Sasha Stone has been around the Oscar scene since 1999. Almost everything on this website is her fault.
Better late than never! Barbie was placed in Adapted at the Oscars but is in the Original Screenplay category here,...
Read moreThe Academy should take a bow this morning for bringing back the Oscars, restoring them to their former glory in...
Read moreThe Golden Globes went off well enough this past year that CBS has signed a five-year deal with the Globes...
Read more
There is a lot of capitalism, racism, socialism and oppression in this movie. Its a bit like 1984 but different. Why does Edgar not take the chance to get out while he can
This is a great SciFi thriller. Tilda swinton is great. And the story takes you in new directions. I also liked the idea of a second ice age and the speeding train. Boo hung Jo is a visionary filmmaker.
ok…i enjoyed it as well. but—so much talk about a movie that just hasn’t done much boxoffice at all. $3.5 miilion after how many weeks? and such great reviews? and a terrific cast including Captain America? is this the great experiment with movie releasing that offers simultaneous downloading and online viewing that is supposed to revolutionize the business? it hasn’t worked.
Snowpiercer has earned $83 million worldwide. More than twice what it cost. (Movies made in other countries somehow cost about 1/3 what Hollywood movies cost to achieve the same production quality and lavish look).
VOD distribution costs the distributor next to nothing and they keep virtually ALL that money. They don’t share a percentage with theater owners. VOD distribution doesn’t suffer the weekly deterioration that theatrical films have. Many films released on VOD will GAIN momentum the longer they’re available — rather than see the embarrassing drop-offs of -50% every week and -50% the next week and -50% less the 3rd week, etc.
Though it’s too soon to tell what the trajectory for Snowpiecer will be, Radius is happy because every million Snowpiercer earns is worth twice as much as the same million earned in theaters (that’s the new rule of thumb being used at the moment, because this distribution pattern is a new thing and it’s not easy to know how to measure these profits yet. There’s not enough cost/benefit precedent yet. The only way to know is to try it.)
One thing for sure though, Radius will easily earn back its distribution costs with no problem. Another thing for sure is that Snowpiercer has already doubled its $39 million investment for its producers and it’s all gravy now.
===
…so much talk about a movie that just hasn’t done much boxoffice at all.
SeattleMoviegoer, now I’ll try really hard not to be bothered by the suggestion that we should only talk about movies if they earn more than $100 million dollars.
…so much talk about a movie that just hasn’t done much boxoffice at all.
I guess I’m just grateful that you didn’t mock us for talking about Haneke’s Amour. Amour only earned $19 million worldwide — less than 25% what Snowpierder has earned. I can’t speak for the rest of our readers, but I really really enjoyed talking about Amour, for months and months. I appreciate that nobody told us it didn’t make enough money to warrant talking about. With all the interesting discussions we had here about Amour, I don’t recall Amour’s box-office every coming up in conversation.
Before anyone objects: “But Amour was a movie about elderly people dying!”
ok then, I’ll use Un prophète as another example. Action-packed gritty studly prison drama. Un prophète earned $17 million worldwide. Less than Amour. … does that mean it wasn’t worth talking about?
“But Ryan, that’s still not a fair comparison! Snowpiercer has lots of non-stop bloody action scenes and hand-to-hand combat!” – says a strawman
ok, you mean like Raid 2? Raid 2, which has earned only $2 million in America and another $2.5 million worldwide? Snowpiercer has earned 40x more than Raid 2. Is somebody going to give me a hard time for mention Raid 2 because it’s only earned 4.5 million? (It cost $5 million so it’s barely broke even).
by the way, and Raid 2 only earned $1 million in 950 theaters. Snowpiercer earned twice as much in 1/3 as many theaters. (and therefore 1/3 the distribution cost).
===
Does the problem with discussing Snowpiercer have something to do with its “Oscar prospects”? erg, I hope not. Snowpiercer isn’t designed to be an Oscar movie. Why lay those expectations on it. It deserves an Oscar nomination for Production Design and Editing, but there was never any chance that the Academy would honor this movie with any top-tier nominations.
And so? Are we not supposed to talk about Snowpiercer because it’s not going to be a Best Picture nominee?
It’s July. Should we just shut the site down until Telluride?
Amour, Un prophète, Raid 2, Snowpiercer — 4 very different ART FILMS made my international directors.
They only have one thing in common: Not enough smart people exist in America who will pay to go see ART FILNS. Art films never earn more than $20 million. So when one comes along that earns $83 million, shouldn’t we be praising it instead of sneering at the fact that a distributor is exploring ways to make movies like this available to 85 million households all at once.
Or should we be wishing that Harvey Weinstein put Snowpiercer in 3000 theaters up against Transformers. The way WB did with Cloud Atlas 2 years ago.
Cloud Atlas, which stuck to the standard distribution model and on its opening weekend earned about 50 cents more than Paranormal 4.
🙂
2nd time around, the film had me more in awe than the 1st time… this is the material classics are made of. It’s iconic, it’s poignant, it’s sharp, it’s risky. Love it, love it, love it.
Saw this movie the other day ironically. Such a weird little movie hard to even explain haha but no doubt, one of the, best directed of this year so far. Tilda Swinton was great as .usual. Man this movie was out there lol but I do appreciate originality.
This would probably be the version of the story sanctioned on the train’s “elementary school.” Snowpiercer is one of 2014’s best IMO if not the best so far….