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Well, @DaltonCraig007, this is what he posted in June of last year:
Pretty much explains it all, doesn't it? He just wants the hobbit to play Bond.
Somewhat anxious by Black Widow arriving two weeks after Bond.
It's Marvel big summer flagship film and their May releases have a tendency to gross north of $1billion. There is also a concern that the films could be similar in content.
The biggest concern is China. The middle kingdom love Marvel and Bond will be a fairly unproven entity. If Black Widow and Bond 25 open close together, Black Widow could swamp it. But I think Bond has the advantage in Europe. However, Black Widow will eat massively into Bond 25's North American gross.
Perhaps, Rachel has spilled the secrets to Eon.....
He's a passive aggressive gas lighter if I've ever seen one, there used to be another one but he stopped posting here a while back.
Are these the same analysts who said that GoldenEye couldn't exist? Who said the helicopter posed no threat and wasn't worth following?
Bond is CONSTANTLY in the news. I'm not sure i've ever seen something like this before in regards to Bond. Everyone in my office is talking about the new Bond being a woman, those are not Bond fans. It's ridiculous. The film doesn't even need marketing at this point, because it's such a hot topic, most movie productions could only dream about that level of attention. Whether that will translate into Box office though remains everyones guess. I think the movie could make Spectre numbers, but if it's really good it will get close to Skyfall. I think EoN is throwing everything and the kitchen sink at the screen to make sure it is.
I remember growing up in the Brosnan era, one thing i loved about a new Bond film being released was that EVERYBODY was jumping on the bandwagon and was trying to get a piece of the Profit. Every local supermarket had some Bond related products in their windows, sporting goods stores were selling 007 branded stuff, i was seeing Bond related advertising everywhere, plus of course non stop TV specials about the new and old movies. So i always kept thinking these films basically market themselves, no need to waste any money.
I haven't payed as much attention to all that in the Craig era but i hope it will be similar with B25.
You appear with the tedius inevitability of an unloved season.
Exactly. What matters at the end of the day is the quality of the film, or at the very least, the quality of the reviews. (Stating the obvious, duh...) If the film is good it will be a BO succes regardless of competition. If it isn't, it will probably still make decent profit, but the return will be more dependent on other factors. If the film is crap... well, then the factors of competition will be a concern. It is not really more complicated or dramatic than that, and honestly all this back and forth discussion seems rather tedius and pointless.
And as I have argued many times before, Box Office should not really be a massive concern for Bond fans. The only negative effect a box office flop would have is that the next film budget might be smaller. But through out the franchise's history there has never been a proportion between budget size and the actual quality of the film. On the contrary EON seems to work better when they have a point to prove and can't simply rely on splashing money at the screen.
Then Skyfall.
The difference between Casino and Quantum is a few million. Not a few hundred million.
is absolute nonsense. A downward "trend" can be seen no sooner than if B25 made less than SP. Spotting a trend after one film is like spotting a linear trend when only two values are available on the entire graph.
DAF made more money than OHMSS. LALD made more money than DAF. TMWTGG made less money than LALD. TSWLM made more money than TMWTGG and LALD. MR made even money than TSWLM. So, would it have been fair in 1974 to talk about a "downward trend" after evaluating TMWTGG's results? Negative.
One case doesn't show a trend.
$1.007000020 bn.
Funny thing is I really enjoyed the 2 Antman movies.
I think so too due what you have put above?
It's unusual that they didn't save the title reveal for the teaser. However, this does beg the question of how 'No Time to Die' will perform at the box office.
A good comparator I think is 'Mission Impossible: Fallout'. That film broke out with:
Domestic: $220,159,104
Foreign: $570,956,000
'No Time to Die' will easily match and beat those foreign numbers. However, I'll be curious to see if 'No Way to Die' will meet those domestic numbers. Currently, the latest 'Fast & Furious' film (albeit a spin-off, but one staring Dwayne Johnson) has grossed $137,192,890 and likely won't till the double century mark.
Sadly, we live in world where comic-book property IP leads the way. I suspect 'No Time to Die' will get hit fairly hard by 'Black Widow'.
Don't give up hope just yet. This age of superhero movies is due a slump and it's due one soon. After Endgame knocked Avatar off the top spot, the only way is down.
Think about it. There are at least three Marvel movies a year nowadays. Yeah OK they're very successful but the novelty wore off years ago.
There won't have been a Bond movie in FIVE years when the NTTD comes out. With audiences wanting something a bit different - I wouldn't count it out just yet.
Isn't that the problem though?
Marvel are riding the biggest wave they have had yet with Endgame (their success story keeps surpassing even their greatest achievements). In that respect, the hype to see Black Widow and the next phase of her journey is guaranteed to excite audiences. There is even a hint that whilst the story is a prequel, some of it may take place post-Endgame.
Bond has been away from screens for 5 years. Daniel Craig was once the young, edgy 007. Now there has been a generation of audiences who have grown up with Marvel who have only known Craig as 007 and associate him as Bond. There's a sense that the franchise is going stale again.
The way to ensure this sentiment dies out is to produce a great movie that gets people talking. I know some female hate the female 007 story - but we all know in our hearts that its just a marketing ploy to generate buzz and interest. Craig is still 007 and the move is an attempt is make the franchise 'relevant' and show it being self-aware. The same can be said of the hiring of PWB.
They have ace with Rami Malek, who will passionately sell this film. I haven't seen someone pimp themselves quite so diligently throughout Oscar season like him.
Plus, Lashana and Ana De Armas compliment each other perfectly. One selling the old-school sexy Bond girl image and the other the modern progressive Bond girl. Eon are having their cake and eating it there.
Also, they'll need a big commercial singer on the theme duties. Dua Lipa or Ed Sheeran have the British advantage. But stars such as Beyonce and Arianna Grande would bite Eon's hand off for the job. Don't expect a Radiohead type group.
But fundamentally what could distinguish the film in the current blockbuster marketplace is the 'prestige' value. Granted NTTD had more cache in this respect when Danny Boyle was to direct, but CJF is still an A-list helmer - even without an Oscar nomination. So if this film can be in the same quality bracket as Skyfall - or even Logan or Black Panther - and be talked about all spring/summer 2020, then it'll be in a very good place.
NTTD's success isn't guaranteed. But there is a very good chance the film is a hit.
Return-On-Investment: financial profits of "No Time To Die" and future Bond-films
As you know, in the past I have started some topics about possible box office predictions, and how 'delirious' I used to be about possible 1 Billion Dollar grosses and how 'extraordinary' that was. "Skyfall" passed the $ 1.1 Billion threshold, and "SPECTRE" almost grabbed $ 900 Million.
However, Hollywood has changed considerably in the recent 4 years. Mostly because Disney (Lucasfilm, Marvel, 21st Century Fox) has been eating up competitors like chocolate, so that it's now a true superstrong entertainment-monopolist, perhaps only feeling some competitive winds from Comcast (which owns Universal). Box office grosses have been broken consistently in those past years, so that $ 1.5 Billion or even $ 2 Billion becomes a new threshold in blockbuster-land to be reckoned with.
But I do not wish to focus on that. Recently I did some (simple) research and really asked myself: How profitable are all these blockbuster franchise-films? And especially how profitable are Bond-films these days? As you know, 'profit' is very different from 'turnover' or 'sales'. Therefore I dug up some information about the real profits of the (recent) Bond-films, or the so called 'Return-On-Investment'-ratio (ROI).
So every now and then I am writing a guest article for Bill Koenig's wonderful SpyCommand blog. I have to thank him for that! This time around I focused on the ROI, and I wrote this: https://spycommandfeatures.wordpress.com/bond-confronting-changing-media/. I am very curious what you fellow fans think about it, and what you think could or should be a realistic ROI-figure (in percentage points) for the new Bond-film "No Time To Die" and future Bond-films.
Down below you will find some recent ROI-scores. One infograph I made compares all the Bond-films with each other, the other ROI-infograph compares "SPECTRE" with the most recent action-blockbusters. I hope this interests you. And it would be nice to also have a pragmatic discussion about the financial health of the Bond-franchise, now and in the long-term future. Because really, box office talk is only one aspect of it.
It really depends what your benchmark, your main discussion point is in this discussion. If the Bond producers are not more 'hand on', more fierce with regard to profits, then "NTTD" will have a similar lacklustre ROI as "SP". Therefore it's especially interesting how powerful the role of Universal has become in this new EON-MGM-UnitedArtists-Universal-construction. Because Universal has only signed a contract for ONE Bond-film. Comcast is way bigger than Sony; they want to prevent the uttermost failure Sony had placed themselves in when they bowed to EON and basically lost money on SP.
An ROI of at least 400% is not only Universal's wish. Be sure they slammed their fists on the table with EON and MGM. I therefore wouldn't be surprised that sole production costs of NTTD will be limited to $200 Million. And all other marketing and distribution investments should not be more than $100 Million. If then the film brings in $999 Million, then Universal might sign a new distribution deal with EON/MGM for more non-Craig Bond films.
And then there's this United Artists nonsense. MGM might as well look into making United Artists a global thing under the lifeline of billionaire daddy Ellison. To be honest, in current blockbuster-climate the management of the Bond-franchise looks more like that bonkers 1967 "Casino Royale" spoof (= not good at all).
Nothing, but relly nothing is certain after NTTD. No one really knows.
The 1-picture deal Universal has with MGM/EON works both ways.
One option could be that both EON and MGM try to lure billionaire Larry Ellison to invest even more in the failed Annapurna Pictures and therefore into the newly revived US distributor company United Artists Releasing. For NTTD United Artists is only doing marketing and distribution in the USA (and Canada). Perhaps MGM and EON want United Artists to become bigger so that with the next Bond-film, Bond 26, they can do the full global distribution programme.
Another option is that Comcast/Universal Pictures simply don't want to have a multi-picture with MGM/EON. Obviously Universal has seen how deadly wrong a similar distribution deal went with Sony. Sony barely got profits from the whole Bond thing. For SP even less than $100 Million. In Blockbusterland that's a big fat no-go these days. So Universal might be in a much stronger driver's seat this time if the Bond producers quickly want to move forward with the franchise and prefer Universal over United Artists doing all distribution.
But in the end it's the ROI stupid. In the end it's all about profits. And even for Barbara and Michael it seems they don't care. They can milk out the franchise with Danjaq Inc. and their sponsorship business. Barbara and Michael are billionaires. The big question mark however is: For how long can they do that? The longer the breaks between Bond-films, the more the brand Bond becomes a peculiar nothingness in our collective consciousness.
Nolan and WB coming aboard? Haha, I don't believe that nonsense. Blockbusterland land is changing. It used to be very much an affair like "We need Bond". That's over. Most big movie monopolists -Disney, ViacomCBS, Comcast, WB- made it the other way around: "Bond needs us….and frankly, we don't need Bond".
Make no mistake, I'm looking very much forward to the new Bond-film. I'm a little kid again!! Can't wait. But financially the Bond-franchise is in a way more dire position than many people realize. It hurts me to be honest. And although we can't look into the future, it would be wise if Barbara & Michael look more to Cubby's original vision and less to Harry's anthics. So my ultimate wish would be that the EON sells their part to a big player like Universal Pictures. But I'm not sure. Barbara and Michael are too powerful financially, while at the same time they don't treat the franchise with a hand-on-mentality like their (step)father. They do Bond because they can, not because they care as much as Kevin Feige care's for Marvel.
On the plus side...….if Nomi gets the 007-number for a short period in NTTD, then there could very well be a future spin-off series. That could generate some extra profits.
There's nothing speculative about micro-economics, nor is there something speculative about the economics in films. Same with simple definitions like 'return-on-investment' and 'profits'. And to be honest, is a forum not existing on the very notion of, as you call it, speculation? Anyway, I find the finances of the Bond-franchise simply an interesting thing.