No matter how bad AOTC is, it will make more money than either HARRY POTTER or LORD OF THE RINGS. You guys are underestimating the fanaticism of the Lucasoids, who will see the film over and over again–maybe even buy tickets for screenings they don’t attend–just to boost the box office of their false idol’s latest cinematic mess–no matter how godawful it is.
Yes, the dreck that was PHANTOM MENACE has hurt the franchise, but that just gives the faithful more reason to see CLONES twenty times–trying to convince themselves that it’s a return to form for George Lucas.
HARRY POTTER may have a big fan base, but Mom and Dad are not going to see it multiple times just to show their allegiance to the franchise. It’s just not going to have that kind of repeat business.
LORD OF THE RINGS will probably be the best film of the three, and hopefully it will do well. But the film will really have to click with audiences for it to compete at the box office with POTTER and CLONES.
Here’s the latest from the AP: Potter grossed $93.5 million in its first three days, beating the previous record holder “The Lost World: Jurassic Park.” “Potter” already set the best debut take ever.
It’s well on the way to hitting the $100 million mark the fastest, doing in four days what “Phantom Menace” did in five.
It’s also on one in four screens in the country, another record.
That’s where the bar is set.
So, word of mouth will be critical to the success of AOTC. The fans will go to it in droves, but those who felt burned by PM will wait until at least some of the reviews are in. If the word goes out that it’s as bad at PM, that’s it. It still will take in a lot of money, but it’s won’t set a record, and that seems to be the basis of this thread.
Admittedly, given how much PM was razzed, it’s a pretty low bar for AOTC to leap over, but we’re talking about the man who’s responsible for both PM and the Star Wars Christmas Special. Anything is possible.
I am waiting for a Star Wars fan to show up and tell us that Harry Potter’s grosses were simply the result of people eager to see the new AOTC trailer.
I ertainly don’t believe that people will buy extra tickets to prove George Lucas is a God. Why didn’t they buy extra tickets at The Phantom Menace so it would beat Titanic?
“The Phantom Menace” was a huge box office success but I fully expect “Harry Potter” will do better than it did. Why would Episode II do better than Episode I, exspecially after Episode I was such a poor movie?
Of course, I am certain you’re half right in that many will rise to the defense of George Lucas, who evidently ran out of ideas in 1980. I like Star Wars too, but if there’s anything more irritating that the Microsoft/Linux/Mac Holy Wars, it’s the Star Wars/Star Trek/All Else holy wars, in this case starring a lot of guys my age with beer guts who blather about the Star Wars “canon” and whether Shadows of the Empire was canon or how a Star Destroyer is cooler than the USS Enterprise and come up with tortured rationalizations for the various throwaway lines in Star Wars - which, of course, they all call “A New Hope.” Just ask them about doing the Kessel Run in twelve parsecs and watch their brains overheat trying to jibe that with something they read in the instruction manual to “X-Wing Alliance.” Shut UP already.
“Star Wars” was a great movie. “The Empire Strikes Back” was great, too. And “Tie Fighter” was a great video game. Can’t we leave it at that?
NOTE: Saw “Potter” today. Very good, but a good director would have made it better; Columbus is, to put it bluntly, inept. The acting was better than I’d expected.
I enjoyed HP, but I can’t see a lot of broad appeal. It really is a kids movie. I can see that it will do very well at the box office because it is a lot of fun. Yes, it is long, but I didn’t notice my butt getting sore or thinking that it was long.
LOTR is going to be three movies. I don’t know if we are going to be able to get non fanatics to sit through three of them. I saw the trailer while at HP, and this was the first non-internet trailer I saw for it. It looked like fun. (I hear they are cutting out Tom Bombadil)
But my money is on ATOC (does the clone title mean they will clone Darth Maul?). Everyone who is seeing HP or LOTR is already a Star Wars ticket sold, but not necessarily vice versa.
Anyway. I don’t know if LotR will make as much money as HP and AotC, but I think it will be the best of the three (and I thought HP was terrific). Anyway, I don’t care about the whole competition angle – I hope Harry and LotR both make piles and piles of money. (I don’t care if AotC does, though I do plan on seeing it. I’m sure, though, I’ll see LotR over and over, 'cause I’m a jumped-up fangirl… ;))
I do think, though, that you guys underestimate the fan base for LotR.
“Everyone who is seeing HP or LOTR is already a Star Wars ticket sold, but not necessarily vice versa”
I dunno. I don’t see a lot of tweenage girls and thirty-something women lining up for AOTC, romantic plotline or no. I do see them lining up for Harry Potter. (In fact I saw 'em just yesterday when I went to see THE HEIST. I haven’t seen lines that long since Star Wars. And I’m talking Return of the Jedi, not Episode I. )
They tried. They just couldn’t do it. PHANTOM MENACE just sucked too bad to draw in enough non-fans to surpass TITANIC.
**
I don’t think HARRY will surpass PM. It might happen, but I doubt it. The film just isn’t that exciting. Once you’ve seen it, there’s not reason to go back. Yes, it will break opening weekend records, but it won’t have the kind of legs to surpass PM.
**]
Yes, the first two STAR WARS films are good, but the steep decline of the second two has not dimmed the fanaticism of the faithful, who are already busy trying to convince us that AOTC will redeem the franchise with its greatness.
Having seen the trailer, I think it looks like a bad Harlequin Romance. Dreadful.
**
Well, it was watchable but hardly magical or amazing – definitely not the “WIZARD OF OZ for this generation.” Like a lot of overly faithful adaptations, it plodded on from scene to scene, trying to squeeze everything (or as much as possible in) without justifying the scenes in the context of the film. It’s just “this happens; then this happens, and then this happens…” for two and a half hours.
All the cost quotes I’ve seen (from 270M$ to 600M$) have combined the cost of filming the whole trilogy. That being the case, one would hope the box office take for the 3 movies combined would be higher than HP or AOTC
(not a serious proposal)
But it does make trying to decide when FOTR is “profitable” and “successful” a murkier calculation.
I will make this prediction: AOTC if it is even 5% better than TPM will be highest grossing independant film ever (at least until ep 3)
Brian
Yes, episode one, two, and three are independant films.
20th Century Fox distributes them because Lucas made them a deal. He said that they could get 1% of the profits for distributing them for him, which is less than usual. Then again, they figured that it’d be great to have their name on the screen every time the biggest movies around play, so they took it.
Lucas pays for everything right out of his own pocket. The fist one cost $115 million, the second is costing about $100 million.
By the way, Attack of the Clones is a good movie. Trust me. I’m ressurecting this thread after it comes out.
Since Empire Strikes Back made less than Star Wars, since AOTC does not have a decade plus of pent-up fanboy longing behind it like Episode 1 did, and since Episode 1, ummm, failed to build the fan base (to put it politely), I predict that AOTC will earn less than Episode 1, not more.
Even if it’s a good movie. (Again, see Empire Strikes back vs. Star Wars.)
–All three LOTR books have been shot. One economic reason given was that the folks in the film will be bigger stars after the release of #1 (Fellowship of The Ring) and would demand higher paychecks to do the sequels.
This also shows the optimism of New Line Cinema that the films will be wonderfully successful.
Remember that Potter is to be seven books. Therefore he ideally will be seven films (and maybe a theme park).
How do you know? Have you seen it? Read the screenplay? I still think LoTR is going to be a huge sleeper hit and you guys shouldn’t rule it out so easily.
By the way, I saw Harry Potter the other night. It was good but it left me wanting to see LotR and AoTC even more, I think they will both be better movies whether they gross more or not.
So here’s my final summation:
Potter was good, but I don’t think all that many people will be back for two and a half hours more of it, so it’s going to need some good word of mouth to hang in there for the long haul.
AoTC already has a huge number of people that are GOING to see it, it just needs to be good enough for them to go back a few times and it can do great.
LotR is going to be an awesome movie. I can feel it. I’ve seen the trailers, I’ve seen interviews with the actors and directors, I just know it’s going to be a great movie, and that’s what it really comes down to. I’ll say it again: don’t rule this film out. It could easily beat the other two.
Reading this thread, I see a lot of people have a lot to learn about how the tweens set goes to the movies.
Listen up folks: the kids are going to see Harry Potter on their own; they don’t need their parents to sit through the film with them more than once.
LOTR will bring in the massive, world-wide audience for each film a couple times (or are you all thinking just of the so-called ‘domestic’ profits, which is kinda senseless seeing as how not one scene of any of these films was actually filmed in the good ol’ US of A?). I mean, people get arrested in Russia for dressing up as hobbits!
Clones has a massive hurdle to overcome: Phantom sucked, and turned off many fans who were chafing at the bit, let alone the mildly interested.
My predictions: Harry’s already demonstrated it’s first-weekend receipts have stomped over everything in history. LOTR will do pretty good in the first weekend, but Clones will not do anywhere near as well.
Long-term: Harry harry harry, then Lord, then Clones.
But everything’s gonna be hyped beyond all rationality, so lots of us will just wait until it comes out on video.
I completely agree with Barbarian. I would love to see AOTC or FOTR do better than Harry Potter (no ill will - I really want to see the movie), but right now I really think that Harry Potter has a bigger fan base.
WHAT?!?
Look, there have been so many Harry Potter books printed and sold across the world it’s ridiculous. It has huge word of mouth, that spreads across nearly every demographic (except possibly fundamentalists). People of all ages love Harry. People of all ages HATE Jar Jar. People of all ages have lost confidence in Lucas. People of all ages can’t sleep at night as they await Harry Potter V.
If you went to Toys 'R Us with 100 children, which shelves are going to sell out the quickest - the Harry Potter shelf, the Star Wars shelf, or the LOTR shelf? The answer is SIMPLE - the Harry Potter shelf. Why? The kids know the story. Ask 100 average 10 year olds what house Harry is in (Griffendor). Then ask those 10 year olds who Luke Skywalker’s father is (Darth Vader). Don’t be surprised when you get more Harry Potter answers correct.
Face it - both LOTR Star Wars’ fan base are a lot older on average than Harry Potter. These people aren’t the types to repeatedly go and see these movies over and over. Plus, once these people see all three movies (which they will), they’re not going to come back. The repeat business always has been and always will be kids. And the kids are going to repeatedly see Harry Potter.
Happr Potter, hands down. I’m a teenager. I’ve already seen it and want to go again. I’m prolly going again this weekend. ALL of my friends have gone, and are planning to come with me again.
I’m also a Star Wars fan, but Ep 1 dissapointed me greatly, and I’m not really looking forward to the second.
I loved LOTR and I will see it more than once, if it ends up being good. But, I really, really doubt it’s going to come close to matching either of the above mentioned movies.
[QUOTELotR is going to be an awesome movie. I can feel it. I’ve seen the trailers, I’ve seen interviews with the actors and directors, I just know it’s going to be a great movie, and that’s what it really comes down to. I’ll say it again: don’t rule this film out. It could easily beat the other two. **[/QUOTE]
Wow! I hope LOTR is great also, but I would be wary of ex ante making it into something it may not be able to live up to.
