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Microsoft to finance Halo movie

Well, the potential problem isn't that fans of the Halo series wouldn't see the movie... it is that 8 million people won't get you anywhere as far as box office is concerned. Even assuming ten dollar tickets across the board (which is nowhere near the case) that gets you 80 million before everyone else takes their cut and MS gets left with something less than even that. You need Halo fanboys + shitloads of other people that haven't expressed any prior interest.
 
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My Arms Your Hearse said:
Well, the potential problem isn't that fans of the Halo series wouldn't see the movie... it is that 8 million people won't get you anywhere as far as box office is concerned. Even assuming ten dollar tickets across the board (which is nowhere near the case) that gets you 80 million before everyone else takes their cut and MS gets left with something less than even that. You need Halo fanboys + shitloads of other people that haven't expressed any prior interest.
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There is a huge market for science fiction fans if properly advertised. Then you factor in the collectibles, action figures, comic books etc. etc.
 
Francias Castiglione said:
There is a huge market for science fiction fans if properly advertised. Then you factor in the collectibles, action figures, comic books etc. etc.
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Also todays game movies doesn't advertice the fact that it's a game movie and instead tries to look like a regular big budget movie, I'm sure it'll be the same for this one.
 
Can't forget DVD sales... lots of movies make more via DVD then in theaters, which is why they're so quick to release DVD's nowadays.
 
$145 million is more than the combined budget of the two Resident Evil movies plus the Silent Hill movie, according to imdb.

Now I've got to ask again, why is this thread not in the OT section?
 
linsivvi said:
$145 million is more than the combined budget of the two Resident Evil movies plus the Silent Hill movie, according to imdb.

Now I've got to ask again, why is this thread not in the OT section?
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Because Halo is a videogame.
 
look at how much money MS have been prepared to lose every three months on the xbox.

$145 million is nothing to them. as for advertising costs, we'll see what happens there as there are ways that MS might not have be the ones fitting the bill. it's a lot easier to get a distributor to pick up a finished film. there's little chance of MS distributing it, and they could get the distributor to advertise. they wouldn't need to sell the film in the US for what it cost them to make, and so they could well more than break even when you factor in international rights.

i wonder... is this the most expensive 'independant' movie ever?
 
Milhouse31 said:
Sci-Fi genre is dead/uncool/neerdy. If your movie is not called Star Wars, you won't make your money back.
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if they can recaoture the feel and newness that Aliens had then they'll score!
 
Milhouse31 said:
Sci-Fi genre is dead/uncool/neerdy. If your movie is not called Star Wars, you won't make your money back.
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As I said they need to advertise it properly to the right people. It has Peter Jackson and WETA on the bill already, if they add one or two big names for the Keyes and Johnson roles I think a lot of the anti-Halo crowd will feel left out come release.
 
I think the studios were right to bail on this project (they'll be lucky to break $100 million domestically due to the lack of broad appeal + boxoffice slump), but it does make some sense for Microsoft to continue funding it.

Even though they're likely not going to come close to making their money back on the movie, the movie will make Halo a more valuable IP and sell some more 360s and Halo 3 copies.
 
They could use this thing as an advertising campaign for Halo 3. Forget the normal movie tie-in, release Halo 3 for the 360 in the Summer of 2008 along with the Halo movie and no other advertising (aside from TV movie trailers) would be required.

Microsoft probably would have spent close to that much advertising the game anyway. The movie will drive some people to buy the game, and the game will probably drive some people to see the movie. Movie tie-ins prove that people will buy anything if it is tied to a major motion picture, so Halo 3 wouldn't even have to be a good game.

If it does get made, I'll go see it just for the hell of it. If it did (by some absurdly miniscule chance) turn out to be a good movie, I would be shocked.
 
Based on this thread GAFers understand as little about making money in the movie business as they do about making money in the videogame business.
 
Francias Castiglione said:
As I said they need to advertise it properly to the right people. It has Peter Jackson and WETA on the bill already, if they add one or two big names for the Keyes and Johnson roles I think a lot of the anti-Halo crowd will feel left out come release.
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Add Samuel L Jackson and its all over. :lol
 
Busty said:
Every year someone swaggers into Hollywood and tries to play hardball with the studios and every year that same someone gets bitchslapped. This year it's Microsoft.
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It's kinda funny how this whole thing has blown up in Microsoft's face after they were so cocky about the whole affair. They make a big press event out of Master Chief delivering the flawless Halo script to all the major Hollywood studios like it's the ambrosia of the gods -- then none of the studios are interested and they have to do a dual-studio partnership. Then the studios demand that the Script of Awesomeness be completely rewritten by someone else. And finally, the studios dump the project entirely.

At the end of the day, I guess it's a good thing that Microsoft maintains total control of the project. They may be on their way to delivering a pretty colossal bomb though.
 
Pseudo judo said:
Universal was one of the Studios that pulled out, was it not?




They Pass on Halo but pump 250 million into the sequel to Bruce Almighty. Universal ftl.

90 million of which was advertising budget, btw.
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That could well turn into a huge bomb, but it's easier to greenlight something like that when the first 1 did over $500 million at the box office, and hundreds of millions more on DVD.

Though that's part of the problem with greenlighting a movie with such a large initial budget. They didn't start off with a $250 million budget, they started at $140 million and it's crept up steadily since then.

border said:
At the end of the day, I guess it's a good thing that Microsoft maintains total control of the project. They may be on their way to delivering a pretty colossal bomb though.
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Halo: The Spirits Within
 
border said:
It's kinda funny how this whole thing has blown up in Microsoft's face after they were so cocky about the whole affair. They make a big press event out of Master Chief delivering the flawless Halo script to all the major Hollywood studios like it's the ambrosia of the gods -- then none of the studios are interested and they have to do a dual-studio partnership. Then the studios demand that the Script of Awesomeness be completely rewritten by someone else. And finally, the studios dump the project entirely.

At the end of the day, I guess it's a good thing that Microsoft maintains total control of the project. They may be on their way to delivering a pretty colossal bomb though.
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Which makes me think. How bad is the script that even Hollywood studios -which have approved some pretty shitty scripts- don't want it?
 
I have some faith that the movie will turn out to be good, though it's pretty frightening when you think about how bad things could turn. 1st time "Microsoft Films Studio" in charge of a 1st time film director....
fortified_concept said:
Which makes me think. How bad is the script be that even Hollywood studios -which have approved some pretty shitty scripts- don't want it?
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It doesn't have to be bad to demand a rewrite. Someone earlier said that it was too dark and splatter-oriented to be a family summer action movie.

I think a part of the problem is that none of the characters in the game have a really charismatic hook that's going to appeal to a wide audience. Master Chief constantly wears a mask and the rest are all military stereotypes. The most lively person is a computer AI. I gotta assume they're putting in some supporting characters and at least couple women. Studios probably wanted a love interest for Master Chief ;)
 
145 million budget huh, no wonder studios wanted to get the **** out. It is a video game movie after all. :P

p.s. there's nothing in the article about MS financing the movie themselves.
 
border said:
I have some faith that the movie will turn out to be good, though it's pretty frightening when you think about how bad things could turn. 1st time "Microsoft Films Studio" in charge of a 1st time film director....

It doesn't have to be bad to demand a rewrite. Someone earlier said that it was too dark and splatter-oriented to be a family summer action movie.

I think a part of the problem is that none of the characters in the game have a really charismatic hook that's going to appeal to a wide audience. Master Chief constantly wears a mask and the rest are all military stereotypes. The most lively person is a computer AI. I gotta assume they're putting in some supporting characters and at least couple women. Studios probably wanted a love interest for Master Chief ;)
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Maybe they need a narrator?

A whimsical floating cyber orb.......
 
HocusPocus said:
$20 million for advertising on a $160 movie (production costs) would be insanely low. :)
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HOLY CRAP! Are you serious? I was trying to be conserative.
 
Wollan said:
Imagine if they spent 145million $ on the game.
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Why don't they spend lots of money on the game like this? I mean don't games make more money than movies now a days? Didn't Halo2 make like $400 million dollars? Shouldn't Halo 3 cost at least $70-100 million dollars?
 
Confidence Man said:
Armchair videogame analysts become armchair film industry analysts. :lol
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In this case it's kind of obvious. No name director, no name actors, halo lacks true mass appeal, halo is onyl really popular in one region of the world, etc. it's not going to gross anywhere near the amount it'll end up costing them especially in this day and age.
 
mckmas8808 said:
Why don't they spend lots of money on the game like this? I mean don't games make more money than movies now a days? Didn't Halo2 make like $400 million dollars? Shouldn't Halo 3 cost at least $70-100 million dollars?
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When they say the game industry surpasses the movie industry they only compare it when it comes to box office, I think. Movies have lots more revenue streams: box office, dvd sales, rentals, licensing (to videogames for example), TV (pay-TV, regular networks, etc). With that said, I don't know how big the budget of Halo 3 is.
 
Well, I can see the studios cringing because never has a live action movie based off of a game had a budget higher than around 50 million. Never has a movie based off a game cracked 100 million domestic.

Though, if the Halo movie is a success and pulls in big dollars the studios will rush to copy the formula and crank out game movie after game movie with big budgets just like they have comic book movies.
 
X26 said:
In this case it's kind of obvious. No name director, no name actors, halo lacks true mass appeal, halo is onyl really popular in one region of the world, etc. it's not going to gross anywhere near the amount it'll end up costing them especially in this day and age.
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It's not obvious at all. Peter Jackson's name is attatched to the project, you don't know who the actors are, and I would say Halo does in fact have mass appeal.
 
Wired said:
Well, I don't think the Chief have the same amount of rabid fans as Christ... but who knows?
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I dont recall Jesus doing shit about the covenant invasion... the Chief has my vote
 
Tieno said:
When they say the game industry surpasses the movie industry they only compare it when it comes to box office, I think. Movies have lots more revenue streams: box office, dvd sales, rentals, licensing (to videogames for example), TV (pay-TV, regular networks, etc). With that said, I don't know how big the budget of Halo 3 is.
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Oh okay. But again doesn't the Halo games make at least $300-400 million dollars without counting rental money?
 
mckmas8808 said:
HOLY CRAP! Are you serious? I was trying to be conserative.
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Remember what you have to do to promote a big summer blockbuster movie. Happy Meal Toys, Prime Time TV Ads, flying your stars around the world to promote, etc.
 
This movie from MS point of view is ultimately about expanding the Halo IP and ultimately the Xbox IP. Halo is truly MS's trump card as they've truly done well from running it into the ground, and as an IP itself it's matoor (unlike Nintendo) but not retarded (GTA hooker killing bullshit), I don't own an Xbox and haven't played Halo, but I recognize this. There's a good chance that the media won't toss it into the compost heap along with all the other Uwe Boll atrocities.

That said, the Studios couldn't give a flying **** about possibly expanding the brand, they want to know exactly what IP brings to the table, how much they should pay for it, and the most return they could get from it at the box office. They know exactly how many people have bought/played/heard of Halo and the number just don't add up. MS is banking on paying that extra bit of money the studios wouldn't pay and (hopefully) creating a movie that reaches beyond the Halo players to the general audience, bringing them to Halo, X360.

Simply put MS and the Movie studios had two very different agendas, thus the split.
 
Seriously, some of you guys make me sick. This is probably one of the best things I've heard all day.

Even if it tanks, the fact that Microsoft has faith in a good script, a great producer and a young and talented director, while taking on the studios by backing it with their own money -- well, needless to say, Microsoft in this instance deserves to win and win big. I really applaud them with their effort to uphold artistic integrity and deliver upon a vision that does not eschew the corporate shill-influenced norm.

DAY ONE, BITCHES.
 
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