sadly, "Producers" film continues to tank at B.O.- Page 4

[sabrelady]

Posted: 1/18/06 at 4:29pm

This will play very well in the Asian market prob Britain as well not so sure about a lot of Europe tho.

[TennesseeTwang]

Posted: 1/18/06 at 5:17pm

While I agree that musicals will never be as popular as they were during the heyday of the MGM musical, I think that PotO, Rent and The Producers would all have stood a much better chance of doing well at the box office if they'd simply been better films.

Yes, yes, yes, I know that each of these films has some very good things in them, not to mention the fact that they have fervent defenders on this board. The trouble is, not enough critics agree with those defenders.

As much as some people may hate reviewers, they do have the power to draw attention to smaller films or a genre of film that isn't done much anymore like Westerns or Musicals.

But they aren't going to recommend a film they think is bad simply to facilitate the popular return of the Western or Musical. Besides, that's not their job.

Also, on previous threads some posters suggested that people weren't reponding to these recent movies because they HATE musicals. Whether speaking about critics or audiences, this is perhaps the lamest excuse of all.

For one thing, most movie reviewers become critics because they love ALL types of film. And while there are audience members who don't like the idea of people bursting into song, those aren't the types that would be going to musicals in the first place. There have always been people like this yet musicals managed to flourish in the past spite of poeple who think musicals are silly.

The point is that there must be a strong consensus within the critical community and with early audiences that these films are actually good.

The rabid fans of the theatrical incarnations of these projects are NOT enough to make these films mainstream hits. That's why slavish adherance to their every demand and to the source material is more often than not, a TOTAL mistake.

[BigGuy]

Posted: 1/19/06 at 11:32pm

I saw it tonight at the Loews 34th Street. The direction was out of the early 30's. Some of the 30's style direction really worked well. The musical leads were shown in full body shots and were in the center of the screen most of the time. You could see their whole bodies dancing. The static camera may have been stagy, but it made following the action very easy. Very little camera work nowadays of dancers show people in full body shots like you would see if you were seated in the audience of a live show; in "The Producers" that's what you see. Vigourously moving cameras and alternate shots, like used on the Today Show and Good Morning America when they're presenting live music, make me dizzy.

There were a few camera shots that were homages to famous films, whether that was purposeful or not, I don't know. The Accounting firm sequence could have been lifted from King Vidor's "The Crowd". The sequence of Gary Beach, as Hitler, sitting on the edge of the stage dressed in red was a great send-up of the Born in a Trunk sequence of Judy Garyland in "A Star is Born".

I thought Uma Thurman was tall enough and pretty enough, but not a talented enough dancer and singer for the role.

The song and dance after the very end of the scrolling credits was a lot of fun.

[Radioactiveduck]

Posted: 1/20/06 at 12:54am

It died because they took out "King of Broadway". Without it, the first 1/2 hour just drags like no other, and I know several people who walked out because they didn't know it was going to get better.