struck by the following:
1. There Were Four Superhero Films on the List, But . . .
We hear much talk these days of superhero fatigue--and much sneering about that talk. "Look at all the superhero films on this list!" some might say. However, one could equally well say, look at all the superhero films that did not make the list, among them two of the year's Marvel Cinematic Universe films (Ant-Man 3 and Captain Marvel 2), and four WBD/DC films (Shazam 2, Blue Beetle, The Flash, Aquaman 2), while two of these topped the list of the year's biggest money-losers (with Captain Marvel 2 heading the list, and The Flash right behind it in second place). One may also note that the one live-action superhero film placing among the top ten this year (a very low proportion by recent standards, especially when one considers the number of releases in this genre the year had), Guardians of the Galaxy 3, was down in ninth place (and the least profitable entry in that series to date). Of the other three superhero films two--PAW Patrol and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles--were Paramount productions that were low grossers (failing to make the list of the top 30 worldwide grossers of the year), but whose low costs, and the inclusion of merchandising revenue in their cases, enabled them to place among the top ten in a year of weak competition. Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, which considerably bettered the gross of the well-received original, can more justly be regarded as a cinematic hit--though it may be noted, its performance is still a far cry from what the Spider-Man franchise accomplished at its strongest (exemplified by the near $2 billion take of Spider-Man: No Way Home back in late 2021). The result is that I would consider the fuller picture evidence for, rather than against, superhero fatigue.
2. There Were Four Animated Films, But . . .
Per usual animation was well-represented on the list of the biggest money-makers of the year. However, in line with what was stated above low budgets were key to their reported profitability (each and every one of the movies reported as having a production cost of $100 million or less), the more in as, gross-wise, only The Super Mario Bros. Movie really soared at the global box office. (Spider-Man was more respectable than sensational internationally, adding just $300 million in those markets to its North American gross--as compared with Super Mario's $800 million in the international market.) And again, merchandising revenue was key to the profitability of two of the four (PAW Patrol and Turtles). As the titles, and low budgets, imply, Disney was not represented here--Pixar's Elemental, if reportedly turning a profit in the end, still failing to make the cut here, while Wish ended up one of the year's biggest flops.
3. Most of the Films Were Surprise Overperformers Rather Than the Predicted Successes.
As the big superhero films and franchise films generally and the Disney productions underwhelmed, the way was cleared for other movies that would ordinarily not have ranked very highly--those lower-budget and less "conventional" blockbusters--to top the charts. According to my reading of the market at a minimum six of the listed movies fall into this category--namely The Super Mario Bros. Movie (few if any anticipated $1 billion+ for this one), the animated Spider-Man film (which so much bettered the performance of the original), Barbie (Boxoffice Pro's prediction for the domestic gross had been in the vicinity of a mere $200 million for this one mere weeks before a release that launched it far, far past that mark), Oppenheimer (ditto), Taylor Swift's concert film (an extraordinary performer by concert movie standards), and Five Nights at Freddy's (again, going above and beyond as it approached $300 million globally).
4. The Profits Were Low, Individually and Collectively.
Together the ten films on the list of most valuable blockbusters made a bit under $2.5 billion in profit. This sounds like a lot. However, compare it to the figures for the 2015-2019 period before the pandemic, when the studios established their current pattern. During this period the profits for the top ten movies, when adjusted for 2023 prices, ranged from $3.3 billion in the lowest-earning year (2016) to $5.4 billion in the highest (2019), and averaged $4.2 billion (leaving 2023 about 40 percent down). Granted, later revelations suggest those profits were overstated--with reports of the third and fourth Avengers films having been much more expensive than originally indicated quite enough to skew the figures. However, the gap is quite large enough that it would take a lot of downward adjustment to narrow it much, while, again, the figures for 2023 are at least as suspect as in prior years. The result is that it seems worth taking the figures at face value for now--the more in as the way in which those films became profitable varies significantly over the period.
5. Those Profits Tended to Reflect Low Costs Rather Than Colossal Grosses.
While I raised the point earlier in relation to the animated films, the truth is that this pattern of low costs translating to surprising profitability--far better profitability than the megabudget movies had--carried over to the year's more successful releases broadly in this year when of the top 10 most profitable films four did not make the list of the top 10 grossers worldwide, three did not make the top 20, and two did not even make the top 30 (with Freddy's at #19, Taylor Swift at #23, PAW Patrol at #31, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles at #34 on the box office charts, despite which the Turtles movie was #4 on the "Most Valuable" list). If Guardians of the Galaxy 3 was a standard megabuck Marvel production (running the studio $250 million), the production cost of every other movie here was reportedly under $150 million--and in many cases much less (Barbie coming in just below that, Wonka lower still at $125 million, Oppenheimer, Spider-Man and Super Mario Bros. as "mere" $100 million productions, and the rest even less, with the Turtles movie made for $70 million, PAW Patrol $30 million, Freddy's $20 million, the Taylor Swift film a mere $15 million). The more striking given the galloping inflation of recent years, it is more striking still in comparison with the films on the flop list--the $200 million reported for The Flash and Wish, the $270 million for Captain Marvel 2, the $300 million for Indiana Jones 5 (by itself, exceeding the combined production costs of the five cheapest of the "most valuable blockbusters" list combined).
6. Thematically it Seems Notable That So Many Movies Were Based on Toys.
I can remember how not so long ago sneering at the video game-based movie as such was virtually universal. Going by the reviews of Super Mario Bros. and Five Nights at Freddy's films the critics' attitude toward such films remains less than kind. (Even as critics grew insanely generous in their evaluations of movies in general those two movies got a mere 59 and 32 percent ratings on Rotten Tomatoes, respectively.) Still, in contrast with before the broader audience has made clear that it does not necessarily feel the same way as the professional critics--with those two movies, again, making the list of the top ten moneymakers of the year and Super Mario in the #1 spot. The movie that came right after it was Barbie--also a movie based on a popular toy. Meanwhile those two lower-cost animated hits, the PAW Patrol and the Turtles, also have a significant toy angle, rounding out the picture.
7. Disney No Longer Rules Hollywood.
Those who have been watching the box office for some time likely remember how back in the 2010s Disney seemed unstoppable. However, between how few hits it scored in 2023, and how many flops it suffered as those very expensive would-be hits proved the opposite, those days seem long past-- Disney's sole representation on the top profit-makers list Guardians at #9, and four of the five biggest money-losers (Captain Marvel 2, Indiana Jones 5, Wish, the remake-no-one-asked-for of Haunted Mansion), including the biggest loser of all (Captain Marvel 2), are Disney productions, with each of these reported as losing $100 million+ and the lot a combined $600 million+. Taking into account the at best lackluster performance of other major Disney productions--like Ant-Man 3 and the live-action adaptation The Little Mermaid--makes Disney's situation look worse still.
8. The Cinematic Market Has Shrunken--and Fragmented.
Listening to the reports of Disney's troubles we hear much about the mismanagement of particular films, usually blaming anyone and everyone but the executives who actually have the power and responsibility in the situation (as in the whining about a lack of "supervision" on the projects, and the stupid and shabby scapegoating of the writers). However, the problem looks structural. During its glory days in the '10s Disney managed to dominate the market through a particular strategy, but that market appears to have since changed, particularly with respect to what moviegoers think is an "event" worth the trip to the theater calling that strategy into question. Until recently it was obvious that a new Star Wars, Marvel or Pixar movie, for example, was usually regarded by a critical mass of moviegoers worthy of being identified with the "general audience" as such an event. However, this has become less clear, the bar for what constitutes an event for the audience raised, so that really wide-audience events are more elusive, and relative to mass audience hits we are seeing more movies become hits on the basis of intense appeal to a limited but very enthusiastic portion of the audience, and particularly a young portion of the audience. Thus did Freddy's, and those Paramount cartoons, become moneymakers--part of the audience really excited about them, the rest not caring at all. Thus did it go with Taylor Swift's film. Even those really big hits, Super Mario and Barbie, seem to have had something of that flavor about them, just on a larger scale (the more in as Barbie was such a divisive, polarizing, film).
As that last especially shows, 2023 was anything but the business as usual to which I had thought the year returning--and it does not seem implausible to imagine that it portends changes in the business.
Look for my thoughts about that in an upcoming post.
As sophisticated box office-watchers know, the tournaments are an imperfect source of data. Just consider how in the past the production budgets they reported proved understated in the wake of later revelations (the more significant in that some of these figures are lower than we were told they were before, as with the $100 million rather than $150 million figure for Spider-Man), the inconsistent use of information about the part subsidies played in the making of the bottom line (we were told the net production cost of Captain Marvel 2 was $220 million after a significant subsidy, but this is not acknowledged here), the similarly inconsistent use of merchandising data, the ambiguities involved in the related-party transaction that is a studio selling the streaming rights to its own movies to its own platform, etc.. However, for lack of any comparably systematic round-up it seems well to go with this report's findings for now, reading which I was struck by the following:
1. There Were Four Superhero Films on the List, But . . .
We hear much talk these days of superhero fatigue--and much sneering about that talk. "Look at all the superhero films on this list!" some might say. However, one could equally well say, look at all the superhero films that did not make the list, among them two of the year's Marvel Cinematic Universe films (Ant-Man 3 and Captain Marvel 2), and four WBD/DC films (Shazam 2, Blue Beetle, The Flash, Aquaman 2), while two of these topped the list of the year's biggest money-losers (with Captain Marvel 2 heading the list, and The Flash right behind it in second place). One may also note that the one live-action superhero film placing among the top ten this year (a very low proportion by recent standards, especially when one considers the number of releases in this genre the year had), Guardians of the Galaxy 3, was down in ninth place (and the least profitable entry in that series to date). Of the other three superhero films two--PAW Patrol and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles--were Paramount productions that were low grossers (failing to make the list of the top 30 worldwide grossers of the year), but whose low costs, and the inclusion of merchandising revenue in their cases, enabled them to place among the top ten in a year of weak competition. Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, which considerably bettered the gross of the well-received original, can more justly be regarded as a cinematic hit--though it may be noted, its performance is still a far cry from what the Spider-Man franchise accomplished at its strongest (exemplified by the near $2 billion take of Spider-Man: No Way Home back in late 2021). The result is that I would consider the fuller picture evidence for, rather than against, superhero fatigue.
2. There Were Four Animated Films, But . . .
Per usual animation was well-represented on the list of the biggest money-makers of the year. However, in line with what was stated above low budgets were key to their reported profitability (each and every one of the movies reported as having a production cost of $100 million or less), the more in as, gross-wise, only The Super Mario Bros. Movie really soared at the global box office. (Spider-Man was more respectable than sensational internationally, adding just $300 million in those markets to its North American gross--as compared with Super Mario's $800 million in the international market.) And again, merchandising revenue was key to the profitability of two of the four (PAW Patrol and Turtles). As the titles, and low budgets, imply, Disney was not represented here--Pixar's Elemental, if reportedly turning a profit in the end, still failing to make the cut here, while Wish ended up one of the year's biggest flops.
3. Most of the Films Were Surprise Overperformers Rather Than the Predicted Successes.
As the big superhero films and franchise films generally and the Disney productions underwhelmed, the way was cleared for other movies that would ordinarily not have ranked very highly--those lower-budget and less "conventional" blockbusters--to top the charts. According to my reading of the market at a minimum six of the listed movies fall into this category--namely The Super Mario Bros. Movie (few if any anticipated $1 billion+ for this one), the animated Spider-Man film (which so much bettered the performance of the original), Barbie (Boxoffice Pro's prediction for the domestic gross had been in the vicinity of a mere $200 million for this one mere weeks before a release that launched it far, far past that mark), Oppenheimer (ditto), Taylor Swift's concert film (an extraordinary performer by concert movie standards), and Five Nights at Freddy's (again, going above and beyond as it approached $300 million globally).
4. The Profits Were Low, Individually and Collectively.
Together the ten films on the list of most valuable blockbusters made a bit under $2.5 billion in profit. This sounds like a lot. However, compare it to the figures for the 2015-2019 period before the pandemic, when the studios established their current pattern. During this period the profits for the top ten movies, when adjusted for 2023 prices, ranged from $3.3 billion in the lowest-earning year (2016) to $5.4 billion in the highest (2019), and averaged $4.2 billion (leaving 2023 about 40 percent down). Granted, later revelations suggest those profits were overstated--with reports of the third and fourth Avengers films having been much more expensive than originally indicated quite enough to skew the figures. However, the gap is quite large enough that it would take a lot of downward adjustment to narrow it much, while, again, the figures for 2023 are at least as suspect as in prior years. The result is that it seems worth taking the figures at face value for now--the more in as the way in which those films became profitable varies significantly over the period.
5. Those Profits Tended to Reflect Low Costs Rather Than Colossal Grosses.
While I raised the point earlier in relation to the animated films, the truth is that this pattern of low costs translating to surprising profitability--far better profitability than the megabudget movies had--carried over to the year's more successful releases broadly in this year when of the top 10 most profitable films four did not make the list of the top 10 grossers worldwide, three did not make the top 20, and two did not even make the top 30 (with Freddy's at #19, Taylor Swift at #23, PAW Patrol at #31, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles at #34 on the box office charts, despite which the Turtles movie was #4 on the "Most Valuable" list). If Guardians of the Galaxy 3 was a standard megabuck Marvel production (running the studio $250 million), the production cost of every other movie here was reportedly under $150 million--and in many cases much less (Barbie coming in just below that, Wonka lower still at $125 million, Oppenheimer, Spider-Man and Super Mario Bros. as "mere" $100 million productions, and the rest even less, with the Turtles movie made for $70 million, PAW Patrol $30 million, Freddy's $20 million, the Taylor Swift film a mere $15 million). The more striking given the galloping inflation of recent years, it is more striking still in comparison with the films on the flop list--the $200 million reported for The Flash and Wish, the $270 million for Captain Marvel 2, the $300 million for Indiana Jones 5 (by itself, exceeding the combined production costs of the five cheapest of the "most valuable blockbusters" list combined).
6. Thematically it Seems Notable That So Many Movies Were Based on Toys.
I can remember how not so long ago sneering at the video game-based movie as such was virtually universal. Going by the reviews of Super Mario Bros. and Five Nights at Freddy's films the critics' attitude toward such films remains less than kind. (Even as critics grew insanely generous in their evaluations of movies in general those two movies got a mere 59 and 32 percent ratings on Rotten Tomatoes, respectively.) Still, in contrast with before the broader audience has made clear that it does not necessarily feel the same way as the professional critics--with those two movies, again, making the list of the top ten moneymakers of the year and Super Mario in the #1 spot. The movie that came right after it was Barbie--also a movie based on a popular toy. Meanwhile those two lower-cost animated hits, the PAW Patrol and the Turtles, also have a significant toy angle, rounding out the picture.
7. Disney No Longer Rules Hollywood.
Those who have been watching the box office for some time likely remember how back in the 2010s Disney seemed unstoppable. However, between how few hits it scored in 2023, and how many flops it suffered as those very expensive would-be hits proved the opposite, those days seem long past-- Disney's sole representation on the top profit-makers list Guardians at #9, and four of the five biggest money-losers (Captain Marvel 2, Indiana Jones 5, Wish, the remake-no-one-asked-for of Haunted Mansion), including the biggest loser of all (Captain Marvel 2), are Disney productions, with each of these reported as losing $100 million+ and the lot a combined $600 million+. Taking into account the at best lackluster performance of other major Disney productions--like Ant-Man 3 and the live-action adaptation The Little Mermaid--makes Disney's situation look worse still.
8. The Cinematic Market Has Shrunken--and Fragmented.
Listening to the reports of Disney's troubles we hear much about the mismanagement of particular films, usually blaming anyone and everyone but the executives who actually have the power and responsibility in the situation (as in the whining about a lack of "supervision" on the projects, and the stupid and shabby scapegoating of the writers). However, the problem looks structural. During its glory days in the '10s Disney managed to dominate the market through a particular strategy, but that market appears to have since changed, particularly with respect to what moviegoers think is an "event" worth the trip to the theater calling that strategy into question. Until recently it was obvious that a new Star Wars, Marvel or Pixar movie, for example, was usually regarded by a critical mass of moviegoers worthy of being identified with the "general audience" as such an event. However, this has become less clear, the bar for what constitutes an event for the audience raised, so that really wide-audience events are more elusive, and relative to mass audience hits we are seeing more movies become hits on the basis of intense appeal to a limited but very enthusiastic portion of the audience, and particularly a young portion of the audience. Thus did Freddy's, and those Paramount cartoons, become moneymakers--part of the audience really excited about them, the rest not caring at all. Thus did it go with Taylor Swift's film. Even those really big hits, Super Mario and Barbie, seem to have had something of that flavor about them, just on a larger scale (the more in as Barbie was such a divisive, polarizing, film).
As that last especially shows, 2023 was anything but the business as usual to which I had thought the year returning--and it does not seem implausible to imagine that it portends changes in the business.
Look for my thoughts about that in an upcoming post.
How Did The Fall Guy Do in the End?
This past weekend The Fall Guy hit theaters. It ended up making a bit under $28 million--under the bottom end of the range projected by Boxoffice Pro, and well under the $35 million that seems to have been conventionally projected for it.
That is to say it performed below even the very low expectations held for the film--with the result that the movie was not only outgrossed by 2005's Kingdom of Heaven, but by every first weekend of May release going back to the 1990s, back when the blockbuster season properly began only a little later. (Consider, for instance, how things stood in 1998, when the first real summer release was Deep Impact--which appeared the second weekend in May, and collected $41 million then, as that first weekend of May was left to a Spike Lee movie.*)
Of course, one can counter that the film's being given this release date was not quite what was never Plan A, that this would never have happened but for last year's strikes, that it is unfair to judge it by big summer movie standards. (Indeed, as Anthony D'Alessandro remarked, "it's a movie you find either in August, the second weekend of June or even the off season, which is where this was originally scheduled on March 1.") However, no one forced the studio to opt for that release date--they had plenty of other choices over the course of this so far very weak year, while one can add that the Ryan "Kenough" Gosling hype may have conduced to more optimism than was warranted. Moreover the money they sank into it (which has had some analysts scratching their heads) is not dump month money but summer month money, such that the studio hoped the prime stretch of year in which it launched it would give the studio a better chance of recouping a considerable investment than otherwise.
Alas, the movie will have to have a lot of staying power at the box office to do that--enjoy very good week-to-week holds again and again. Where this is concerned the fact that those bothering to show seem to like it (the audience rating on Rotten Tomatoes is 87 percent, not rapturous but not bad), and the weakness of the competition in coming weeks, may make this a possibility. Still, it is an inauspicious opening for the movie--and for the summer season that was so thinned out as to make this one look like it "coulda been a contender," and as yet all too likely to end up looking like 2023 would have, minus its eleventh hour rescue by Barbie and Oppenheimer.
* Of course, that $41 million is, before inflation, about 50 percent more than The Fall Guy picked up, and adjusted for 2024 dollars $79 million, or almost three times as much.
That is to say it performed below even the very low expectations held for the film--with the result that the movie was not only outgrossed by 2005's Kingdom of Heaven, but by every first weekend of May release going back to the 1990s, back when the blockbuster season properly began only a little later. (Consider, for instance, how things stood in 1998, when the first real summer release was Deep Impact--which appeared the second weekend in May, and collected $41 million then, as that first weekend of May was left to a Spike Lee movie.*)
Of course, one can counter that the film's being given this release date was not quite what was never Plan A, that this would never have happened but for last year's strikes, that it is unfair to judge it by big summer movie standards. (Indeed, as Anthony D'Alessandro remarked, "it's a movie you find either in August, the second weekend of June or even the off season, which is where this was originally scheduled on March 1.") However, no one forced the studio to opt for that release date--they had plenty of other choices over the course of this so far very weak year, while one can add that the Ryan "Kenough" Gosling hype may have conduced to more optimism than was warranted. Moreover the money they sank into it (which has had some analysts scratching their heads) is not dump month money but summer month money, such that the studio hoped the prime stretch of year in which it launched it would give the studio a better chance of recouping a considerable investment than otherwise.
Alas, the movie will have to have a lot of staying power at the box office to do that--enjoy very good week-to-week holds again and again. Where this is concerned the fact that those bothering to show seem to like it (the audience rating on Rotten Tomatoes is 87 percent, not rapturous but not bad), and the weakness of the competition in coming weeks, may make this a possibility. Still, it is an inauspicious opening for the movie--and for the summer season that was so thinned out as to make this one look like it "coulda been a contender," and as yet all too likely to end up looking like 2023 would have, minus its eleventh hour rescue by Barbie and Oppenheimer.
* Of course, that $41 million is, before inflation, about 50 percent more than The Fall Guy picked up, and adjusted for 2024 dollars $79 million, or almost three times as much.
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