BIGGER, NOT BETTER
Hollywood blockbusters put squeeze on smaller, dialogue-driven movies
Size does matter in Hollywood movies these days. Apparently, bigger means better profits. But not necessarily better films.
The motivation is simple: Superhero flicks and action epics translate well in international markets.
And with the North American box office declining to near 20 per cent of the profit total for many of this year’s movies, expect more of the same in the future.
Take the Transformers franchise. Last summer’s Transformers: Age of Extinction earned $1.09 billion, 77.4 per cent of that total from foreign markets. In 2007, the first Transformers had scored $709.7 million, 55 per cent of it from international markets.
Dawn of the Planet of the Apes was considered a low-performing action flick in North America last summer but rallied internationally to take in $707.5 million, more than 70 per cent abroad.
What does that mean for moviegoers in Canada and the U.S.? Look for less talk and more action at mul- tiplexes. Moviegoers can anticipate a fifth Transformers, already in the planning stages, and yet another Apes picture.
It’s the new order — and Jon Favreau knows all about the dynamic. The former indie actor and filmmaker surprised many in the business when he successfully launched Iron Man and its sequel. But he had to struggle to find financial backing for last spring’s low-profile comedy Chef.
“I wanted to relive the experience when I started out where you can be funny and heartfelt in the same scene as long as you focus on a personal expression,” says Favreau, who made his movie debut with 1996’s Swingers.
Iron Man’s Robert Downey Jr. and Scarlett Johansson signed on to do cameos in Chef, which was eventually enough to get the film made. “It’s just the way it is,” Favreau says. “Studios aren’t that interested in backing smaller movies that have personalities.
“If you want to make those movies, you have to go the (film) festival route or take them to places like HBO.”
Zach Braff, from TV’s Scrubs, found a more encouraging studio climate back when he was developing Garden State in 2004.
For his comedy-drama Wish I Was Here, in theatres last summer, the actor, writer and director turned to the crowdfunding site Kickstarter.
“Almost from the beginning, I knew I would need the creative freedom because I liked the script too much to compromise,” Braff says, although he admits few studios seemed interested.
“Now (studios) tend to pick stars that have big foreign box office,” he says. “I don’t have any foreign box office.
“Films are financed on the scenario that a George Clooney movie will make x-amount of money in Germany. So in the studio algorithm they decide how much they will invest, and I am at zero.”
In fact, Braff is convinced that one of his favourite films, Terms of Endearment, likely wouldn’t get backed by a studio in today’s blockbuster climate.
Jane Fonda agrees. She co-stars in the fall comedy-drama This Is Where I Leave You, but is convinced studios would probably pass today on two films that earned her best-actress Oscars in the 1970s.
“Movies I used to make with studios, like Coming Home (and Klute), I could never make now — no way,” Fonda says.
TV has provided her a creative option. Fonda earned an Emmy nomination for her portrayal of media CEO Leona Lansing in Aaron Sorkin’s The Newsroom on HBO.
“Television is forgiving to older women and makes it possible to have long careers,” Fonda says. “It’s a smaller screen.”
Like Fonda, daughter of Henry Fonda, Michael Douglas is Tinseltown royalty. The son of legendary Kirk Douglas has carved out an illustrious history in medium-sized dialogue-driven movies that aren’t being made anymore — as producer (One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest) and actor (Fatal Attraction and Wall Street, among many).
But even Douglas has now succumbed to the superhero shift, starring in Ant-Man, which arrives in theatres next July.
“I realized I’ve done over 50 movies, and they are all contemporary for their time,” he says.
“I am actually excited about doing (Ant-Man) because it’s a Marvel Comics movie. And they already have a release date which is, in itself, amazing that they’ve carved it out.”
Angelina Jolie finds a way to work both sides of the fence in big and small productions.
Last spring, she starred as Maleficent in the epic fantasy and she is the director of the independently funded Unbroken, which will be released in December.
Her motto is more can-do than can’t, regardless of the current size-matters obstacles.
“We didn’t have that much money, and we didn’t have that much time,” Jolie says of Unbroken, a biopic of war hero and Olympic champion Louis Zamperini. “It’s a new scare.”
Clooney seems to have navigated around the bigger-is-better formula, earning acclaim and a lucrative bank account in the process.
If a film is a personal production, he makes money only if the film does. If he’s involved in a studio deal, he adjusts accordingly in a reasonable way.
“If the movie makes money, I make money,” he says of his pet projects. “If I don’t, I’ve still made the movie I wanted to make.”