K:SI - Box Office Discussion

[Chrispy_G]

Still a very impressive achievement in context because, again...at the box office, Pacific Rim < Godzilla < Kong: Skull Island.

Godzilla 98, King Kong, and Cloverfield were all one-off kaiju films....so whether they were massive or not, there was really no value in building momentum there.

Now we can only hope that the quality of films like Pacific Rim: Uprising and Godzilla: King of the Monsters is what it needs to be...and that the studios become more confident in the marketing power they put behind the films.

We know WB is going to be all-in on the MonsterVerse now. The only thing up in the air is what kind of confidence and push Universal will put into Pacific Rim: Uprising.

[CyberZilla]

Still a very impressive achievement in context because, again...at the box office, Pacific Rim < Godzilla < Kong: Skull Island.

Godzilla 98, King Kong, and Cloverfield were all one-off kaiju films....so whether they were massive or not, there was really no value in building momentum there.

Now we can only hope that the quality of films like Pacific Rim: Uprising and Godzilla: King of the Monsters is what it needs to be...and that the studios become more confident in the marketing power they put behind the films.

We know WB is going to be all-in on the MonsterVerse now. The only thing up in the air is what kind of confidence and push Universal will put into Pacific Rim: Uprising.

Judging by the uphill climb of box office sales, the films are gaining enough interest to be successful. If the numbers keep going up like this, and assuming the films will be quality, then the Monsterverse will be well on its way to affluence.

[Pacfanweb]

$558 million after this weekend. Another $1.5 million domestically.

[Gothicserpent]

Awesome!

[Jomei]

The "Kong's box office beat Godzilla's" meme might be somewhat misleading.

It's worth remembering that Kong was about, what, $25 million more expensive? And more of its total is coming from overseas. Hopefully the current arrangement with Chinese distribution is more profitable.

[scottzilla]

They need to keep an interest in monster movies high. Although Pacific Rim isn't connected to this universe, I'm hoping that it can at the very least bridge the time gap for general audiences between Skull Island and King of the Monsters.

[The Octopus]

The "Kong's box office beat Godzilla's" meme might be somewhat misleading.

Its been a while since I was in school but isn't 560 M a bigger number than 530 M?

[Jomei]

The "Kong's box office beat Godzilla's" meme might be somewhat misleading.

Its been a while since I was in school but isn't 560 M a bigger number than 530 M?

You didn't finish reading my post. Plus "misleading" =/= false. Kong's box office is bigger, yes, but simply leaving the story there gives us a rather incomplete picture.

Reiterating: Kong has made more, but it was also more expensive to make, and it has made considerably less of its money domestically. Typically, the amount studios recoup is greater in domestic theaters, but I don't know where arrangements stand with China right now. When you consider how well a film has done, simply looking at one figure, the amount of its box office, is not going to tell you enough.

[The Octopus]

^ Who cares about it making "considerably less" than Godzilla domestically. The International box office is much bigger than domestic (heck The Fate of the Furious only pulled in 1/5 of its massive $500 M opening weekend domestically). Plus with Wanda owning LP they are keeping 60% to 65% of the Chinese take far more than any other studio which keeps only 25%.

Studios keep roughly 55% of the domestic cut and roughly 40% of the International cut of a film. While the percentages are smaller overseas, the grosses are so much bigger, so that when you crunch the numbers you walk away with a bigger profit from an overseas release than you would domestically.
For example If you take 55% of the projected final domestic gross for Kong ($166 M) you get a cut of roughly $91 M for the studio. If you take 40% from the projected final International tally ($397 M) it will come out to about $160 M*. So that means the studio is making more profit from the films overseas release than its domestic release. This is why most of these big movies nowadays open overseas before they open here even though they are Hollywood productions. It just seems that studios care more about International numbers than domestic numbers in the 21st Century.

*That number will be higher since you have to change the Chinese take from 25% to 65%.

[Showa Gyaos]

^ Who cares about it making "considerably less" than Godzilla domestically. The International box office is much bigger than domestic (heck The Fate of the Furious only pulled in 1/5 of its massive $500 M opening weekend domestically). Plus with Wanda owning LP they are keeping 60% to 65% of the Chinese take far more than any other studio which keeps only 25%.

Studios keep roughly 55% of the domestic cut and roughly 40% of the International cut of a film. While the percentages are smaller overseas, the grosses are so much bigger, so that when you crunch the numbers you walk away with a bigger profit from an overseas release than you would domestically.
For example If you take 55% of the projected final domestic gross for Kong ($166 M) you get a cut of roughly $91 M for the studio. If you take 40% from the projected final International tally ($397 M) it will come out to about $160 M*. So that means the studio is making more profit from the films overseas release than its domestic release. This is why most of these big movies nowadays open overseas before they open here even though they are Hollywood productions. It just seems that studios care more about International numbers than domestic numbers in the 21st Century.

*That number will be higher since you have to change the Chinese take from 25% to 65%.

People keep saying this, yet they fail to produce a source for this information every time.

This has been debated countless times and there is a notable lack of information to support this claim.

[Kongamera]

Pre-release many were worried that this movie might just end up making around 400-420 million$. Very Glad to see it defying expectations. Props to WB's marketing team.

[Gothicserpent]

I think the other Monsterverse films need to be cheaper.

[GoWhaleTours]

no.
[-][-]
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[Tohosaurus]

I think the other Monsterverse films need to be cheaper.

They can't really make giant monster movies much cheaper than Godzilla.

[Relair]

Yeah, they got Gareth Edwards specifically because of his work on Monsters, doing the less-is-more bit to keep costs down. It would be tough to make a proper blockbuster spectacle for much less than G14. I could see them doing a lower budget Mothra or Rodan or something one day, more human drama, all the monster stuff could take place in wooded areas or mountains and not a city, keep the budget to like 75-90mil but even that would be pretty hard to pull off.

[godzilla5417]

They can't really make giant monster movies much cheaper than Godzilla.

Ehh... they could actually. Just look at Shin and colossal both these movies have more monster action then 2014's Godzilla.

[InnocentClarke]

They can't really make giant monster movies much cheaper than Godzilla.

Ehh... they could actually. Just look at Shin and colossal both these movies have more monster action then 2014's Godzilla.

Ah, but then you also have to keep in mind that Japan's movie-making industry is a lot cheaper, too, thus why most Japanese films by far don't cross the $20 million threshold. Remember, Final Wars was the most expensive film in the franchise and was $19.5 million. Meanwhile, 20 mil in Hollywood won't give you an even remotely decent film when it comes to huge spectacles as are necessary for monster films like these. Everybody requires considerably more money here, especially actors. You can bet Sam Jackson was at least a few million by himself, for instance.

[godzilla5417]

actors. You can bet Sam Jackson was at least a few million by himself, for instance.

They could hire actors that are much more cheaper, which are just as good or even better then the ones they've been hireing. like Colossal which has fairly well known actors.
Besides it really doesn't matter who Ledendary hires to be in their movies, since they end up just wasting there talant on horrible scripts.

[InnocentClarke]

They could hire actors that are much more cheaper, which are just as good or even better then the ones they've been hireing. like Colossal which has fairly well known actors.

They could, but that still wouldn't make enough of a difference to matter. Now, I don't know much about Colossal, but I somehow doubt it has within it an even remotely similar level of destruction, at least impressive-looking destruction, that the average Godzilla film has. The problem is that this is where the budgets of these spectacle films go. Remember, Pacific Rim didn't have a particularly notable cast at the time, save for the limited amount of Ron Perlman in the film, and yet its budget was $190 million. Why? Because it has to look good, and looking good costs a lot of money.

[The Octopus]

Hey! Has the film been closed or something? The numbers don't appear on the boxoffice chart this week.
http://www.boxofficemojo.com/weekend/ch ... =17&p=.htm

Edit: I juts checked TheNumbers and they have Kong at #16 with $1.1 million