Hollywood Road

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A film made for the taste of the public, or a film with a strong personal style, which one is more likely to attract ordinary audiences? The answer to this question is obvious. [Bayi Middle School)]?\u003e

Since Friday, "X-Men 2" has dominated this weekend, and easily cut nearly 26 million US dollars in one day, fully embodying the advantages of sequels of blockbuster movies and super commercial productions. Faye and Miramax's "Sin City", facing the impact of the super-large-scale production in the summer, fully exposed the defect of insufficient audience. The single-day box office is less than a fraction of "X-Men 2", less than five One million U.S. dollars.

After consuming a large number of fans and fans of black cubs, "Sin City" somewhat lacks stamina.

Facing the impact of "X-Men 2", the only thing that can comfort Murphy and Miramax is that the audience and professional reputation of "Sin City" is generally better than that of "X-Men 2".

Especially the film critics, as in the past, generally hold a derogatory stance towards a big-investment and big-production comic film, and the evaluation basically contains words such as "vulgar and boring", which is similar to the attitude of singing praises when "Sin City" was released. In stark contrast.

All in all, although the word-of-mouth of "X-Men 2" is not as overwhelming as that of "Sin City", it is not bad in the summer popcorn-type movies, especially for fans of "X-Men" and comics. Fans generally buy it, and word-of-mouth is very important to a film, but in many cases it may not be a key factor in determining a film's box office, otherwise the top ten films in the North American box office rankings every year will not be basically replaced by popcorn-type films. Occupy has already become the world of Oscars or other award-winning films.

Word of mouth can't make up for a film's inherent defects, such as the audience of a film, why is a niche film called a niche film? It is not obtained from a small investment. Its audience may increase due to word-of-mouth, but there will be no fundamental change.

The most typical example is Quentin Tarantino's "Pulp Fiction", which only depends on the film's word-of-mouth and its status in film history.

But the actual situation, when "Pulp Fiction" was released, the North American box office only had a box office of more than 50 million U.S. dollars. Two years ago, after Miramax was re-released in theaters, the North American box office barely exceeded 100 million U.S. dollars.

This kind of noir film is Murphy's favorite type, which can also be seen from the type of film he chose to make after he came here. He used to feel upset about "Pulp Fiction", thinking that such an excellent film There should be a smashing box office. After coming here, he realized how unrealistic and stupid such an idea is. Who stipulates that a good movie must have a good box office? The laws of the film market will not be changed by personal will at all.

The same is certainly true of Sin City.

Much praise from the media and a wave of praise from film critics did not make this film a popular work.

Under the impact of "X-Men 2", the box office performance of "Sin City" in the second weekend has been tepid.

On Saturday, "X-Men 2" suffered a slight drop at the box office after consuming a large number of fans and audiences. The rough report of the day was close to 23 million US dollars. "Sin City" was not much better, and did not take the opportunity to rebound. The single-day box office also fell, earning 4.3 million US dollars from 2850 theaters.

Although the box office for the three-day weekend cannot be counted yet, such box office performance has made it several times more difficult for "Sin City" to break through the 100 million box office in North America.

With the arrival of a new week, last weekend's box office statistics are released, and there is no suspense about the box office champion. "X-Men 2" firmly sits at the top of the box office list with 68 million US dollars. City" came in second with $13.4 million at the box office.

This result has plummeted by 65% ​​from the weekend!

However, counting the box office of the previous four working days, the cumulative North American box office of "Sin City" reached 63.5 million US dollars, which not only crossed the film's total cost line, but also set a new record for Murphy's personal record. North American box office record.

In the following week, the weekday box office of "Sin City" dropped to the level of one million US dollars, and it only earned more than 4.4 million US dollars in four working days. With the arrival of the new weekend, many films were added to the summer vacation In the case of contention for files, the number of theaters showing shows will inevitably be cut off by a large amount, plummeting to 2100.

Under such circumstances, the weekend box office of the film inevitably declined again. The third weekend dropped by 60% compared with the second weekend, and the three-day weekend grossed less than 5 million US dollars.

The North American box office of "Sin City" accumulated 72.9 million US dollars, creating Murphy's highest North American box office record.

But such a box office trend also basically determines that the film's North American box office cannot break through the $100 million mark.

After all, it’s the summer season now. In addition to “X-Men 2”, there will be super masterpieces such as “The Matrix 2: Reloaded” and “Finding Nemo” released in the next 6 sequels. The release rate will only be further compressed.

No matter how much work Miramax does, it can’t change this inevitable law. Not to mention other things, if the theater side is asked to choose between "The Matrix 2: Reloaded" and a film with a limited audience Choose, a fool knows who to choose.

During the two weeks, Murphy also carried out routine publicity activities in some large and medium cities in North America according to the publicity plan formulated by Miramax. After "Sin City" got a good weekly box office in North America, he was responsible for The label Bowei International under Disney, which is traveling overseas, has also pushed the film into several major overseas markets. With Robert Downey Jr. and James Franco as the main actors, it also started an overseas promotion tour.

But Murphy didn't go, and the publicity still focused on actors.

Compared with North America, the overseas response of "Sin City" is much worse. Frank Miller's comic influence is mainly concentrated in North America. The number of overseas fans is limited, and the scale of the film is too large. Restricted, these will significantly affect overseas box office performance.

The weekly box office of the United Kingdom is only 2 million US dollars, France is slightly better, only a little over 2 million US dollars, and Germany, another major European film market, is relatively poor. Perhaps the strong personal style does not conform to the relationship between German aesthetics. Zhou has just over a million dollars in Germany.

The best performer in the overseas market that has already started production is Australia. The source of large-scale plasma films is Australia.

Generally speaking, the overseas screening performance of "Sin City" is not very outstanding.

When the North American box office of the film exceeded 75 million U.S. dollars, "Sin City" only earned more than 16 million U.S. dollars in the 26 overseas markets where it has been filmed.

"The overseas box office is definitely not as good as the North American box office,"

By the pool in his backyard, Murphy was sitting under a parasol, with a pair of oversized black covering half of his face, "I'll be content with fifty million dollars."

He stretched long, "Bill, how much of my share has arrived?"

"Everything that should be there has arrived." Bill Rossis said some nonsense first, and then said in detail, "Fox Searchlight has paid off all the dividends of "Saw", and the dividends of "Planet Terror" Miramax The payment is basically in place, and the rest of these two projects are long-term small-scale dividends."

"Oh, yes." He added, "there is also the union's mandatory share, but this aspect is very small for you."

Murphy nodded. Although he withdrew from the directors' union, he was still a member of the screenwriters' union.

With these shares in the account, plus the profits from investing in "Chain Saw 2", he can be said to be a veritable multi-millionaire.

Where is the best place to go for that money? It must be to buy the movie copyrights of the superheroes in Marvel Comics, and let them fight together in the end.

After the screening of "X-Men 2", Murphy did not give up completely and continued to contact Marvel Comics. Unfortunately, the results were very unsatisfactory. Marvel Comics' attitude was extremely firm and seemed to have absorbed the lessons of "Spider-Man" and "X-Men". , Say nothing to sell the film rights of its well-known heroes.

But for those lesser-known comics, if Murphy's price can make them tempted, they can consider cooperating with Stanton Studio.

Like Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, Black Widow and other well-known heroes, Marvel Comics also set a price for Murphy, packing 1.5 billion US dollars, which is clearly determined not to sell.

Regardless of whether the money is worth it or not, Murphy has no place to raise such a large sum of money.

But Murphy didn't give up completely. He searched a lot of information about Marvel-level heroes to see if he could find the type that he could remember from the unknown ranks.

"Amazing Comics is very difficult. They have already received investment and are not short of money. They are said to be preparing their own superhero movie." Bill Rosses tapped on the armrest of the chair and reminded, "Amazing A channel that comics lack!"

Hearing this, Murphy sighed. His own movies have to rely on other companies, so what can he use to impress Marvel Comics?

Anyone with a discerning eye can see that even if Marvel wants to sell itself now, it will only be sold to a big company with a broad distribution channel and a complete industrial platform, just like DC Comics.

What can an individual like him, or a company like Stanton Studios, bring to Marvel?

"Murphy, Harvey and Frank Miller talked to me yesterday," Bill Rossis suddenly changed the subject, "I want to push "Sin City 2" into the preparatory stage as soon as possible."

"So urgent?" Murphy took off his sunglasses and asked, "What do you think?"

Bill Rossis said without hesitation, "I think it's best to turn it down!" (To be continued.)