• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

Deadline: Ghost in the Shell will Lose $60M+

Status
Not open for further replies.
The worst bit is they will learn the wrong lessons from this, they will say "anime doesn't sell" when they should be saying "hey maybe we should listen to what the fans of the source material wants".
 

commedieu

Banned
Scarlet shares no responsibility in why this tanked. Shes a good actor. The ad campaign wasn't too sharp, and the movie looked meh. A smaller budget raid redemption sort of movie would have likely performed better, with innovative/fresh eye candy and action. They could have saved money on trying to get a big star and spent that on the film itself.


But that's not how Hollywood works. We are lucky they didn't just take the name and make unrelated movie with name association the movie #3052.

Trying to cash in on gits was a bizarre move to begin with.
 

TDLink

Member
Alita: Battle Angel is in production, and with a $200 million budget it has the potential to be a colossal bomb unless it's very good and/or very well marketed. There's also the new Akira adaptation, and given Ghost's failure it'll be interesting to see how they approach that. I don't think it's got any more mainstream recognition than GitS.

Battle Angel has a few things going for it that GITS didn't:

  • Better release date, actually in the summer
  • Produced by JAMES CAMERON, the man who brought you ALIENS, TERMINATOR, AVATAR (you can be sure marketing will use this)
 

Ridley327

Member
Battle Angel has a few things going for it that GITS didn't:

  • Better release date, actually in the summer
  • Produced by JAMES CAMERON, the man who brought you ALIENS, TERMINATOR, AVATAR (you can be sure marketing will use this)

His name being plastered all over the likes of Sanctum and Cirque du Soleil: Worlds Away did little for those films. People want James Cameron films, not James Cameron leftovers.
 

TDLink

Member
His name being plastered all over the likes of Sanctum and Cirque du Soleil: Worlds Away did little for those films. People want James Cameron films, not James Cameron leftovers.

Neither of those were summer blockbusters or even action movies. Battle Angel is much more "on-brand" for Cameron and his fans. I also expect it will have a much bigger marketing campaign than a February dumping ground film like Sanctum did.
 
Battle Angel has a few things going for it that GITS didn't:

  • Better release date, actually in the summer
  • Produced by JAMES CAMERON, the man who brought you ALIENS, TERMINATOR, AVATAR (you can be sure marketing will use this)

Marketing was a crucial failure for GITS. Without being already a fan of the manga or anime there was no way one would get out a reason to watch the movie from the trailers.

Battle Angel Alita is also the way better base for turning it into a summer blockbuster action movie.
 

Nuu

Banned
Is Ghost in the Shell even that big of an I.P. anymore? It's hey days seemed to be ten years ago but it's fallen silent since.
 
Is Ghost in the Shell even that big of an I.P. anymore? It's hey days seemed to be ten years ago but it's fallen silent since.

I always found gits to be a niche anime? Even when I was heavily into the stuff I never cared for it or bothered to get into into it.
 

Haly

One day I realized that sadness is just another word for not enough coffee.
Actual numbers are starting to come in, 40 plus millions outside the US, 3 millions in South Korea alone (million more than XXX or 2,5 more than John Wick 2).

So better wait before declaring a bomb, else crows could become an endangered species. China and Japan are getting the movie end of this week.

Don't mind me just getting my digs in.
 

Ridley327

Member
Is Ghost in the Shell even that big of an I.P. anymore? It's hey days seemed to be ten years ago but it's fallen silent since.

GitS is one of those properties that more influential for filmmakers than it is something that could be turned into a big mainstream enterprise. Its biggest fans, the Wachowskis, already repurposed a lot of it to make The Matrix, and I think that's good enough for most people that could be otherwise interested in cyberpunk sci-fi.
 

Pachimari

Member
Marketing was a crucial failure for GITS. Without being already a fan of the manga or anime there was no way one would get out a reason to watch the movie from the trailers.

I knew nothing of GitS. Watched the 95' anime a few weeks before movie release, and disliked it. I went really excited into the theater just to watch GitS, and came out extremely satisfied.

I'm just sad the majority didn't feel like this.

They should have copied my DNA, Major!
 

Falchion

Member
Unpopular opinion warning:

After watching this and the original anime, I enjoyed the Hollywood version far more. Seriously, what was up with the ending of the anime where Major just merges with the guy and is now living in the body of a young girl?
I still think the show was the best by far though.
 

fvng

Member
Good.

Stop being risk averse, make a good movie, and don't be afraid to cast and "unknown" as a lead.

Hopefully the Naruto movie learns this lesson.

Easy to say when it's not your money. A cast of unknowns is a hard sell to get a movie greenlit. That only works for established franchises like star wars
 
Alita: Battle Angel is in production, and with a $200 million budget it has the potential to be a colossal bomb unless it's very good and/or very well marketed. There's also the new Akira adaptation, and given Ghost's failure it'll be interesting to see how they approach that. I don't think it's got any more mainstream recognition than GitS.

$200 million is an insane budget for Alita, I don't care how much they spam James Cameron's name. Even the first Matrix which did extremely well for itself had only a $63 mil production budget at the time.

I'm hoping that Battle Angel does well, but it just seems crazy to drop that much on something that's not a sequel to a hugely popular franchise, a super well known IP, or an animated kids film. There are obviously cases where films have come out, not hitting any of those criteria and gone on to do well (and granted, a couple of those films are ones that Cameron directed), but they shouldn't be using those exceptions as the rules.
 

Takuan

Member
Kind of a shame. I watched it last week and thought it was perfectly fine. Pretty shallow, but I had a good time.
 

Korigama

Member
At first, I was convinced that James Cameron throwing his former passion project to the wolves by letting Robert Rodriguez make it instead would lead to it having a shoestring budget typical of the latter's films. Now that I know that they're spending even MORE money on Battle Angel than was spent on an overbudgeted flop like Ghost in the Shell, as though they still had Cameron helming it, I'm quite positive that the executives who approved it are completely insane.

Given his sensibilities, I expect it to resonate with audiences about as much as Grindhouse.
Unpopular opinion warning:

After watching this and the original anime, I enjoyed the Hollywood version far more. Seriously, what was up with the ending of the anime where Major just merges with the guy and is now living in the body of a young girl?
I still think the show was the best by far though.
Because the show (which is also a completely different continuity from the original film, which itself was a different continuity from the manga) was indeed the best. I say this in spite of actually liking the original Oshii film.
 
That what you get when you have no idea what made the original great. And the mediocre shallow people you made this american nonsense version for don't watch these movies. They watch Vin Diesel in a fast car.

Want to make a real life anime, study at what makes them great.

Watched the movie two days ago and when i walked out of the theater, i forgot about the movie. I did remember Scarlett though.
 

Haly

One day I realized that sadness is just another word for not enough coffee.
Easy to say when it's not your money. A cast of unknowns is a hard sell to get a movie greenlit. That only works for established franchises like star wars
His point is that being "risk averse" is evidently as much as an actual risk as what's usually referred to as risk, or rather that executive and investors' concept of risk is completely fucked, which is what they need to change.

People always say "well studio executives are opposed to taking risks" but what if their evaluation of "risk" was simply wrong?
 

oni_saru

Member
Because the show (which is also a completely different continuity from the original film, which itself was a different continuity from the manga) was indeed the best. I say this in spite of actually liking the original Oshii film.

Just did my GitS rewatch and i wish they would have just done it based on the show.

Hell they could have adapted the Major recruiting Saito episode into a film and that would have been more entertaining and true to the Major's character then the shit we got.

Let the focus be on the characters first and somewhat focus on the tech.

Then sequel could have more tech and Section 9 stuff.

The story in this movie adaptation was just boring. I didn't care for the Major. Hell, i wasn't even sure why her teammates held such high respect for her or why she was even called Major.
 

Aaron

Member
The story in this movie adaptation was just boring. I didn't care for the Major. Hell, i wasn't even sure why her teammates held such high respect for her or why she was even called Major.
This strikes me as an odd complaint when it's never explained in the manga or anime either. They hold her in high regard from the beginning and we never delve into her military past to any real extent. Maybe that's Arise which I haven't seen.
 

DarkestHour

Banned
I too have an unpopular opinion.

As a fan of the original film, I really enjoyed the live-action version.

I saw it a few weeks ago with my buddy in 3D (which I typically can't stand) because there were no 2D showings.

The visual effects paired with the 3D were amazing. The movie was very similar to the anime and not a complete departure. Despite all the claims of "white washing" there were many Japanese actors in this movie and
the movie even explains why Major is not Japanese in body.

However, if I was not a fan of the anime I would imagine the movie would have no appeal or would have been confusing.
 

MattKeil

BIGTIME TV MOGUL #2
This strikes me as an odd complaint when it's never explained in the manga or anime either. They hold her in high regard from the beginning and we never delve into her military past to any real extent. Maybe that's Arise which I haven't seen.

I think he means that in the other versions of the story, the respect she's given is self-evident in her extreme skill and leadership abilities, plus the extremes she goes to take care of her men. In the live action movie she's more of a loose cannon who's just buddies with Batou until a poor judgment call on her part costs him his eyes. She seems a lot newer to the job in the live action movie, too.

The visual effects paired with the 3D were amazing. The movie was very similar to the anime and not a complete departure. Despite all the claims of "white washing" there were many Japanese actors in this movie and
the movie even explains why Major is not Japanese in body.

Explaining erasure doesn't justify it. Also the effects weren't that great, I thought. Lots of compositing problems throughout, especially in the wide shots of the city.
 
This strikes me as an odd complaint when it's never explained in the manga or anime either. They hold her in high regard from the beginning and we never delve into her military past to any real extent. Maybe that's Arise which I haven't seen.

It most definitely is very clear in every other adaptation. She's easily the most competent, skilled member on the team and it's easy to see why she has their respect and is the leader. In the movie she's like some little kid Section 9 has to babysit and doesn't seem to care about any of them
 
Deadline's box office estimates ended up being too optimistic for Ghost in the Shell. $50M domestic, $50M China. and $200M worldwide isn't happening.

The actual figures will be $40-42M domestic, $30M China, and $170-175M worldwide. Bump up those losses by another $10M.

After the Fate of the Furious weekend drop, it was clear that $200 million wasn't happening.
 

oni_saru

Member
This strikes me as an odd complaint when it's never explained in the manga or anime either. They hold her in high regard from the beginning and we never delve into her military past to any real extent. Maybe that's Arise which I haven't seen.

I think he means that in the other versions of the story, the respect she's given is self-evident in her extreme skill and leadership abilities, plus the extremes she goes to take care of her men. In the live action movie she's more of a loose cannon who's just buddies with Batou until a poor judgment call on her part costs him his eyes. She seems a lot newer to the job in the live action movie, too.

It most definitely is very clear in every other adaptation. She's easily the most competent, skilled member on the team and it's easy to see why she has their respect and is the leader. In the movie she's like some little kid Section 9 has to babysit and doesn't seem to care about any of them

This.

Also I believe they mention the Major being a world class hacker a couple of times in the anime.

Also in regards to the Saito specific episode, you have Batou who barely knows Kusanagi get to learn why she's "queen kong" as Ishikawa puts it. Here her skills are on display and you see why Ishikawa has so much faith in her.
 

Haly

One day I realized that sadness is just another word for not enough coffee.
It's important because there are wizard class hackers but she's beyond wizard.
 

mr_nexus

Banned
I was going to go and watch the film this weekend but it's not playing in my local cinema anymore. They dropped that movie fast.
 

BocoDragon

or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Realize This Assgrab is Delicious
I was going to go and watch the film this weekend but it's not playing in my local cinema anymore. They dropped that movie fast.
I wouldn't be surprised to see it on streaming services asap.
 
The worst bit is they will learn the wrong lessons from this, they will say "anime doesn't sell" when they should be saying "hey maybe we should listen to what the fans of the source material wants".

The problem, though, is the actual amount of fans of the source material is pretty small in the scope of a big budget Hollywood film.
 
The least surprising news. Its a shame Hollywood doesn't look at material that actually stands a chance of being adapted really well. I mean monster is one that could easily excel and a majority white cast wouldn't even be seen offensive. Guess it's time to adapt another extremely Japanese anime and act surprise why people didn't like how it turned out.
 
That's not good :(

I want my good anime movies!

Then watch things like the rurouni kenshin live action movies.

Lol paramount. The real cost for ScarJo was way more than 12 million since they delayed the production for so long for her. They could have gone for a new white actress with less notoriety or an Asian actress for far less and start immediately. Dumb, just dumb.
 

Timbuktu

Member
That's not good :(

I want my good anime movies!

Anime adaptations might be fine, but just don't expect them to be massive tent poles billion dollar earners. I just don't understand how they can spend so much money on this, around $60 million more than the likes of Lucy or Looper? It really doesn't need to be this much, it can't just be for ScaJo, given Under the Skin got made starring her for less than $15 mil and look great. This would have been fine if it had a regular sci fi budget.
 

kewlmyc

Member
Everyone told me EoT was based on a book 🤔

It was based on a book. As far as I know, they never even made an animated version. Just Edge of Tomorrow.

Yeah, it was based off a book. A Japanese light novel to be more specific, but it never got an anime adaption, so I was wrong there. Though you could say every anime Hollywood adaption has also been based off a Japanese book/manga so my point still stands.
 
Anime adaptations might be fine, but just don't expect them to be massive tent poles billion dollar earners. I just don't understand how they can spend so much money on this, around $60 million more than the likes of Lucy or Looper? It really doesn't need to be this much, it can't just be for ScaJo, given Under the Skin got made starring her for less than $15 mil and look great. This would have been fine if it had a regular sci fi budget.

Under the Skin is a classic indie/smaller studio project that an actor/actress does for a far reduced price just because they really dig it. Paramount obviously wanted GitS to be a big budget thing, and I doubt ScarJo was that big of a fan, so she was going to demand that cheddar.
 
Yeah, it was based off a book. A Japanese light novel to be more specific, but it never got an anime adaption, so I was wrong there. Though you could say every anime Hollywood adaption has also been based off a Japanese book/manga so my point still stands.

It eventually got a manga adaptation.
 

Steveo

Banned
The worst bit is they will learn the wrong lessons from this, they will say "anime doesn't sell" when they should be saying "hey maybe we should listen to what the fans of the source material wants".

I don't think a Ghost in the Shell movie would of been successful at it's current budget no matter how faithful they were to the source material.

While it may seem like Ghost in the Shell has this giant audience that can carry 100+ million dollar budget, in reality it really doesn't.
 
I don't think a Ghost in the Shell movie would of been successful at it's current budget no matter how faithful they were to the source material.

While it may seem like Ghost in the Shell has this giant audience that can carry 100+ million dollar budget, in reality it really doesn't.

If it had been more faithful it wouldn't have been at this budget.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top Bottom