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JOHN CARTER (OF MARS!) |OT| (dir. Andrew Stanton)

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Gemüsepizza;38215115 said:
Did it bomb? I know there were lots of media reports claiming Disney lost $200 million with "John Carter", but if I look at the numbers, that does not seem to be true:

http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=johncarterofmars.htm

Budget: $250 million

Box office: $272,825,619

...and that is apparently without DVD / Blu-ray sales.

LOL. Firstly, the production budget was at least $300m, not the reported $200m. Secondly, that doesn't even factor in more than $150m in marketing.

John Carter bombed hard.
 

Loofy

Member
Gemüsepizza;38215115 said:
Did it bomb? I know there were lots of media reports claiming Disney lost $200 million with "John Carter", but if I look at the numbers, this does not seem to be true:
http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=johncarterofmars.htm
Studios dont keep all of the box office, theaters get a cut too. And I think hollywood gets even less when it comes to overseas revenue.
Then theres marketing which I think was $100 million.
 
Gemüsepizza;38215115 said:
Did it bomb? I know there were lots of media reports claiming Disney lost $200 million with "John Carter", but if I look at the numbers, this does not seem to be true:

http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=johncarterofmars.htm

Budget: $250 million

Box office: $272,825,619

...and that is apparently without DVD / Blu-ray sales.

The studio doesn't get the whole boxoffice money though, they have to split it with theater owners. We also don't know if the reported budget includes marketing costs (probably not). It's hard to tell with studios being secretive about the real numbers, but a generally held belief is that films have to earn roughly double the amount of their production budgets to make them profitable. I'm sure someone else will be able to elaborate on this.

Edit: Beaten.
 
Despite what some people might have said I really did enjoy this one. They could have done somewhat of a better job on explaining what the whole 'copy' thing was and how it actually worked. Despite that I thought the overall presentation was well done and not once did I had this entire Disney feeling. It actually felt a little too mature for Disney's tastes which caught me by surprise.
 
Why? It's a commonly held opinion.

Every one of my adventure genre loving friends/acquaintances loves this film. Every last one.
Hahahaha, oh your adventure genre loving friends love it. Okay. I guess that makes it a "commonly held opinion."

Let's remove your adventure genre loving acquaintances from the equation - just for now - and look at every film review site on the internet:

Rotten Tomatoes
Nemo: 98% fresh
Carter: 52% rotten
Nemo: 8.5 (average rating)
Carter: 5.7 (average rating)

Metascore
Nemo: 87
Carter: 51
Nemo: 8.6 (user score)
Carter: 7.2 (user score)

IMDB
Nemo: 81
Carter: 69

Box Office Gross
Nemo: $867,000,000
Carter: $272,000,000

Okay, now let's put them back into the equation.

krypt0nian's adventure genre loving friends/acquaintances:
Nemo: (unknown)
Carter: they liked it

Now that I look at that list again, you may be right!
 
Hahahaha, oh your adventure genre loving friends love it. Okay. I guess that makes it a "commonly held opinion."

Let's remove your adventure genre loving acquaintances from the equation - just for now - and look at every film review site on the internet:

Rotten Tomatoes
Nemo: 98% fresh
Carter: 52% rotten
Nemo: 8.5 (average rating)
Carter: 5.7 (average rating)

Metascore
Nemo: 87
Carter: 51
Nemo: 8.6 (user score)
Carter: 7.2 (user score)

IMDB
Nemo: 81
Carter: 69

Box Office Gross
Nemo: $867,000,000
Carter: $272,000,000

Okay, now let's put them back into the equation.

krypt0nian's adventure genre loving friends/acquaintances:
Nemo: (unknown)
Carter: they liked it

Now that I look at that list again, you may be right!

Speed Racer

Rotten Tomatoes
38%

Metacritic
37

IMDB
6.1

Those are worse scores and a bigger bomb than Carter.

Yet Speed Racer is a gem and your argument is invalid.
 

Router

Hopsiah the Kanga-Jew
Finally watched this last night. I didn't think it was as bad as most people made it out to be. It was pretty bland and lacked any real drive IMO. The effects were good.
 
So fucking what? I know the people that tell me they love it and trust their opinion.
Why on earth would your friend's opinions matter more or less than Scullibundo's or anyone anyone on IMDB or anything? Who cares about your friends? This is all getting away from the point people should be taking away from all this:

John Carter was a disappointment.
 

Loofy

Member
Finally watched this last night. I didn't think it was as bad as most people made it out to be. It was pretty bland and lacked any real drive IMO. The effects were good.
2 things wrong with the movie.

1. John fell in love with the princess within a day, after she lied to him twice and was basically just using him.
2. Red vs Blue. So why were the red guys bad?? oh I get it..
Red = People using gas destroying the earth. Blue = Environmentalists who want clean energy.
I think Disney thought they could pull an Avatar by making another treehugging propaganda movie.

I thought the movie was still ok though. And taylor kitsch is actually pretty good.
 
Why on earth would your friend's opinions matter more or less than Scullibundo's or anyone anyone on IMDB or anything? Who cares about your friends? This is all getting away from the point people should be taking away from all this:

John Carter was a disappointment.

They matter more because they are my friends. Get some and see how that works, sunshine.

John Catrter was a fine example of an adventure film. That it made no money matters not to me, as you've proven in years of posts that most people have terrible taste.

Then you post metacritic scores as if they should hold more meaning to me than my opinion or that of valued friends. You're the one that tried to laugh Sculli out of the thread like an ass.


I don't agree. What is your friends opinion about this?

They don't think you're worth dating either. So you're out of luck all around.
But anyone who hates Speed Racer already knows that.
 
They matter more because they are my friends. Get some and see how that works, sunshine.

John Catrter was a fine example of an adventure film. That it made no money matters not to me, as you've proven in years of posts that most people have terrible taste.

Then you post metacritic scores as if they should hold more meaning to me than my opinion or that of valued friends. You're the one that tried to laugh Sculli out of the thread like an ass.
Wow, you are really taking this personally. Cheer up, I'm sure the sequel will fix the original's shortcomings ;)

In the future I will photoshop my impressions onto T-shirts for Mike Works and have directors wear them in public.
Sculli, you know more about films than most people on these forums, but you have the most baffling of opinions sometimes.
 
Wow, you are really taking this personally. Cheer up, I'm sure the sequel will fix the original's shortcomings ;)


Sculli, you know more about films than most people on these forums, but you have the most baffling of opinions sometimes.

You made it personal when you acted like an ass at the top of the page.

Nothing needs to be fixed in JC. They put out a film with all the right pieces, and the movie going public failed it.

Sculli knows great films. He doesn't let metacritics decide, but rather his innate sense of great film. I don't always agree with him, but I know it is heartfelt. That's why I'm defending him from pests like you.
 
Wow, you are really taking this personally. Cheer up, I'm sure the sequel will fix the original's shortcomings ;)


Sculli, you know more about films than most people on these forums, but you have the most baffling of opinions sometimes.

I'm just very open to all types of films. I didn't connect with Nemo because I didn't care for any of the characters. I think it is a beautiful looking movie, but ultimately not something I can rewatch.

John Carter was funny, heart-felt and contained the sort of big pulpy sci-fi that has been missing from the movies for a long, long time. The part where Carter leads the army to the wrong city and gets slapped across the back of the head still has me laughing my ass off.

I don't pretend the film doesn't have its flaws, but what it does right hits the sweet spots for me in all the right ways. I can't wait to see it again.

Edit: And I don't need defending. This thread just got way too serious. Zodangans up in this bitch.
 
alienwhut.gif
 

Fusebox

Banned
I watched this yesterday, I'm a big fan of the books, they're great fun in a kitschy way, but this movie seriously blows. It was such a wreck, very disappointing stuff.
 

dantares

Member



I can kind of understand why. Watching the Avengers in a jam-packed theatre with your buddies is really a thrill ride., but in a few years you're just going to remember it as a solid action film. If they don't make another Avengers I would honestly be ok with that.

John carter left a different impression on me.The characters have personality, the plot was good and the visuals were awe-inspiring. just an unforgettable experience. When I left the theatre after John Carter I wanted to go back to Barsoom already. It's the kind of movie that just grows on you for weeks even after you leave the theatre

Don't get me wrong the Avengers had incredible character interaction but it just wasn't as emotionally impactful as John carter was. I didn't feel for one second the fear that the odds were stacked against our heroes or the eartth was in imminent danger. and when Iron man did his sacrifice play I didn't feel one ounce of the emotion that i felt when Carter sends Dejah and Sola away and takes on the army of green martians. When John carter had the chance to leave Barsoom and go back to earth and reap the rewards from his newfound cave of gold, he chose to stay. choosing to love dejah and fight for a cause with the odds insurmountably against them over wealth. that kind of reminded me of Han Solo from Star War.
 
I'm watching Avatar on TV and then a commercial for the DVD/Bluray relase of this comes on.
3 months? Isn't that really short to be on DVD already?
 
I'll also chime in on JC being better than The Avengers, and I had such a great time with The Avengers that I saw it twice. Dat Giacchino score.

(I miss the woola in your avatar, sculli.)
 

Angry Fork

Member
I know I'm late but I just saw this. I hated the trailers, I thought it looked stupid, it seemed to try too hard to appear epic and copy off Avatar in terms of scope and so on.

But I have to say I really enjoyed it. There were some amazing scenes. I smiled wide in the beginning when he breaks out on the horse and they're all on horseback chasing Carter. The music was so good. I REALLY loved the bits that show Carter's past, and when he fights to defend the girl and it goes back and forth from the battle to the burying of his wife. Very nice. Loved the ending as well.

The main drawbacks imo are the aliens/villains/ships felt uninspired. That stuff is definitely all 'meh' in terms of design. But man gaf really shitted on this when it came out, people saying it was a terrible movie, deserved to bomb, one of the worst movies ever etc. Completely dead wrong imo I know gaf likes to have fun with hyperbole but I feel bad that this bombed. I would definitely see a sequel if one is made.
 
Saw it and I thought it was pretty mediocre. I hated Kitsch and Collins (that fucking accent), but the majority of my problems fall under two categories:

1) Bad Design

I hated the visual design of this movie. Everything about the red martians; their technology, armor, city, ect. looked unremarkable and utterly forgettable. It had a very generic look. The Tharks also had a shitty cartoonish design that really failed to convey any sense of menace. I'm not a big fan of Woola either. I understand that he was charming, but he was also hideous and his super-speed gag pulled me out of the movie every time they did it. It felt like the Road Runner was making a cameo. Overall, I just felt like there were a lot of really bad decisions made concerning the look of this movie. I think a lot of that came through in the marketing as well, which helped warn audiences away.

2) Needless Complexity

You know you're in trouble when your movie has three opening scenes. The first opening is the kind you'd expect for a movie like this; a shot of Mars followed by a sci-fi battle with narration setting up the world. The battle itself failed to be engaging or make me interested in any of the characters, but I thought it worked fine. Then we got a second opener with John Carter's nephew to set up the mystery of John Carter's disappearance. This felt like a totally unnecessary distraction, and I don't know why they felt the need to pile this plot line on top of everything else in this space opera. Finally, we get an opening sequence on the American frontier that actually introduces the protagonist, makes us sympathetic to him, and entertains us along the way. It would have made more sense to open with the Mars battle and then jump straight to this bit. The storyline with the crypt and the nephew was needlessly distracting.

After all that, we get introduced to Tharks, Heliumites, Zandaks, Jedaks, and god knows what else. I don't mind having to deal with a little sci-fi jargon, but this movie makes no attempt to clarify all the bullshit terminology or relate it to things the audience understands. Did the kings on mars really need to be called 'Jedaks'? At the very least, couldn't they be called Jedak kings, or Jedak lords? Star Wars did this with the Jedi Knights, tying a new concept (jedi) to something we are familiar with (medieval knights) so that we won't be completely lost. Apparently, this never occurred to Stanton.

Built on top of this unsteady foundation of multiple setups and nonsense terminology, we get a war between two cities inhabited by red martians who look human, immortal instigators with lightning/teleportation/shapeshifting amulets, and green aliens who are apparently allied to none of the above. That's four independent factions plus John Carter who serves as the outsider that manages to throw everything off balance. And just to make it even more confusing, the two warring armies are only distinguished by the color of their flags. This is another shitty design decision, but it makes the plot harder to follow. Why the fuck didn't they have noticeably different armor?

In spite of all this, I thought the action was pretty well directed and I thought most of the jokes hit (at least the ones that didn't rely on Taylor Kitsch being an actor).

They put out a film with all the right pieces, and the movie going public failed it.

This is the most ridiculous thing I've ever read. A movie's job is to be entertaining. If people are entertained, they pay money. The movie failed the audience, not the other way around.
 

daviyoung

Banned
Saw this the other night. Massive missed opportunity, too long with no real pay-off. Interesting subtext was skimmed over for happy ending. The best acting came from the lanky green men, the script was one-note and it just wasn't very enjoyable.

Fully deserves its turkey status imo. And yes it's better than Finding Nemo.
 
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