Comment by theshrike79
2 years ago
Mid-price movies are the ones that have mostly gone extinct.
We have the Disney-level Mega Movies with ONE BILLION DOLLAR budgets. These are the ones that are made by a committee of producers and executive producers and shareholders. They're too big to fail, so they'll be tested and re-tested and re-shot until they WILL make a profit. Currently they will also include a Chinese movie star and won't touch any subjects too sensitive for China, because multiple tens of percents of profit will be made in there.
Then we have the Blumhouse[0] type 5-20 million dollar movies. They give a hard budget limit and won't pay the actors much - they'll get a share of the profits instead. They're cheap enough to not bankrupt the production company if it flops, but will make immense profits if they succeed. The Company won't usually affect the production much, giving the director free reign to do what they want.
What's missing in today's world are the $10-$100M, movies. These have a big enough budget to not have to cut corners much, but still small enough to not draw the attention of The Executives who want their favourite things in the movie - letting the director enact their vision. The only mid-budget movie I can think of in the recent years is Michael Bay's Ambulance[1], shot with $40M.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blumhouse_Productions [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ambulance_(film)
Everything Everywhere All At Once, currently in theaters, had a $25 million budget, and has made a respectable $38 million in the theater so far, enough that some articles are calling it a box office hit.
Also in 2019 there was Knives Out, which had a budget of $40 million and made $311 million in the box office.
I agree with your overall point, just giving a couple more examples.
Until recently, Denis Villeneuve's movies were in this range as well:
* Prisoners: US$ 46M
* Sicario: US$ 30M
* Arrival: US$ 47M
See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denis_Villeneuve#Reception
His first three movies were <$7M. He went up market (>$160M) with BR2049 and Dune.
>What's missing in today's world are the $10-$100M, movies.
You're 70 years too late. Life magazine in 1957 talked about how one of the consequences of the Hollywood studio system (from both TV, and the 1948 Paramount antitrust case) was the death of the "million-dollar mediocrity" (<https://books.google.com/books?id=Nz8EAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA146>):
"It wasn't good entertainment and it wasn't art, and most of the movies produced had a uniform mediocrity, but they were also uniformly profitable ... The million-dollar mediocrity was the very backbone of Hollywood".
The "million-dollar mediocrity" died because the Paramount case forbade block booking, in which studios required that theaters purchase said mediocrities to also buy big films. Original TV movies appeared in the 1960s but their budgets and production values were too low to really fill the hole in Hollywood, but today's streaming companies' insatiable appetite for content has opened a new outlet for middle-tier films (and, more importantly, series).
Matt Damon agrees and gives some good insights about why the industry is moving in that direction. Short answer: because streaming replaced DVDs.
https://youtu.be/yaXma6K9mzo?t=837
Yes, DVDs were the second wind for many movies. Even if they failed in theatres they could be a hit on DVD.
I've got a ton of movies in my collection I would've never watched in a theatre setting, but have enjoyed on DVD multiple times.
LadyBird had a $10M budget, and is outstanding. (Not detracting to your point; an exception to the rule, and an example of movies we need more of)
The Northman is a 70M-90M budget movie. I guess that's how it got that kind of budget without ever having a chance at making back the money lol (it's just too weird).