Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice

[Silver Nemesis]

All due respect but that's simply not true. If nothing else, it's an open secret that critics look down their noses at mainstream Hollywood summer stuff and all but have quite the spring in their step when heading into a low budget indie film. Snyder is not a director with a ton of admirers among the critic community.

Indie filmmakers don't have the financial resources or marketing outlets necessary to promote themselves, so they rely on critics to spread positive word-of-mouth on their behalf. There are thousands of indie films that get released each year, but we never hear about most of them because the critics don't bring them to our attention. We only hear about the good ones. It's the same with foreign language cinema. Usually only the good ones get decent distribution in English-speaking territories. This can create the false impression that all foreign language cinema is good, when in fact the bad films vastly outweigh the good. We just don't hear about the stinkers.

By contrast, we hear about every major popcorn flick churned out by the big studios. The marketing machine makes certain of that. So when the critics dismiss one of those films, the movie's failure is far more visible. This creates the perception that critics are prejudiced towards popcorn flicks, when in reality they're no more selective about blockbusters than they are about indie films. It's just that critics have more incentive to be passionate about indie films because they know their opinion can make or break them. And when they're not passionate about an indie film, we don't usually hear about it.

Here are some big budget popcorn flicks the critics championed in 2015:

Furious 7 – RT 81%
Jurassic World – RT 72%
Star Wars: The Force Awakens – RT 92%
Avengers: Age of Ultron – RT 75%
Ant-Man - RT 80%

If there was truly an agenda amongst critics, I doubt they would have supported these pictures.

Whose expectations? The film's worldwide numbers are above $700 million, which both outgrosses MOS and more than accounts for the higher production cost of the movie. If WB (or anybody) "expected" a billion dollars, they were dreaming.

I didn't see a single professional analyst lowball BvS with a -$1 billion estimate. People like Kevin Smith, who predicted a $2 billion cume, were dreaming. The rest, who predicted a haul in excess of $1 billion, were simply making educated estimates based on the hype factor and comparative box office precedents. Just look how many films made over a billion last year alone:

•   Star Wars: The Force Awakens - $2.063 billion
•   Jurassic World - $1.670 billion
•   Avengers: Age of Ultron - $1.405 billion
•   Furious 7 - $1.516 billion
•   Minions -  $1.159 billion

And as BatmAngelus points out, the previous two Batman films both made over a billion. And they did it without the revenue boost from 3D ticket sales. BvS Superman had every advantage in its favour.

•   It had a simultaneous global release that gave the studio a head start on pirates.
•   It had the two most iconic superheroes of all time.
•   It had Wonder Woman making her big screen debut, plus Lex Luthor, Doomsday, the Flash, Aquaman and Cyborg to attract fans.
•   It had a review embargo that prevented the critics from impacting presales.
•   It had an Easter release date when lots of kids were off school.
•   It opened on a massive number of screens, including IMAX and 3D showings (which cost more than regular tickets).
•   It had a clear field at the box office, with absolutely zero competition whatsoever.

They couldn't have stacked the deck more in its favour. This movie should have breezed past a billion no problem. WB will try and put a positive spin on things in their press releases, but I guarantee they're racking their brains right now trying to figure out what went wrong.

The budget was $250 million, it will end up with 3-4 times that amount once it leaves theatres. Say what you like about the film itself but it was a worthwhile business investment. The billion dollars was a best case scenario, it is still very profitable

Unfortunately it's not that simple. Theatres keep their cut of the box office. Only part of it goes back to the studio. In North America, the studio cut can be as much as 55 cents on the dollar; though it decreases the longer the film's been in theatres (which is why studios favour frontloaded releases). Overseas revenue can return as little as 20 cents on the dollar. This is where the generalisation comes from that the studio keeps only 50% of the WW box office. WB spent around $400 million on BvS: $250 million production budget + $150 million print & advertising costs (both foreign and domestic). Which means it needs to make $800 million just to break even. According to the 50% rule, at least.

However this system of analysis is not terribly accurate. Another way of looking at it is that the studio gets about half of domestic revenue and about 1/3 of overseas. Which means BvS would have to make $400 million domestic and $600 million foreign to break even. This is why many analysts are saying it needs to gross a billion to get out of the red. But at the end of the day, this system is also imprecise. We armchair analysts will never truly know how much the studio makes.

What we do know is that Warner Bros is notoriously bad at accounting. The most famous example of this is Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, a film which grossed $939 million on a production budget of $150 million. And Warner Bros still ended up losing $167 million on the picture: http://deadline.com/2010/07/studio-shame-even-harry-potter-pic-loses-money-because-of-warner-bros-phony-baloney-accounting-51886/

Man of Steel is another film that didn't perform too well. Jeff Robinov famously predicted it would gross $1.3 billion prior to its release. It ended up making a little over half that amount. It's final WW box office sum brought in a negative return on investment, but luckily WB had already made over $160 million in pre-release promotional tie-ins. So what was Man of Steel's net profit at the end of the day? $42.7 million: http://deadline.com/2014/03/iron-man-3-gravity-man-of-steel-profit-most-profitable-movies-2013-701662/

To put that into perspective, Age of Ultron returned Marvel/Disney a net profit of $382 million: http://deadline.com/2016/03/avengers-age-of-ultron-profit-2015-box-office-marvel-universe-1201725562/

Even Ant-Man, a film which grossed $519 million WW on a budget of $130 million, yielded a net profit for Marvel/Disney of $103 million: http://deadline.com/2016/03/ant-man-profit-box-office-2015-marvel-paul-rudd-1201723544/

When a D-lister like Ant-Man makes over twice as much profit for the studio as an A-lister like Superman, then you know something has gone very, very wrong.

Ultimately box office success is determined by numbers, and numbers don't lie. Man of Steel underperformed and now Batman v Superman is underperforming too. Don't get me wrong, the kind of money they're bringing in would be excellent if we were talking about a lesser known character like Cyborg or Hawkman. But for Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman, and taking into account just how much WB has invested in this, the outlook isn't looking too good.

[The Laughing Fish]

Is it really dreaming though? The last two Batman movies scored over a billion.

Undeservedly so, unfortunately.    But that's beside the point.

I don't understand either why it would be unrealistic to expect a billion dollars from BvS, if a lot of other pop culture film could do it.

I confess that my knowledge when it comes to box office numbers is nearly non-existant, but this is what I don't get about the movie needing to earn $925 million to break even. I thought if it had a budget of $250 million, it would need to double the gross at the box office, i.e. around $500 million (assuming that my maths is even correct, which it likely isn't ). At the time of writing, Box Office Mojo says it has earned more than $720 million after thirteen days, so you think it would be a little safe by now.

But if it still isn't enough, is it because a large portion of the budget was spent on marketing expenses? I heard a rumour that the marketing department for The Amazing Spider-Man 2 had spent too much on merchandise, and that spending contributed to Sony feeling dissatisfied with the final box office revenue. Could it be a similar dilemma for BvS?

[Silver Nemesis]

It's often been observed that if Superman were to catch someone falling at high speed – as he's done many times in previous films and TV shows – he'd actually end up killing the person he's trying to save. I like the fact that when he catches Lois in BvS, he initially matches her rate of descent, then gradually slows to safely break her fall. It's the first time I've seen Superman catch someone like that in a movie or TV show.

[Silver Nemesis]

Simon & Garfunkel's 'Sound of Silence' has soared to 6th place on the Billboard Rock Top 10 chart thanks to the 'Sad Affleck' video going viral: http://www.cnet.com/news/sad-affleck-vid-sends-1966-simon-garfunkel-song-to-top-of-charts/

Here's a link to the Billboard chart: http://www.billboard.com/charts/rock-songs

When I posted the 'Sad Affleck' video a couple of weeks back, it'd only had around a thousand views. Now it's up to 22 million!

[Catwoman]

Whatever gets more peeps listening to Simon and Garfunkel is Kitty-approved.

[Catwoman]

Whatever gets more peeps listening to Simon and Garfunkel is Kitty-approved.

"I am a rock, I am an iiiiiiiiiiisland...."

[Catwoman]

Yes I know I'm not right in the head

[Silver Nemesis]

It seems Batman v Superman has been toppled from the number 1 spot at the US box office by The Boss. That's right, an R-rated Melissa McCarthy comedy produced on a budget of $29 million, with a Rotten Tomatoes score of 18% and a CinemaScore of C+, has overthrown Batman, Superman and Wonder on their third weekend. We all knew Jungle Book would dethrone BvS in its fourth week, but for this to happen on its third weekend is just embarrassing.

Now I wish the Ghostbusters remake was opening opposite Suicide Squad so SS could bury it at the box office.

On the subject of Batman v Superman's box office performance, it actually made less money on its third Friday than Tim Burton's Batman did back in 1989. And that's not adjusted for inflation.

[johnnygobbs]

It seems Batman v Superman has been toppled from the number 1 spot at the US box office by The Boss. That's right, an R-rated Melissa McCarthy comedy produced on a budget of $29 million, with a Rotten Tomatoes score of 18% and a CinemaScore of C+, has overthrown Batman, Superman and Wonder on their third weekend.

So the critics aren't to blame.

On the subject of Batman v Superman's box office performance, it actually made less money on its third Friday than Tim Burton's Batman did back in 1989. And that's not adjusted for inflation.

Clearly that film had 'legs' (presumably because of great word-of-mouth and repeat business).  Bear in mind Batman was released in the middle of a summer that featured hits such as Honey I Shrunk the Kids (which opened on the same weekend), Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, Ghostbusters 2, Lethal Weapon 2, The Abyss, When Harry Met Sally, Parenthood, Dead Poets Society, Uncle Buck and Do the Right Thing (as well as films that were expected to do well, but ultimately failed, like Star Trek V and The Karate Kid III).

[The Laughing Fish]

Meanwhile, Batman v Superman is failing to show it has legs at the box-office. Although it has passed $700 million globally, the second-weekend drop-off was at a substantial enough level for analysts to believe the overall gross could be $900 million, just short of the $925 million it needs to break even.

What's the worst case scenario if the film doesn't meet that break even point?

I'm coming back to this. I found another article published a day before the film was released that claimed it needs gross $800 million to break even. But at the same time, it claims there the budget spent an additional cost of $150 million on marketing.

Source: http://www.newsy.com/videos/batman-v-superman-needs-800m-to-break-even-but-reviews-are-rotten/

I'm finding this really confusing. Which break even estimate is the correct figure - $925 million or $800 million?