comment #1

thatrader says ...

"Against All Enemies" starring Sean Penn as Dick Clarke would've been a failure. With Tom Hanks, as you suggested, it would be a lot less polarizing.

Any period epic starring James Franco is box office poison: see "Flyboys," "Great Raid," "Tristan and Isolde."

comment #2

sunny says ...

Peter Bart recently participated in a doc. in which the whole premise was that you can never tell which movie will be a hit.

comment #3

zoey says ...

I would think just about any movie where the script is not finished on the first day of shooting and is being re-written in between takes.

comment #4

Craig Kennedy says ...

It's easy to say Pirates was destined to be a blockbuster long after it's established fact, but it in no way proves "the fate of most movies is decided by the first day of principal photography." That's a retarded statement and it is in no way supported by the rest of the article. There are no preordained successes.

comment #5

Larry says ...

Like Casablanca, zoey?

Anyway, regardless of how much money they made, Superman Returns was doomed once they decided it should start after everything interesting had already happened.

comment #6

Mark G. says ...

A movie has to strike a chord at the right time. Plenty of blockbusters wouldn't do the same amount of money released just ten, five or two years later...

If STAR WARS would be released today for the first time, would it become the biggest movie of all time in today's environment?

If TITANIC would be released today, would that movie become the biggest movie of all time nowadays?

Would ACE VENTURA jumpstart the career of Jim Carrey today in the same way as it did twelve years ago?

Add your own question...

comment #7

TKC says ...

This is typical Monday-morning quarterbacking on Bart's part -- whenever big news happens in Hollywood, he'll sigh and say that he saw it coming. (You'll notice the piece contains no predictions of what's *going* to happen, only descriptions of what *already* has happened.)

What I'd be interested in reading: A list, written by Bart, of which movies currently in production are going to work, and which are going to tank. We can come back in a year and see if he was right or not.

comment #8

Mark says ...

I hope i'm wrong, but I don't see how a movie like Zodiac can take off. 70's serial killer flick, with a downer ending, and no draws besides Fincher whose movies are more of the DVD type of draw anyway.

Plus the Robert Downey Jr. poison factor; the guy hasn't been in a $70 million movie since Back to School.

comment #9

nemo says ...

Maybe Zodiac will be Robert Downey Jr.'s Johnny Depp moment.

comment #10

sunny says ...

http://www.hbo.com/docs/programs/boffo/interview.html

Peter Bart: I think BOFFO! is both an homage to filmmakers and to filmmaking. But it also shows the agonies of the process. That when you're making a picture, you don't know what you've got, whether you've captured lighting in a bottle, or as Sydney Pollack says, something that somehow seems better than it was going in. You don't know
whether you have that or whether you have something that doesn't work at all and will embarrass you rather than make you proud. And I think that's something Bill has captured brilliantly. You just don't see that point of view in a typical movie about movie-making. They tend to be puff pieces about how brilliant everyone is. And indeed sometimes they are brilliant. But sometimes brilliant people can make terrible movies.
**************

heh.

comment #11

fnt says ...

DALLAS remake -- a total bomb that will be a WTF upon release by everyone everywhere.

comment #12

Bob Loblaw says ...

Re: Downey -- what are y'all thinking about Iron Man?

comment #13

VanDyck says ...

Re:Iron Man

Personally, I think the casting choice is genius. I'm not too sold on the director, but if its done right it could carry the kind of emotional gravitas Batman Begins had, as well as being a film about a person-not special effects.

Comic book fans know and love these characters because they have gone through the ups and downs with them, and if they pull this off it will do huge numbers.

comment #14

Nate West says ...

Bart seems to be saying that some films are so irresistible as "concept + cast" that it doesn't matter how they're actually executed (i.e., "sloppy storytelling").

So, for example, we know that "The Queen" (concept) starring Helen Mirren (cast) will do relatively well.

"The Good Shepard" (murky concept) with Damon and Jolie (wrong cast) will not.

"Venus" with Peter O'Toole will do well. "Zodiac" with Robert Downey, Jr. will not.

"Dreamgirls" with Beyonce Knowles et al. will do well. "The History Boys" will not.

"Flags of Our Fathers" will do well. "Letters from Iwo Jima" will not.

"Babel" with Brad Pitt will do relatively well. "Children of Men" with Clive Owen will not.

"The Pursuit of Happyness" with Will Smith will do well. "Breaking and Entering" with Jude Law will not.

"Volver" with Penelope Cruz will do well. "Fur" with Nicole Kidman will not.

"Iron Man" with Robert Downey Jr. will NOT do well. But "Plastic Man" with Robert Downey Jr. would be a blockbuster.

Downey IS Plastic Man.

comment #15

DarthCorleone says ...

I'm sorry, but Peter Bart's statement is nothing more than arbitrary tautology. It equates to: most of the time something was successful because it was successful, and most of the time something was a failure because it was a failure. The proposed exercise of predicting doom or victory for upcoming projects is fun, but there's nothing profound in what spurred it.

comment #16

Nate West says ...

Oh, it's quite profound. You missed it. You will not do well.

comment #17

christian says ...

i did actually get chills when i heard downey jr will be tony stark. i think a suave guy like clooney would have been absolutely perfect, but downey is an inspired choice on the level of alfred molina as doc ock...

comment #18

Cadavra says ...

HAIRSPRAY was dead the moment they cast Travolta.

comment #19

d manhattan says ...

Please try to read with a little appreciation for subtlety and nuances. Bart is only saying that once principal photography begins, all the set pieces are there and the fate sealed. Pirates was just one example.

"Bart seems to be saying that some films are so irresistible as "concept + cast" that it doesn't matter how they're actually executed (i.e., "sloppy storytelling")."

"Sloppy storytelling" was one line in the whole column. But the case you are making for concept+cast is pretty good.

Hmm.. On second thought, maybe Bart is talking about execution being drastically overvalued and getting to much focus (when measuring commercial success). I sure believe it is, compared to concept and cast.