Variety: Why Studios Must End Their Mega-Budget Obsession

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  • Variety: Why Studios Must End Their Mega-Budget Obsession

    "One of the most startling revelations about this summer’s duds is how accurately they were predicted. Cowen and Co.’s May 3 report forecast that at least four big-budget action adventure movies would fail, and analyst Doug Creutz modeled five: “Lone Ranger,” “White House Down,” “World War Z,” “After Earth” and “R.I.P.D.” “World War Z” was the lone outlier—just by the skin of its teeth."

    ...

    "Piedmont Media Research has begun to work with studios testing a film’s concept and correlating that to its box office potential. For instance, as early as February, the newbie company predicted “R.I.P.D.” would be one of this summer’s biggest flops. The film, which opened with a dismal $12.7 million domestic, earned a composite score of just 137, according to Piedmont’s consumer engagement rating system; a film needs to score at least 250 to be successful at the box office, according to Piedmont prexy Josh Lynn.

    “Instead of throwing money at a film or an actor and hoping for the best, there is a better, more analytic way to determine beforehand if a film is worth making, and at what specific dollar value,” Lynn said."


    http://variety.com/2013/film/news/bo...es-1200566353/

    I looked up this Piedmont company and read this on their website:

    "Testing on over 375 recent movies using cross-tabbed demographic breakdowns was able to determine, among many others, that films such as “Cowboys & Aliens”, “John Carter”, “Battleship” and “R.I.P.D.” would be notable domestic bombs, six months before release of any of these films. As well, the Consumer Engagement metric was able to determine early on that films such as “The Help”, “Chronicle”, “Zero Dark Thirty” and “The Wolverine” would be outsize hits."

    http://www.piedmontmedia.com/consumer-engagement-metric

    They get my love for the following quote:

    “Looking closer at the demographics, there are distinct and similar weaknesses with two big budget films, R.I.P.D. and Pacific Rim,” Olson continued. “While Pacific Rim rates better among men, both films perform very poorly among females of all ages, scoring just a third as well in that demographic as Marvel’s The Wolverine, for example. And with females making up 52 percent of the movie ticket-buying population, studios must tailor their marketing strategies to reach out to them, if they want their films to fully succeed.”

    http://www.prweb.com/releases/2013/6/prweb10798368.htm

    What I really want to know, and what I can't find, is HOW they test these concepts on audiences.
    Last edited by LauriD; 07-25-2013, 10:48 AM.
    "People who work in Hollywood are the ones who didn't quit." -- Lawrence Kasdan

    Please visit my website and blog: www.lauridonahue.com.

  • #2
    Re: Variety: Why Studios Must End Their Mega-Budget Obsession

    From the same article:

    "While the movie industry is on track for a record summer box office . . ."

    Let's see the studios actually start losing money before anybody talks about what they have to do to change their fortunes

    [P.S. Edit: http://www.thewrap.com/movies/articl...reaker-105621]
    Last edited by JoeBanks; 07-25-2013, 09:19 AM.

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    • #3
      Re: Variety: Why Studios Must End Their Mega-Budget Obsession

      [quote=LauriD;876155
      What I really want to know, and what I can't find, is HOW they test these concepts on audiences.[/quote]

      I believe you'll discover they use Glove puppets
      I heard the starting gun


      sigpic

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      • #4
        Re: Variety: Why Studios Must End Their Mega-Budget Obsession

        Originally posted by LauriD View Post
        What I really want to know, and what I can't find, is HOW they test these concepts on audiences.
        I think it's like candidates and messages in politics and like ads for potato chips.

        They poll. They run focus groups. Run historical comparisons using existing data and segment however many ways. I see that firm that ran H Clinton's campaign has a film research division.

        That guy that was in the news recently, Vinny Bruzzese? His company's website, unlike similar research firms, lays it on, quite like you might expect: http://www.worldwidempg.com/mpg-serv...nd-exit-polls/ (that is the last screen in their script-to-screen marketing spiel -- it begins with "assess the story" http://www.worldwidempg.com/mpg-serv...t-assessment/).

        Definite Interest Intensity (DII) and Title and Star Conversion (TSC) -- almost sound like real things.

        The sample sizes sound really very small. Not sure what that is about.

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        • #5
          Re: Variety: Why Studios Must End Their Mega-Budget Obsession

          Originally posted by -jam- View Post
          I think it's like candidates and messages in politics and like ads for potato chips.

          They poll. They run focus groups. Run historical comparisons using existing data and segment however many ways. I see that firm that ran H Clinton's campaign has a film research division.
          Yes, that part I understand. But what do they use to test on people? If it's an existing property like The Help or Wolverine there's name recognition and familiarity with the basic story.

          But how do they test Pacific Rim? Just say it's an homage to Japanese monster movies that involves giant robots and monsters? Do they show them trailers? Concept art? Or what?
          "People who work in Hollywood are the ones who didn't quit." -- Lawrence Kasdan

          Please visit my website and blog: www.lauridonahue.com.

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          • #6
            Re: Variety: Why Studios Must End Their Mega-Budget Obsession

            Lauri, as always, THANK YOU for posting articles/links.

            Very interesting and helpful.

            Good luck in the Page Awards

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            • #7
              Re: Variety: Why Studios Must End Their Mega-Budget Obsession

              Hi Lauri-

              I know you like to research, so this is meant well (as in, look, cool stuff) and not in a snarky way (just making sure):

              Concept testing seems like an established tool in market research. I have no domain knowledge and not as much interest as you, but my favorite lazy way into a subject is to run searches in google books and it looks like they use words, as in, they read concepts to people. (Not that they couldn't or don't use storyboards and video like they do in advertising concept-testing, I just found no references, and if they have a proof-of-concept short like they have directors make for some films, would they test it? Sounds likely to me but who knows.) Some search terms I used are concept testing, positioning studies, qualitative studies, proof of concept, etc. I just learned that they did concept testing on Titanic (read the concept and stars over the phone; girls were interested in DiCaprio). That there was concept testing, pre-script, as early as the 80s (with focus groups). That one author thinks such concept testing is rare (Marich).

              For TV shows, apparently, they read concepts over the phone to people or at previews for other shows: "one-paragraph descriptions of series formats to people who fit the profile of likely viewers." Source

              The script assessment services that were in the press recently are not qualitative. It stands to reason that only things that are similar to other things can be assessed in this way if "[m]oviegoers are not queried, but, rather, research companies use their expertise and database from other movies." Marich

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