"Quantum of Solace Becomes Top Bond of All Time"

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Re: "Quantum of Solace Becomes Top Bond of All Time"

Post by crusading_saint »

Nope - the budget for QOS was around $200m, according to Box Office Mojo - Variety reports a negative cost of $230m, but adds that that includes some print and advertising costs (It doesn't specify how much) - which is where the widely reported figure of $230m comes from. IMdb concurs - giving the budget as $200m, and stating in its FAQ that the budget they give reflects the actual cost of making the movie, not any prints or advertising costs. Other sources don't do that. Where are you getting $260m from?
In % terms, that means QOS cost around 33% more than CR. TND cost $110m - a whopping 85% more than it's predecessor. (and that's the reported budget - Roger Spottiswoode has admitted it went over budget, but he didn't say how much). Hence my post.
As for the actual advertising costs, well, we'll never know for sure. $100m is far too high an estimate, given that almost no film spends that much (The average for a wide release these days is around $40m, according to the Hollywood Reporter - indie releases average around $13m), and while QOS was widely advertised, I wouldn't say it was marketed any more aggressively than any other Bond movie. But if we are generous and say that QOS spent twice as much as the average wide release, that would be $80m, which would give Sony's total output as $280m - which QOS has already passed, even once you take off the theater owner's cuts.
In addition, Wikipedia tells me that QOS has also given Sony/MGM its highest ever revenue from a Bond movie in terms of product placement - around $75-$80m, much higher than CR, which adds a nice figure onto the total revenue - and that's not counting the ancillary revenues from things like tie-ins, soundtracks, games, merchandising, et al.
And speaking of cuts, one thing the producers must be thankful about is Craig himself - when DAD came out, not only was Brosnan getting a nice salary (almost $17m), but he was also getting a %. Craig's much cheaper, and they don't have to pay him one :)
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Re: "Quantum of Solace Becomes Top Bond of All Time"

Post by crusading_saint »

Mazer Rackham wrote:TND did good on its own, might have done better without the leviathan hogging the sunlight but it shouldn't be compared to Titanic.
I don't know what the point of comparing them is. To say TND did well against a record smashing movie, fine. To say TND fought for his place and Quark hasn't, maybe but movies generally don't pull each other out of orbit. Titanic had an unusual draw and made records but couldn't cripple Bond or any other movies. There may be point to perhaps the opening weekend being stronger. Possibly the over all take being stronger.
[/quote]

That's my point exactly - Kristatos implied that TND would have done better if Titanic had not been released at the same time - I pointed out there was no impact - you're quite correct - movies don't pull each other out of orbit. TND would have made the same had it been released at the same time as Titanic or not.
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Re: "Quantum of Solace Becomes Top Bond of All Time"

Post by Mazer Rackham »

crusading_saint wrote:Nope - the budget for QOS was around $200m, according to Box Office Mojo - Variety reports a negative cost of $230m, but adds that that includes some print and advertising costs (It doesn't specify how much) - which is where the widely reported figure of $230m comes from. IMdb concurs - giving the budget as $200m, and stating in its FAQ that the budget they give reflects the actual cost of making the movie, not any prints or advertising costs. Other sources don't do that. Where are you getting $260m from?
260m is from a in house source of actual production cost, not going into advertising. The production number has been continually massaged downward. Of course remember that the original numbers were that CR cost 70m, and it stayed at the number for quite a few sources. What Eon had meant to say of course was £70. That's what happening here.
Also as the exchange rate gets worse the cost will amazingly go down :shock:
$100m is far too high an estimate, given that almost no film spends that much (The average for a wide release these days is around $40m, according to the Hollywood Reporter - indie releases average around $13m)
Nope, that may be an average but they were spending around 50m for promoting GE. CR got 120m at least, Quark could have surpassed that. Also the bigger the movie the bigger the promotions. Spider-man 3 got $120m at a minimum although some reports have it as much more.
Curiously it another Sony movie that went way over budget and then was suddenly cheaper.
Sony's total output as $280m - which QOS has already passed, even once you take off the theater owner's cuts.
In addition, Wikipedia tells me that QOS has also given Sony/MGM its highest ever revenue from a Bond movie in terms of product placement - around $75-$80m, much higher than CR, which adds a nice figure onto the total revenue - and that's not counting the ancillary revenues from things like tie-ins, soundtracks, games, merchandising, et al.
Working with the wrong premise. But the right Idea.
Wikipedia? Did you write that yourself? :wink:
Lets see from the two sources I have read: the Times had it £50m total and the other at +$36m over CR

And speaking of cuts, one thing the producers must be thankful about is Craig himself - when DAD came out, not only was Brosnan getting a nice salary (almost $17m), but he was also getting a %. Craig's much cheaper, and they don't have to pay him one :)
Nope, that was the old contract. New contract has different provisions including a % ("a sliding salary.. Based on BO and merchandising"). Brozza never got a %. He barely got just under £10m. Part of the disinformation after Craig was hired was that Brozza wanted 30m and a %. Later it came out that he wanted £10m, the % I'm not sure if any bothered to confirm that.
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Re: "Quantum of Solace Becomes Top Bond of All Time"

Post by crusading_saint »

Mazer Rackham wrote:260m is from a in house source of actual production cost, not going into advertising. The production number has been continually massaged downward. Of course remember that the original numbers were that CR cost 70m, and it stayed at the number for quite a few sources. What Eon had meant to say of course was £70. That's what happening here.
Also as the exchange rate gets worse the cost will amazingly go down :shock:
Aha - rumors, then. I'll stick with trusted sources, thank you. In fact, after researching it, the only mention of a $260m price tag I can find is a rumor attributed to 'rival studio chatter'. Not the most trustworthy source, is it? Spider-Man 3 is quite a different example - rumors abounded for months that Sony was downplaying the costs - same with Pirates 3 the same summer. Budgets can't stay a secret for too long in Hollywood. In comparison, QOS was reported at one number, and remained the same since then. All evidence points to my figure. Of course, neither you nor I are taking into account the tax breaks the film is reportedly taking advantage of, but since there's no way to find out that figure, it can't be taken into account.
Nope, that may be an average but they were spending around 50m for promoting GE. CR got 120m at least, Quark could have surpassed that. Also the bigger the movie the bigger the promotions. Spider-man 3 got $120m at a minimum although some reports have it as much more.
Curiously it another Sony movie that went way over budget and then was suddenly cheaper.
I'm going to need some sources on that - QOS was not marketed nearly as much as Spider-Man 3 (though you seem to be impying it was, which I can't agree with), and Spider-Man 3 cost $120m for marketing. I think my estimate of $80m is sound. By comparison, The Dark Knight, also released this year, spent $100m on advertising, and QOS was not marketed as heavily. I stand by my figure.
Lets see from the two sources I have read: the Times had it £50m total and the other at +$36m over CR
50 million pounds was what I had read, too. Hence, $75-80m (at the time, anyway. It would be less now, given that the pound is in freefall)

Nope, that was the old contract. New contract has different provisions including a % ("a sliding salary.. Based on BO and merchandising"). Brozza never got a %. He barely got just under £10m. Part of the disinformation after Craig was hired was that Brozza wanted 30m and a %. Later it came out that he wanted £10m, the % I'm not sure if any bothered to confirm that.
That's not a % - it just means that his salary for the next picture will depend on how much QOS makes. He's not getting a cut of the net or gross profits. And I do seem to be wrong about Brosnan. Oh well.
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Re: "Quantum of Solace Becomes Top Bond of All Time"

Post by Mazer Rackham »

crusading_saint wrote: Aha - rumors, then. I'll stick with trusted sources, thank you. In fact, after researching it, the only mention of a $260m price tag I can find is a rumor attributed to 'rival studio chatter'. Not the most trustworthy source, is it? Spider-Man 3 is quite a different example - rumors abounded for months that Sony was downplaying the costs - same with Pirates 3 the same summer. Budgets can't stay a secret for too long in Hollywood. In comparison, QOS was reported at one number, and remained the same since then. All evidence points to my figure. Of course, neither you nor I are taking into account the tax breaks the film is reportedly taking advantage of, but since there's no way to find out that figure, it can't be taken into account.
Not a rumor, a trusted source. But I take your point. Iwill add that I know of several other insiders thatrefer to higher cost in $260 range. Either way Quark is easily a 230m movie. In a way it's the exact same thing that the spider-man 3. Sony finally settled of about 260m for that film but it is widely accepted that isn't necessarily accurate.
There were memos from February-March 08 that talked about 230m cost, and that was before the delays and disasters. Also pre-production cost to consider.
I'm going to need some sources on that - QOS was not marketed nearly as much as Spider-Man 3 (though you seem to be impying it was, which I can't agree with), and Spider-Man 3 cost $120m for marketing. I think my estimate of $80m is sound. By comparison, The Dark Knight, also released this year, spent $100m on advertising, and QOS was not marketed as heavily. I stand by my figure.
Free tickets and the 30ft poster don't come cheap. Sony's own numbers for CR was 120m marketing. I think DAD was around 90 to 100m worldwide as well.
Quark's marketing was there in force if you didn't see perhaps they didn't get their monies worth. But watch a TV recording (w/commercials) from November and you should see at least one Quark ad.


For most big movies 50m to 80m will be spent in North America alone. Examples- "Alexander"cost $155 million to make and $60 million to market domestically
Iron Man had 75m marketing budget.
The Dark Knight had (in May 2008) a marketing budget of 150m, they also used a lot viral marketing as well.
Lets see from the two sources I have read: the Times had it £50m total and the other at +$36m over CR
50 million pounds was what I had read, too. Hence, $75-80m (at the time, anyway. It would be less now, given that the pound is in freefall)
Nope, that was the old contract. New contract has different provisions including a % ("a sliding salary.. Based on BO and merchandising"). Brozza never got a %. He barely got just under £10m. Part of the disinformation after Craig was hired was that Brozza wanted 30m and a %. Later it came out that he wanted £10m, the % I'm not sure if any bothered to confirm that.
That's not a % - it just means that his salary for the next picture will depend on how much QOS makes. He's not getting a cut of the net or gross profits. And I do seem to be wrong about Brosnan. Oh well.
There is another report where it goes into more detail. One of the points it touched on is a % of the movies earning, gross or whatever not sure what the specifics are, but there should be a % , possibly a sort of bonus + the next deal.

Lets try something. CR cost 150m, my sources have total cost w/marketing at 270m, not considering all of the additional advertising for tie in products like Heineken which come as more of a bonus. CR made 594m total. What was the take home profit?
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Re: "Quantum of Solace Becomes Top Bond of All Time"

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Not a rumor, a trusted source.
If they don't have a name, I'm going to count that as a rumor...I'll have to go with my own trusted sources, I'm afraid, and they match with what I'm stating.
And I think we'll really have to agree to disagree on the marketing costs...I have my figures, and they don't jibe with what you're saying, but since neither of us has a detailed budget analysis from Sony on our desks (or if we did, it wouldn't be a good idea to mention that), I don't think I can convince you or anyone else otherwise. Sony does not release their marketing costs to the general public, so we're going to end up with your word versus mine, and I doubt either of us are going to budge (I'm not, anyway, I know I'm right - no offence :)).
And as for your question - logic dictates that profit was around $56m ($594m - studios get an average of 55% of the gross, less costs + marketing), but that's impossible to really figure out. Some studios have a sweeter deal with the theaters, some movies % can change depending on how long it stays in theaters, some studios demand a higher % for the opening weekend, and so on.
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Re: "Quantum of Solace Becomes Top Bond of All Time"

Post by Mazer Rackham »

They have names, numbers even ;)

I know you are way off in the marketing budget, but it will be awhile before the Quark number are released publicly. A rough estimate based on the CR number budget would say that 100m is a very safe guess.

$56m? really?

594 -270= 324m after initial costs

further break down
426,793,106 foreign take, average 60% take for the theater owners leaves $170,717,242 to play with.

167,445,960 domestic take, average 45% for the theater owners leaves $92,095,278 to play with. nearly 262m totaled
right?
Well those are just rough estimates based on publicly printed information.

262m profit may seem reasonable, but it doesn't account for the cost to produce.

How to resolve this then?

According to another public source (LA Times) when all was said and done CR made profit of better than 150m, when the break up of profits came down the line Sony took home the lions share, well because they put up the lions share to make the film. 75% by most accounts. Sony took home over 100m from the profit.

Quark will make money but bring home no where near the CR 150m profit split.
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Re: "Quantum of Solace Becomes Top Bond of All Time"

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They have names, numbers even ;)
As do mine, but as I say, it's not of much help to either of us, since I doubt you'll reveal yours and I sure won't release mine - which is why I was trying to point to official sources as much as I could to avoid degenerating into he said/he said
Hmm....I disagree with your math. Here's my calculation - on a very rough and average basis, studios get 55% of the gross, with the rest going to theater owners. 55% of $594m is $326m. Your budget estimate was $270m. Total revenue of $326m minus total costs of $270m = $56m. However, this is very rough - some studios insist on opening weekend that they get as much as 75%, and it goes down with each successive week, other studios don't - it depends on the movie and the studio. It also varies from country to country. 55% is a very rough average.
Sony's figure quoted in the paper does seem to confirm a lower budget, though :)
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Re: "Quantum of Solace Becomes Top Bond of All Time"

Post by Roger Devereau »

Wikipedia states that Quantum of Solace receivced $50 million in product placement income. This beats Die Another Day which earned $40 million worth of prduct placement income in 2002.

Die Another Day made more money (adjusted) than GoldenEye. I wonder of Craig's last Bond outing will make more than Casino Royale, given the unprecedented critical mauling Quantum of Solace received?
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If they don't have a name, I'm going to count that as a rumor...I'll have to go with my own trusted sources, I'm afraid, and they match with what I'm stating.
You sound like David Icke. :lol:
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Re: "Quantum of Solace Becomes Top Bond of All Time"

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I hate to be the one to break it to Sony/Eon but Thunderball is the biggest Bond film of all time. Everyone knows that.
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Re: "Quantum of Solace Becomes Top Bond of All Time"

Post by The Sweeney »

Roger Devereau wrote: Die Another Day made more money (adjusted) than GoldenEye. I wonder of Craig's last Bond outing will make more than Casino Royale, given the unprecedented critical mauling Quantum of Solace received?
It all depends on the quality of his next couple of Bond films. EON struck gold with CR, and this is in no small part down to a return of adapting a Fleming novel. When EON are left to their own devices, and try to come up with a brand new storyline, they usually balls it up. As someone cleverly stated on MI6, Nolan set out to make a Batman sequel, while EON set out to meet a deadline, with a make-it-up-as-you-go-along kind of approach. Bond films deserve better than this.

They messed it up big time with Brozza's 4 movies with this headless chicken approach, and after all the hard work of wiping the dirty slate clean and starting afresh with CR, they quickly slip back into their bad habits again with QoS.

I honestly think they need to look at adapting the remainder of unused Fleming material for the next 2 films - MR, DAF, TSWLM, YOLT and TMWTGG. All these novels still have massive scenes, characters, great moments in them that have not been adapted to the screen yet (YOLT and TMWTGG in their entirety have not been adapted properly yet). After that, they should look at doing a faithful adaptation of Colonel Sun - the only other author to have penned a novel that is deemed worthy of being compared to Fleming. And also look at perhaps bringing in an action director, someone like Tony Scott, who has done similar films like Spy Game and Enemy of the State.

It's not rocket science, but instead EON try to pick unwilling directors like Forster. If the guy showed initial reluctance in directing QoS, they should have moved swiftly on (`NEXT...') etc. as there would be a string of Grade A Hollywood directors lining up round the block to direct a Bond movie (even Spielberg).
But EON really do make hard work of this..... :roll:
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Re: "Quantum of Solace Becomes Top Bond of All Time"

Post by Kristatos »

The Sweeney wrote:[I honestly think they need to look at adapting the remainder of unused Fleming material for the next 2 films - MR, DAF, TSWLM, YOLT and TMWTGG. All these novels still have massive scenes, characters, great moments in them that have not been adapted to the screen yet (YOLT and TMWTGG in their entirety have not been adapted properly yet). After that, they should look at doing a faithful adaptation of Colonel Sun - the only other author to have penned a novel that is deemed worthy of being compared to Fleming. And also look at perhaps bringing in an action director, someone like Tony Scott, who has done similar films like Spy Game and Enemy of the State.
I don't think they own the rights to Colonel Sun, though TSWLM has several plot similarities to that novel. I did try to get some unused Fleming bits into my fanfic, if that's any consolation.
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Re: "Quantum of Solace Becomes Top Bond of All Time"

Post by stockslivevan »

I think it's possible for a Bond film to be completely original while being very good. The problem with EON is that their attemps have either been mostly good (LTK/QOS) or mostly bad (TWINE/DAD), and never top quality Bond like FRWL.

Still, they manage to come up with some really good premises, such as DAD's origianl storyline of Bond searching for the MI6 mole as his entire mission. The problem isn't that they're non-Fleming, it's that they're not executed to their potential.
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Re: "Quantum of Solace Becomes Top Bond of All Time"

Post by Kristatos »

stockslivevan wrote:I think it's possible for a Bond film to be completely original while being very good. The problem with EON is that their attemps have either been mostly good (LTK/QOS) or mostly bad (TWINE/DAD), and never top quality Bond like FRWL.

Still, they manage to come up with some really good premises, such as DAD's origianl storyline of Bond searching for the MI6 mole as his entire mission. The problem isn't that they're non-Fleming, it's that they're not executed to their potential.
Well, DAD wasn't entirely non-Fleming, it used bits from Moonraker that didn't make it into the film adaptation (if you can call it that).
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Re: "Quantum of Solace Becomes Top Bond of All Time"

Post by stockslivevan »

Kristatos wrote: Well, DAD wasn't entirely non-Fleming, it used bits from Moonraker that didn't make it into the film adaptation (if you can call it that).
Almost forgot of that! *d'oh!* I recall GE used some Moonraker bits as well.

Speaking of MR, I hope they bring in Gala Brand sometime in the future, complete with her turning Bond down.
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Re: "Quantum of Solace Becomes Top Bond of All Time"

Post by Kristatos »

stockslivevan wrote:Speaking of MR, I hope they bring in Gala Brand sometime in the future, complete with her turning Bond down.
I think Miranda Frost was called Gala Brand in early drafts of the script.
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Re: "Quantum of Solace Becomes Top Bond of All Time"

Post by stockslivevan »

Kristatos wrote:
stockslivevan wrote:Speaking of MR, I hope they bring in Gala Brand sometime in the future, complete with her turning Bond down.
I think Miranda Frost was called Gala Brand in early drafts of the script.
I recall that. Thankfully they scrapped that idea.
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Re: "Quantum of Solace Becomes Top Bond of All Time"

Post by FROSTY »

The Sweeney wrote:bringing in an action director, someone like Tony Scott, who has done similar films like Spy Game and Enemy of the State.
He unsuccessfully pitched for the QOS Directing job :wink:

They picked Forster over HIM??????? (clearly EON have never sat through his: CRIMSON TIDE :roll: - one of the best suspense thrillers that i'd seen in years!!)
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Re: "Quantum of Solace Becomes Top Bond of All Time"

Post by The Sweeney »

FROSTY wrote:
The Sweeney wrote:bringing in an action director, someone like Tony Scott, who has done similar films like Spy Game and Enemy of the State.
He unsuccessfully pitched for the QOS Directing job :wink:

They picked Forster over HIM??????? (clearly EON have never sat through his: CRIMSON TIDE :roll: - one of the best suspense thrillers that i'd seen in years!!)
Is that true? Do you have a link?

If it is true, that just p!sses me off!! What the hell are EON playing at? Choosing someone like Forster over Tony Scott.... :shock: :evil: :evil:
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