"Films with female leads just don´t make money"

[Eliseu Gouveia]

Yeah

Twilight New Moon smashes opening day box office record

Simon Brew

We knew it was going to be big - but Twilight New Moon has notched up staggering opening day numbers...

Published on Nov 21, 2009

Given the hype, the build-up, the Robert Pattinson fever and the general feeling that the world of Twilight was one that was attracting a fair bit of interest, we still didn't expect a number like this.

For the opening day take of Twilight: New Moon has shattered single day opening records, leaving films such as The Dark Knight in its wake.

Are you sat down? Twilight New Moon's opening day take in the US alone is $72.7m. That's over $5m more than the previous record holder, The Dark Knight, which was also playing on more screens. Furthermore, the opening day record has traditionally gone to a summer blockbuster, rather than a November release.

New Moon has also doubled the original Twilight's take in the same space of time, and for sake of comparison, its opening day take was $10m more than that for Transformers 2,
$13m more than Spider-Man 3 and $22m more than Star Wars Episode III: Revenge Of The Sith. Harry Potter has also had his ass spanked.

Where this leaves the full weekend gross in the US is unclear, but don't rule off something around the $170m mark. Ron will have the full box office report, as well as his take on Twilight: New Moon, on Monday.

As much as I don´t really care for Twilight saga... like, at all! .................good!

[jamesfreeman]

Was there ever any doubt that romance films make money?

[kid_mash]

Aren't werewolf pectorals the lead in that movie.

[diana_fan]

I don't understand this thread. Other than a movie about vampires, werewolves, and teen angsty romance, that's a runaway hit as a book series did well.

Am I missing something?

[Red Jack]

yes, a movie exec (can't remeber which one) announced that his studio would no longer be making action films with female leads because "nobody wants to see that" and "they don't make money."

As is usual with these things, he was dead wrong.

[dumbstruck]

At the end of the day, this film was made for teenage girls and women who still think they're teenage girls. The success story here is the marketing. This film was marketed to it's core audience, and they came out. As much as I would scratch my own eyes out if I was made to see this movie, good on the studio's marketing machine.

[diana_fan]

Originally Posted by Red Jack

yes, a movie exec (can't remeber which one) announced that his studio would no longer be making action films with female leads because "nobody wants to see that" and "they don't make money."

As is usual with these things, he was dead wrong.

Was he talking about stuff like Ultraviolet, Resident Evil, the Beckinsale oeuvre?

Because if he was, he's right: no one wants to see that.*






* Though I do admit to enjoying a couple fo the RE flicks, but I really loved the game. And Milla Jovovich and Michelle Rodriguez are freakin' hilarious on the RE 1 commentary. It's it worth it for the commentary alone.

Or maybe I was just drunk.

[sweetdreams]

Originally Posted by kid_mash

Aren't werewolf pectorals the lead in that movie.

Yeah, I think the two male leads made the bank on that one.
But, Aliens, Underworld, Resident Evil or Titanic disprove the theory mentioned I think.

[diana_fan]

Originally Posted by sweetdreams

Yeah, I think the two male leads made the bank on that one.
But, Aliens, Underworld, Resident Evil or Titanic disprove the theory mentioned I think.

-- The Underworld franchise has been a mixed bag. Though it's generally done fairly well.

-- Resident Evil barely made back it's production budget. When you add in the (usually assumed) 20% for marketing, it was a wash.

-- Aliens is an outlier, considering everything going on there. And it was 20+ years ago.

-- Titanic was not a "Film with a female lead" so much as it was a "Film with a female and a male lead, and big honking ship."

[MacQuarrie]

Originally Posted by diana_fan

Was he talking about stuff like Ultraviolet, Resident Evil, the Beckinsale oeuvre?

Because if he was, he's right: no one wants to see that.*






* Though I do admit to enjoying a couple fo the RE flicks, but I really loved the game. And Milla Jovovich and Michelle Rodriguez are freakin' hilarious on the RE 1 commentary. It's it worth it for the commentary alone.

Or maybe I was just drunk.

He was talking about movies starring Sandra Bullock, Jodie Foster, etc.

[Calvin Government]

Originally Posted by Eliseu Gouveia

Yeah



As much as I don´t really care for Twilight saga... like, at all! .................good!

Err... first, this isn't exactly a 'Kristen Stewart' film. These girls aren't going to see Stewart - they're going to see Pattinson and that 10 year old werewolf kid who never wears a shirt.

Second, if I recall the original quote, it was in reference to female led action films. Which, to be entirely honest, IS a subset of movies that has historically failed. General consensus is that the only female lead that generally pulls as much weight as an action film requires is Angelina Jolie - so SALT is a pretty huge step for the action genre, if it works.

(the role was originally given to Cruise, but when he backed out, they rewrote a bit of it, changed the MC to female, and cast Jolie)

[diana_fan]

Originally Posted by MacQuarrie

He was talking about movies starring Sandra Bullock, Jodie Foster, etc.

Ahh, ok.

Don't know about Foster, since I can barely think of anything she's been in since Panic Room (which, for a Fincher flick, was pretty damn weak).

Bullock has certainly been in some successful films (Speed, anyone?), but I wouldn't call her the lead in any/most of them.

[Evan Waters]

I'm glad this movie series is succeeding, solely because I desperately want to see how they handle BREAKING DAWN.

[Sean Walsh]

So wait, are the men in the new Twilight movie so emo that they're considered women now?

I reckon this quote, though, means more in regards to films like Elektra, Catwoman, Aeon Flux, Ultraviolent and (albeit it's a stretch, because they were rather successful) the Resident Evil flicks.

And I think the dumber exec quote is "I don't want Galactus in this movie, people don't want to basically see a giant robot in a movie" (said by the producer of FF 2: Silver Surfer the same year a movie called Transformers also came out)

[titanfan]

Bullock has certainly been in some successful films (Speed, anyone?), but I wouldn't call her the lead in any/most of them.

The Net. She was definitely the lead in that and it was a hit...