Sweeney Todd; Filmimg starts feb 5th- Page 4

[Michael Bennett]

Posted: 9/12/06 at 5:18pm

RENT and THE PRODUCERS and PHANTOM were just poorly made movies in general. Their failure was based more on that than specifically being poorly made "musicals."

They had had bad reviews and bad word of mouth. Thats a recipe to kill any movie - singing or not.

[munkustrap178]

Posted: 9/12/06 at 5:18pm

I don't know if unknowns still has much to do with it.

If a movie opened and I didn't know a single person in the entire cast, but it got glowing reviews and garnered some Oscar buzz, I would go. I think most people would.

[Michael Bennett]

Posted: 9/12/06 at 5:20pm

There are at least a half a dozen film musical projects in the works, with another couple of dozen being planned or considered.

I'm with you on wanting musical movies to become popular again, but frankly, we don't have anything to complain about - there are more musicals being made now than in the past 35 years!

[MrMidwest]

Posted: 9/12/06 at 5:32pm

"we don't have anything to complain about"

True to a certain extent, but at a certain point, if the majority of musical films continue to be of the same quality as a lot of recent film musicals, I'd almost rather they didn't make them at all.

[Paulyd]

Posted: 9/12/06 at 5:35pm

Very True, but really how many hit movies verus duds have we had. My hopes are high for Dreamgirls as Bill Condon is a great director. I hope too much of the score hasnt gone by the wayside. I think what outs many studio's off is the cost/ I work in Marketing for a film company in London, and they always dismiss new movie musical aquisitions.

[munkustrap178]

Posted: 9/12/06 at 5:40pm

I really think that DREAMGIRLS will be stunning.

[MrMidwest]

Posted: 9/12/06 at 5:51pm

You're probably right. I just don't want to get my hopes up like with Memoirs of a Geisha last year. There was so much buzz around that early on, but the film fizzled. I hope the people who are saying Beyonce and Jennifer are solid in the film are right.

I have this image in my head of the people involved with the Hairspray movie seeing Dreamgirls and thinking "Oh sh*t, we should've stepped up our game."

But I hope both movies will be good.

[Paulyd]

Posted: 9/12/06 at 6:06pm

i rwally wanted to see Hairspray when i was in New York over the summer, but i didnt have time. I think Dreamgirls will be a hot because of its cast, and the fact that it has some fantastic tunes in it. i wont remark on the Hairspray until i've seen it

[xoxRogue]

Posted: 9/12/06 at 6:06pm

Everytime I think this will crash and burn, I reread that people with actual talent (in one respect or another) are going to be involved and I start to get hopeful.

[munkustrap178]

Posted: 9/12/06 at 6:10pm

GEISHA hardly fizzled. It won three Oscars, and was nominated for a handful.

I thought it was great, but some disagree.

[MrMidwest]

Posted: 9/12/06 at 6:16pm

Compared to the amount of awards and acclaim it was expected to receive, I'd say it fizzled. It was the Cold Mountain of that year. I expected you to disagree, though, munk. I'm glad that you enjoyed it. I liked how it looked, but not how the story was handled.

[munkustrap178]

Posted: 9/12/06 at 6:22pm

I see. I did not read the book, so I guess it's not fair for me to judge.

[americanboy99]

Posted: 9/12/06 at 6:23pm

I think HAIRSPRAY may make this film look boring the audiences. I don't know if America can handle SWEENEY. Or if they want to.

[munkustrap178]

Posted: 9/12/06 at 6:25pm

America could handle UNITED 93 and WORLD TRADE CENTER, among hundreds of other disturbing movies.

We can handle god damn SWEENEY TODD.

[best12bars]

Posted: 9/12/06 at 6:28pm

Yes, but could they handle a SINGING "United 93" or "World Trade Center"...

[americanboy99]

Posted: 9/12/06 at 6:28pm

Maybe handle wasn't the best word. America didn't want RENT. I just think that HAIRSPRAY is going to be such a huge success, people are going to look at SWEENEY and say "blah".

But hopefully, that won't be the case.

Marketing with be key for this film.

That was oart of RENT's demise. It marketed to the completely wrong crowd. Commercial's on MTV made kids thin kti was going to be funny and fun, but no. One kid saw it and told another kid who told another kid that it was about AIDS. The cycle never ended.

[MrMidwest]

Posted: 9/12/06 at 6:33pm

I don't know if I think marketing Rent to the younger crowd was a mistake. I almost think not marketing it enough to a younger crowd was part of the problem, aside from it not being a very solid movie. I saw part of the Out Tonight video on MTV only once when Rosario was on TRL.

[munkustrap178]

Posted: 9/12/06 at 6:33pm

Americanboy, you are making no sense.

[americanboy99]

Posted: 9/12/06 at 6:35pm

What doesn't make sense? Do tell.

[munkustrap178]

Posted: 9/12/06 at 6:36pm

Marketing RENT to young people via MTV was the right choice. Where else would they plug it, on the Jesus channel?

And nothing about any of the RENT trailers would lead one to believe that it would be funny and lighthearted. They were not misleading, and were open about the content of the film.

[Raviolisun]

Posted: 9/12/06 at 6:46pm

Is this going to be the first Burton musical with music not written by Danny Elfman?

Updated On: 9/12/06 at 06:46 PM

[Ghosthost999]

Posted: 9/12/06 at 7:46pm

Phantom had amazing word of mouth. Its legs/multiplier was through the roof.

[munkustrap178]

Posted: 9/12/06 at 7:48pm

How did PHANTOM have good word of mouth?

Sure, a lot of people I know loved it - including myself - but more people hated it.

Before I had even seen the film, I had read about 50% more negative reviews than positive. Sure, it had a better word of mouth than RENT or THE PRODUCERS, but that's not saying much.

What do you mean by legs/multiplier?

[Michael Bennett]

Posted: 9/12/06 at 7:53pm

No film with "through the roof" word of mouth does as poorly as PHANTOM did at the box office. It is true that the roll out for the film was totally misguided, but if you look at the box office figures you can see that the per screen averages of the film tanked as the film went wide, with huge drop offs each week there after. A film's drop off percentage after opening weekend is always the best barometer of good or bad "word of mouth."

[bwayondabrain]

Posted: 9/12/06 at 8:02pm

i think the movie musicals sort of kept getting worse and worse- PHANTOM was great in my opinion, RENT was okay (the cast was too old, sorry), and THE PRODUCERS... im not even going to start

but i hope the next 3 movie musicals (DREAMGIRLS, HAIRSPRAY, and SWEENEY) redeem the term "movie musical" if you get my drift :P