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Disney’s MULAN – Are Audiences Getting Tired of Remakes?

Disney’s MULAN – Are Audiences Getting Tired of Remakes?

The first footage from Disney’s live-action remake of MULAN has landed, and it’s got plenty of people excited. But there’s also a good number of people who are already tired of seeing Disney dredge through its catalogue of animated classics for films to remake.

Since Kenneth Branagh’s CINDERELLA in 2015, no animated classic has been safe – and 2019 has already been the busiest year of all. DUMBO and ALADDIN have both already been released to mixed reviews, and they’re soon to be joined by THE LION KING in just a couple of weeks time.

And after that? We’ve still got MALEFICENT: MISTRESS OF EVIL (sequel to MALEFICENT) and LADY AND THE TRAMP (to be released exclusively on Disney+) before we even get to MULAN early next year!

At first glance, it might seem that Disney are in danger of over-saturating the market with remakes. However, the numbers don’t support that idea.

ALADDIN didn’t impress the critics (or us!) all that much, but that didn’t put people off, taking an extremely healthy $921.7 million at the box office. And just two years ago, BEAUTY AND THE BEAST managed a monstrous $1.2 billion!

The simple fact is that it doesn’t matter if a few people get tired of seeing these remakes because Disney has a core audience who will happily line up to see their films no matter what. Playing on childhood nostalgia and the strength of their own brand, these remakes are always going to be sure-fire hits.

And that brand strength gives these films yet another advantage: Disney doesn’t need to worry so much about casting big-name actors who will help attract audiences. Look at ALADDIN as an example, where the only famous name in the project was Will Smith. Just being remakes is enough to bring audiences in.

So don’t expect these remakes to stop coming any time soon. Disney has already announced a whole host more, including THE LITTLE MERMAID, THE HUNCHBACK OF NOTRE DAME, and LILO & STITCH.

You may be getting tired of the endless Disney remakes, but there’s a core audience which isn’t – and it’s that core audience that ensures they’ll keep getting made.

 

AVENGERS: ENDGAME conquers the box office

AVENGERS: ENDGAME conquers the box office

It’s no secret what kind of films are doing well at the box office these days – and which film in particular right now. Riding the wave of superhero successes, AVENGERS: ENDGAME, the 22nd film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, is destroying all the competition in its path.

To put the success of ENDGAME into context, the film broke more than a dozen records in its opening weekend alone, as reported by this article by Variety. Most notably, it had the biggest worldwide opening of all time and took just five days to reach $1 billion.

And it goes on. The Marvel movie is charging towards the all-time worldwide record held by AVATAR having now made $2 billion. It took AVATAR 47 days to hit that threshold. ENDGAME has managed it in just 11.

The Marvel Cinematic Universe was already the biggest grossing franchise in movie history, and looking at this unprecedented success, it’s easy for writers and producers alike to start thinking that franchises are the way forward – hence the DC Extended Universe and the attempted Dark Universe from Universal, which got off to a rocky start with their 2017 reboot of The Mummy.

But before you start planning out your own movie universe, a few words of caution. Looking at the other biggest grossing franchises, only two out of the top ten aren’t based on pre-existing books or comics. So it’s tough to create one from scratch.

It’s also worth noting that neither of those two – STAR WARS or THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS – set out trying to create a franchise from the start. They began with stand-alone films and grew from there.

Even the MCU did something similar with its earliest films, rather than trying to introduce too much all at once. It may have shown the potential for vast, interwoven universes in film, but it didn’t overreach itself in the beginning. It also relied on the strength of its source material.

So before you start writing that massive series you’ve got planned out in your head, you might want to start on a smaller scale. The MCU may be wildly successful, but it’s tough to replicate that kind of success.

Click here to read more about AVENGERS: ENDGAME’s record breaking success from Variety, and their assessment of whether it’ll be able to overtake AVATAR…

Why Bohemian Rhapsody is hitting all the right notes

Why Bohemian Rhapsody is hitting all the right notes

There are plenty of things that make us wax rhapsodic about a script: an exciting story, engaging characters, dialogue that jumps off the page… But we also look at a screenplay’s commercial aspects, such as its budget and chances at the box office.

That’s why it’s always important for a writer to always keep a finger on the industry’s pulse. Figuring out what sells and what doesn’t is vital if you want to be successful as a screenwriter, and right now, what’s selling is BOHEMIAN RHAPSODY.

The Queen biopic may have had a turbulent time behind the scenes, but that hasn’t affected its success. Variety reports that the film has taken a massive $72 million internationally in addition to $50 million domestically, adding up to a tremendous $122.5 million. For a film that cost $52 million to make, that’s a major success.

Our own Ian Kennedy has seen the film already. His verdict? “To my surprise, that hit all the right notes for me. Impressive screenwriting and musical concision, to balance everything they did, acknowledge the untold, and keep a PG-13 rating.”

Musical dramas have already enjoyed success this year with A STAR IS BORN being a critical and commercial success, and being eyed by many as a potential contender at the Academy Awards. Of course, this isn’t the only genre succeeding at the box office right now – but by paying close attention to these kind of things, we know what to look for when judging scripts for our competition.

It’s also interesting to note that BOHEMIAN RHAPSODY has achieved huge success at the box office despite its mixed critical reception, with a Rotten Tomatoes score of 60%. Much like the MAMMA MIA films, there’s more to success than just what the critics say!

We’re currently nearing the end of Standard Entry for our Winter 2019 Screenwriting Contest, from just $39 until this Sunday, 11th November. Don’t forget we’re also looking for scripts to be directed by 2x BAFTA winner and 2x Oscar nominee Habib Zargarpour, too – an opportunity not to be missed!

Click here to enter!

BLADE RUNNER 2049 Not running at full speed yet…

BLADE RUNNER 2049 Not running at full speed yet…

BLADE RUNNER 2049 Not running at full speed yet… maybe that’s not a bad thing though…

BLADE RUNNER 2049 may have had a slowish start to its Box-Office life, but that could work in its favor… sorta.
While the film may never be a blockbuster hit in the same vein as any Marvel film or STAR WARS, it could become a cult classic in its own right.

The original itself was never a big conventional Hollywood blockbuster either, so in that regard the sequel stays true to the original – which is great… for the fans. But it’s been such a long time since the fans and the theme of a film were prioritized over making some dough, and for that BLADE RUNNER 2049 has our backing (see Ian’s review as well for why).

Read more here: http://www.indiewire.com/2017/10/blade-runner-2049-box-office-cult-classic-1201885405/

© WriteMovies 2017. Exclusive to WriteMovies – To syndicate this content for your own publication, contact ian (at) writemovies dot-com.

Hollywood Box-Office Flopbusters: A Summer to forget

Hollywood Box-Office Flopbusters: A Summer to forget

Summer Box-Office flopbusters – Notice the trends of Summer flops to avoid the same pitfalls.

A Summer to forget for Hollywood… the worst grossing Summer in the last ten years, but just why has this happened?

The content has been there. WONDER WOMAN, SPIDERMAN: HOMECOMING, BABY DRIVER, THE DARK TOWER, DUNKIRK, WAR FOR THE PLANET OF THE APES. Of course, they’re different in quality and appeal, but these belong to some big franchises and film companies. But, this Summer has not been so hot.

It’s hard to remember many other films beyond these. If I asked you to name 15 films released since the start of June you’d probably struggle – hell, we’d struggle!

One of the issues is the ease which moviegoers can check a review and decide on whether it’s worth going to see and spend their hard-earned cash on. It takes less than 30 seconds to open up the IMDB app on my phone to check the Dunkirk rating (8.4/10, not bad, Nolan). And this is no doubt how a lot of people are choosing to see films now.

And so many of those low scoring films will just be forgotten. Remember how the BAYWATCH movie was released this Summer, or PIRATES 5 at the end of May? No, me neither. It seems that Hollywood films are becoming more polarizing each year – we’re losing middle ground and average, yet enjoyable, rom-coms and now receiving either complete trash or filmmaking brilliance. We think that script development professionals deserve a bigger voice in the studios’ choice of projects and scriptwriting – and our founder Alex is compiling the research that’ll prove it, we’ve already had a look!

The lack of comedy seems apparent this Summer. Summer action films are always likely going to be a hit, but there’s very little engaging or original comedies or rom-coms out there. Which is just sad for the Summer. Now, we have to settle for things like THE EMOJI MOVIE… We used to get much better quality and ideas…

Maybe this represents a need for better and more original comedies, but there’s also a sign that Winter is becoming the time to release films. The Oscar bait is usually released around Autumn and Winter time, plus the STAR WARS franchise (and before it THE HOBBIT trilogy) was released around Christmas to increase revenue… and it worked.

It’s worth looking more deeply into what films have flopped and why. Try and spot any trends that occur in the failures and do your best to avoid them.

Read more on Hollywood’s horrible Summer here; https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-08-11/hollywood-s-summer-from-hell

You can also see what sort of scripts are selling recently with Script Pipeline: https://scriptpipeline.com/category/script-sales

 

Exclusive to WriteMovies – To syndicate this content for your own publication, contact ian (at) writemovies dot-com.

© WriteMovies 2017

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