Monday Morning Quarterback Part I
By BOP Staff
August 12, 2014
BoxOfficeProphets.com
Edwin Davies: I'm surprised by how well this one debuted, since even the most generous estimates had it opening in the mid-40s. The buzz around the project has been primarily negative ever since it was announced, the trailers looked terrible and the turtles themselves looked freakish and ugly. The explanation that makes the most sense to me is the strength of the Turtles brand, which now spans multiple generations, three separate animated series (including one that is currently in production and has proved fairly popular) and has managed to produce five feature film iterations. The success of this film seems to have been driven by families, who have come out in force two weekends in a row now thanks to Guardians and this, and the parents of those kids would have grown up knowing the animated series and the three live action movies, while their kids would have been introduced to them through the more recent show.
The existence of the new TV show is probably the key difference between this film's success and the more modest success of the 2007 animated feature, which earned only $54 million domestically and $41 million internationally against a $34 million budget. It increased awareness amongst the younger generation, and probably helped it bring in fans of the earlier incarnations who probably wouldn't have seen it if they didn't have to take their kids.
Matthew Huntley: I would agree with everything Edwin pointed out, and I too am surprised the movie opened this well (I never thought it would generate numbers greater than, say, $45 million, and then finish below the century mark - which is still possible, I suppose). One other thing I think contributed to the film's success was the fact that it is a reboot of the origin story and NOT a new Ninja Turtles adventure. It's essentially an updated version of the 1990s film's plot, and that familiarity and nostalgia factor probably drove older fans (who now have kids) out to the theater. They wanted to see how it was done differently. If this is indeed the case, then it's sad, because instead of trying anything new and different, studios are going to continue to simply recycle/update old material because they know that's what audiences will pay for, even though it's not exactly what audiences deserve, or even want.
Brett Ballard-Beach: "That's what audiences will pay for, even though it's not exactly what audiences deserve, or even want." I find very little I can add to Matthew's astute comment. Getting people to shell (no pun, this film doesn't deserve it) out big bucks for something they don't even want means your business model is the loop of infinity, and you deserve all the profit you get.
Jay Barney: I am not sure how Paramount achieved this result and am left grasping at reasons why this film has received such a positive reception. The generational factor seems the most likely here, as those people who were fans in the 1990s now have kids of their own. This is not particularly a kids’ movie, but in a weird way it is playing like a family film.
In my mind this opening is a larger statement as to how strangely the box office has performed this summer. Aside from Amazing Spiderman 2, Godzilla, and X-Men earlier, there really as not been any discussion about massive openers. Transformers can be added to that mix, but the number of films with smaller than expected first weekends have far outpaced the big ones. It wasn't until Planet of the Apes that things started to heat up again a bit, and now for two straight weeks it is almost as though it is okay to go to the movies again. It is strange.
This opening is huge in my book and very unexpected. It is crazy to think that tracking was off by nearly 30%. You just don't see that very often. Also, if you take a look at the numbers, I never expected Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles to be one of the top 10 openers for 2014 up to this point.
Finally, this is proving to be a not so bad summer for Paramount. Transformers was a massive hit. Hercules should make its money back when all is said and done, and TMNT is going to just do fine now. They have not put as many projects out there as other studios, but their recent investments have proven pretty sound.
Bruce Hall: I do think there's a tremendous amount of goodwill toward the Turtles franchise. My stepson loves TMNT and to my knowledge, he's never even SEEN them before. I also would like to point out that while (in my opinion) the trailers for this movie were awful and told me nothing of what the film was about, they WERE mesmerizing in an "I should really hate this but I can't believe how grotesquely realistic it all looks" sort of way.
I also tend to have a different view than Matthew of what general audiences expect or deserve. I've said many times, especially with regard to superhero themed films, that audiences don't KNOW what they want. That's why they're sitting in the theater. They're not looking to be told a story so much as they can't figure out what else to do with their afternoon, so why not go see some explosions? I've long decried the summer blockbuster trend of computer generated event films whose incomprehensible plots suffer at the expense of just finding a way to stretch $120 million worth of eye candy into two hours.
I do think that the success of Guardians energized audiences, and it's possible they were willing to come back out in force for what they hoped would be a similar experience. But as I said last week, even the majority of people who liked Guardians of the Galaxy probably can't tell you what the hell it was even about one week later. And in the case of the Ninja Turtles, I'm willing to bet the amnesia sets in for most people before they get back to their car.
I hear people say all the time of these kinds of films, "I hated that movie, it didn't make any sense." When I suggest why it might not have made sense - there was little to no plot, the characters were underdeveloped, it was full of vapid, meaningless action sequences that did nothing to advance the story - and the response is always "Oh, it's just a movie, Bruce."
Well, if that's your level of expectation, why were you disappointed? Time and time again, people walk into what will almost certainly be a visually arresting but narratively empty experience, and walk out shaking their heads. And yet they keep pulling out their wallets every summer. Hollywood keeps making these movies because people continue to be fooled into believing that there's a correlation between the quality of the visuals and the quality of the story.
In that (admittedly broad) respect, we do indeed get the movies we deserve.
Kim Hollis: I’m admittedly baffled by this film’s success. The actual characters themselves are ugly, and that ugliness carries over to the appearance and atmosphere of the movie in general. It looks dark and grimy. The only thing I can figure is that TMNT still has popularity amongst its core audience, which has aged up to a point that they have their own children to introduce to the characters. I suppose there might also be something to the notion that the goodwill from Guardians of the Galaxy carried over to the next frame, creating a “rising tide lifts all boats” situation.