"Avatar" Movie discussion - Page 4 - Basketball Forum : Professional and College Basketball Forums

**jmk** · 08-23-2009, 02:08 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by HB

all of a sudden worldwide numbers matter, I am pretty sure you've used that argument against me before. Somehow its not so trivial anymore I guess. Nice one jmk. You know darn well thats not what I meant. Clooney and Cruise simply arent bringing in the crowds domestically as they used to.

You're going to have to find that, bud. Does money not exist outside of America? Do studios not collect money from showing films overseas? You need to think before you post, bwoy.

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Michael Clayton- Domestic box office $49 million
Leatherheads- Domestic box office $31 million
Unfortunately couldn't find burn after reading, but I'd be shocked if its taken over $60 mill domestic.

I already said that Leatherheads didn't do great at the theaters, but it's hard to consider it a bomb when no one thought it would do great in the first place.

Michael Clayton had a budget of $25 million and made over $49 million domestically. How is that in any way supposed to be a bomb?

And FYI, get ready to be shocked, because Burn After Reading made over $60 million domestically.

All things considered, Clooney has done pretty well for himself at the box office in recent years. Despite what hbwoy thinks.

Quote:

Whoop de damn doo about the total world wide combines, lol of course thats going to bring in a decent haul, but clearly these guys arent doing so hot domestically.

Yeah, already proved you wrong there. And your point was about Cruise and Clooney making bombs lately, yet "still being allowed to do more movies." Why would overseas box office not factor into this? Surely you're not that thick, right? Right?

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The ocean's movies had some other stars too, so lets not act like Clooney was solely responsible for the big numbers.

Oh, I get it. When it's convenient for you, you'll use a silly argument. Guess what? Clooney was the topped billed. For ****'s sake, he's the titular character. How can you not count that as a George Clooney movie? By the way, it made over $117 million domestically.

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Cruise wasnt the star of Tropic Thunder and wasn't billed as such, nice try buddy.

I'd say you're losing it, but you'd have to have it in the first place.

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These guys are supposed to be the A-list stars, the big number guys, doesnt look like they can get Americans to watch their movies to me.

That's because you can't see too well. Outside of Lions For Lambs for Cruise, and Leatherheads for Clooney, these guys are still getting it done at the box office, and these guys are still A-listers, and for a reason.

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We dont even know if the Blue guys are the main characters considering they gave us so many random parts of the movie.

They are.

**jmk** · 08-23-2009, 02:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by HB

Jmk was right, I dont read movie sites, but just for the fact that we are on here arguing about this movie, I can only imagine such convos are going on all over the place, meaning this guy is generating buzz for his movie, like it or not.

Yeah, negative buzz. That's not a good thing.

**jmk** · 08-23-2009, 02:13 PM

Here's a good, non-biased article from CHUD on the matter:

http://chud.com/articles/articles/20...ERS/Page1.html

Quote:

Originally Posted by CHUD

If early reports from the East Coast are to be believed, this is not the happy Avatar Day that James Cameron and Fox wanted. Reading Twitter feeds is not quite an exact science, but people are saying that they attended screenings in theater that were half, or less, full.

In Atlanta former CHUD writer Russ Fischer says: Avatar maybe 1/2 full.

Aint It Cool's Quint chimes in: Wow, the Avatar theater in San Antonio is only a quarter full. Yikes...

JackGi on Twitter writes: I'm in MD and it was about half full, but the response from the crowd was pretty optimistic.

Florida's DrumDog2112 tells me: I went to the AVATAR preview. There were maybe 50 people in the theater.

Word from overseas is also worrying. IanLoring says Half full in Bristol UK, was being reported as sold out. No ****ing way.

Our message boards have conflicting overseas reports: message board user jmub says his Melbourne theater was empty, while cognizant (posting, I believe also from Australia, but I could be wrong. Definitely outside of the US) saw it with a packed crowd.

At first I thought that the preview might not be filling seats in the heartland, but that it would do well in New York in LA. But then Latino Review's Kellvin Chavez weighed in from NYC: D believe or not it's half empty here at the 68st IMAX, but I think it's because they added the 8 & 9pm shows.

Besides cognizant I have heard of other sold out shows; Sean_Oconnell says: Packed house for 6 p.m. in Charlotte.

Let's be really honest here - unless West Coast attendance (and the buzz from those shows) really outpaces everywhere else, this is either:

- bad for Fox and James Cameron or

- really bad for Fox and James Cameron.

This preview is meant to play to the faithful, who will in turn become a buzz machine to bring this picture to the masses. Let's face facts: this movie needs to do very, very big business to turn a profit, and the reality is that there's a whole generation of young moviegoers for whom James Cameron's name means nothing. You and I and other film fans and people of a certain age certainly know Cameron, but his last theatrical film hit 12 years ago and it was a chick flick. Massive amounts of Avatar's potential audience have never seen a James Cameron film in theaters.

That's why Avatar Day is a big deal. Fox needs the buzz that can only come from seeing the film on a big screen in 3D to really sell it. The studio counted on rapturous comments on Twitter and on blogs, but if nobody is going to see the footage, there's no buzz. In fact the buzz becomes about how nobody saw the damn footage, which is poisonous buzz.

So what the hell happened? I think I have it narrowed it down to two possibilities:

1) Fox screwed the pooch. The ordering system for Avatar Day tickets was a disaster. Some people have speculated that this was on purpose - by 'crashing' the servers and 'selling out' of tickets, Fox gets extra buzz in the mainstream. But if it was on purpose it could have been a disastrous decision, as the difficulty in getting tickets may have kept some people from even bothering. That's on top of the expected drop out rate from any free event - when people didn't pay for tickets they're more likely to just flake on them, as there's no personal financial loss. That's why you overbook events like this, as seats will always turn up empty.

If this is the reason why Avatar Day seems to be fizzling on the East Coast and in foreign territories, it's bad. There was a bunch of money spent on creating buzz out of these screenings, but buzz won't be created out of half-empty theaters. But there's a much worse possibility...

2) People were turned off by the trailer. The reaction to yesterday's trailer was perhaps best described as whelming. Some people were psyched, some were disappointed, but the vast majority seemed to be mostly unmoved one way or the other. This is terrible because Avatar needs to be the kind of movie that gets people really excited, as a 150 million gross is just not enough for this film. It needs to be huge, which means the excitement needs to be huge. I suspect that what might be the culprit here is the design of the Na'vi; personally I hate it, and I've seen many reactions that are less than favorable. That's just a totally blind guess, though, based on little to nothing solid.

If this is what happened it's just horrible for the film. Your first teaser trailer should be getting people excited, not making them skip the free 16 minute 3D preview you're throwing. That's the exact opposite reaction you're looking for.

Or is the East Coast/international attendance an anomaly? Michael Moses informs me via Facebook that there's a good sized line at the Universal CityWalk IMAX two hours before showtime, while AICN's Capone says Chicago: 1st of 2 screenings 3/4 full, but second show will clearly be sold out based on line. There could be other major factors, including the fact that the original shows were at the work unfriendly times of 6 and 6:45, although Fox has claimed they all sold out. Could the later shows that were added actually play to full crowds?

HB · 08-23-2009, 02:24 PM

Hmmm pretty sure we talked about worldwide sales in the dragonball argument. I dont recall you being a fan of worldwide sales in that thread. As for Ocean's, did it ever cross your mind that people might actually want to go see Pitt or maybe Damon instead of Clooney? Ya know, guys that DO REALLY WELL in the box office.

As for Cruise, I admit I jumped the gun, I remember seeing his opening weekends for his past couple of movies and they were all under 30 or so mill. Same thing goes for Clooney. Surprised they'd do so well overseas though.

HB · 08-23-2009, 02:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jmk

Yeah, negative buzz. That's not a good thing.

Indifference means negative nowadays? Interesting!

**jmk** · 08-23-2009, 04:36 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by HB

Indifference means negative nowadays? Interesting!

When the expected buzz is supposed to be jizzing in pants, yes, indifference is extremely negative.

This is simple, man. Why are you having so much trouble with it?

HB · 08-23-2009, 04:42 PM

^That very same article you put up says they were venues where there were long queues for the movie.

Futurama_Fanatic · 08-25-2009, 01:25 PM

i'll wait til i see more. cameron has made some good movies so i'll see where he goes.

kisstherim · 09-02-2009, 12:43 PM

Hilter learns the Avatar trailer sucks

**Hyperion** · 09-02-2009, 02:18 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kisstherim

Hilter learns the Avatar trailer sucks

That was ****ing HILARIOUS!!!

kisstherim · 10-29-2009, 05:30 PM

2nd trailer:

This one gets so much better man. Or that is an understatment. At least now I know why this costs 3 hundred millions dollars.

**jmk** · 10-29-2009, 08:05 PM

Certainly a better trailer, but those blue mother****ers still look horrendous. It's like they're straight out of a video game vignette. They just look silly, and I wouldn't be surprised to see that take a lot of people out of the movie.

**jmk** · 10-29-2009, 08:10 PM

Also some word going around that Cameron may have ripped off a chunk of story from a science-fiction novella from the 50's.

http://chud.com/articles/articles/21...OFF/Page1.html

HB · 10-30-2009, 08:36 AM

Its not doing it for me

**Tom** · 10-30-2009, 08:57 AM

They need Captain Kirk to uhhhh build a bridge between worlds.

Seriously...Where is Jar Jar

10-29-2009, 08:05 PM	#57 (permalink)
jmk Yes, please. Join Date: Jun 2002 Posts: 16,649 Rep Power: 13702009	re: "Avatar" Movie discussion Certainly a better trailer, but those blue mother**ers still look horrendous. It's like they're straight out of a video game vignette. They just look silly, and I wouldn't be surprised to see that take a lot of people out of the movie. __________________ I have to return some videotapes.**

10-29-2009, 08:10 PM	#58 (permalink)
jmk Yes, please. Join Date: Jun 2002 Posts: 16,649 Rep Power: 13702009	re: "Avatar" Movie discussion Also some word going around that Cameron may have ripped off a chunk of story from a science-fiction novella from the 50's. http://chud.com/articles/articles/21...OFF/Page1.html __________________ I have to return some videotapes.

10-30-2009, 08:57 AM	#60 (permalink)
Tom -LIFETIME MEMBER- Join Date: Jul 2002 Location: Cincinnati Age: 45 Posts: 19,685 Rep Power: 6285236	re: "Avatar" Movie discussion They need Captain Kirk to uhhhh build a bridge between worlds. Seriously...Where is Jar Jar

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