{"id":3911,"date":"2007-07-26T13:51:00","date_gmt":"2007-07-26T13:51:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/brianjnoggle.com\/blog\/?p=3911"},"modified":"2017-11-25T13:47:34","modified_gmt":"2017-11-25T19:47:34","slug":"hollywood-moviemakers-lack-business-sense-instead-they-have-conscience","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brianjnoggle.com\/blog\/2007\/07\/26\/hollywood-moviemakers-lack-business-sense-instead-they-have-conscience\/","title":{"rendered":"Hollywood Moviemakers Lack Business Sense; Instead, They Have "Conscience""},"content":{"rendered":"

According to the Washington Post<\/i>, numerous filmmakers are going ahead with anti-war films<\/a>:<\/p>\n

On Sept. 14, Warner Independent Pictures expects to release “In the Valley of Elah,” a drama inspired by the Davis murder, written and directed by Paul Haggis, whose “Crash” won the Academy Award for best picture in 2006. The film stars Tommy Lee Jones as a retired veteran who defies Army bureaucrats and local officials in a search for his son\u2019s killers. In one of the movie’s defining images, the American flag is flown upside down in the heartland, the signal of extreme distress.<\/p>\n

Other coming films also use the damaged Iraq veteran to raise questions about a continuing war. In “Grace Is Gone,” directed by James C. Strouse and due in October from the Weinstein Company, John Cusack and two daughters struggle with the loss of a wife and mother who is killed on duty. Kimberly Peirce’s “Stop-Loss,” set for release in March by Paramount, meanwhile, casts Ryan Phillippe as a veteran who defies an order that would send him back to Iraq.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So Hollywood is going to try to educate us how to think, again. I have a bit of advice, Hollywood: If you’re interested in how the heartland (read: your customers) thinks about their country and its military, perhaps some comparisons are in order.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
Title<\/b><\/td>\nBudget<\/b><\/td>\nBox Office<\/b><\/td>\nDifference<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
300<\/i><\/a><\/td>\n65,000,000<\/td>\n210,614,939<\/td>\n145,614,939<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Jarhead<\/i><\/a><\/td>\n72,000,000<\/td>\n62,658,220<\/td>\n9,341,780<\/font><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
 <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Rambo: First Blood Part II<\/i><\/a><\/td>\nn\/a<\/td>\n150,415,432<\/td>\nn\/a<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
First Blood<\/i><\/a><\/td>\n15,000,000<\/td>\n47,212,904<\/td>\n32,212,904<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Born on the Fourth of July<\/i><\/a><\/td>\nn\/a<\/td>\n70,001,698<\/td>\nn\/a<\/font><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
 <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Courage Under Fire<\/i><\/a><\/td>\nn\/a<\/td>\n59,031,057<\/td>\nn\/a<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Three Kings<\/i><\/a><\/td>\n75,000,000<\/td>\n60,652,036<\/td>\n14,347,964<\/font><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n

I realize this is not a comprehensive survey of box office and really reflects my own taste as much as anything else, but the more, erm, message-driven reeducational sorts of films don’t seem to do so well as the patriotic or less nuance-principled films, at least domestically.<\/p>\n

But maybe Hollywood isn’t making films for us any more; perhaps they’re focusing on the foreign markets or on impressing themselves and the Academy.<\/p>\n

However, allow me to predict that this story will participate in next year’s “Box Office Revenue\/Ticket Sales Continue to Decline” story. Followed, no doubt, with industry claims that piracy is causing it instead of disconnect between the moviemakers and movienotgoers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

According to the Washington Post, numerous filmmakers are going ahead with anti-war films: On Sept. 14, Warner Independent Pictures expects to release “In the Valley of Elah,” a drama inspired by the Davis murder, written and directed by Paul Haggis, whose “Crash” won the Academy Award for best picture in 2006. The film stars Tommy […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3334,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3911","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-movies"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brianjnoggle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3911","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brianjnoggle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brianjnoggle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brianjnoggle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3334"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brianjnoggle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3911"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/brianjnoggle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3911\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17932,"href":"https:\/\/brianjnoggle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3911\/revisions\/17932"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brianjnoggle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3911"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brianjnoggle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3911"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brianjnoggle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3911"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}