Lost in all the fuss over Sandra Bullock cancelling her appearences in London and Berlin is that they were to promote the European release of “The Blind Side”, which has been out so long in the US it’s already on DVD. And it’s not the only film released in Europe long after its American release; I remember “Up!” being advertised in British magazines last fall even though it was released in May 2009 in the US. Why not just release films the same time around the world? Not only would it economize on promotion, but staggering release dates would seem to really encourage pirating between countries.
Non-universal release times are the exception, not the rule; most big-budget films are released simultaneously around the world, or at least within a couple of weeks.
I don’t know what the story is with “Up”, but “the Blind Side” is kind of obvious: as football (and baseball) films don’t sell outside of the U.S., they probably had no intention of releasing it in Europe at all, until Bullock won her Oscar and turned it into a prestige film.
If I had to guess, universal release times would require a lot more prints. With staggered release you can use the same prints in different markets.
I can’t imagine that this is any way true. For some mega-blockbusters I suppose, but most movies have staggered releases.
A big issue is cost. Releasing a movie isn’t as simple as just handing out copies. Prints of films are extremely expensive, something on the order of thousands of dollars for each print, and to release it in theaters all across the world would require printing a copy of the movie for every screen. That would get insanely expensive. Staggering releases allows studios to both reuse some prints cutting costs and it allows them to wait until a movie generates income before running a second printing. This means they have to borrow less money on the front end and are able to mitigate their financial risk. Secondarily it allows them to measure a movies box office response in one market first so they don’t lay out huge costs in other countries on a movie that bombs. A staggered release is simply practical.
In addition to the costs of film prints there’s the even greater cost of marketing a new release. This might not apply to every movie since some movies get very small marketing, but for the big studios who might not flinch at the cost of thousands of prints it’s critical. Marketing campaigns tend to operate in the tens of millions of dollars and it’s simply not practical in most cases to market a movie all across the globe at once. They wait for the same reasons noted above. They can reinvest the profits from the initial release to market in other locations as opposed to incurring risk. And they avoid marketing a turd that won’t recover it’s costs.
About 5 to 6 grand, or more, just for the print.
The Blind Side just would not have a huge appeal in most foreign markets. A lot of movies wouldn’t.
I imagine a film being a huge hit in the US may be a selling/marketing point in other areas.
Releasing a movie is not rocket science, it is harder than rocket science. Let’s say you have a movie that almost done. It’s a decent romantic comedy. What weekend of the year do you release it? When the other studios announce that they releasing a romantic comedy the weekend before you open yours, what do you do? When they announce that some huge ‘tentpole’ type release is going to open on you and you know that that film will get all the larger ‘houses’ in the theatres, what do you do then? Is your movie “counter programing” or is it going to be lost.
One thing that may have help up UP is the fact that it’s a 3D movie and those screens are limited. So you really have to have a time slot that is clear of other 3D films.