The View From Here III

I’ll lead off by admitting that ever since Universal mishandled the opening of Land of the Dead, I’ve had it out for them. But even someone without a grudge against the studio, using as their guide a normal definition of business success, would have to be asking themselves why the studio hasn’t been shuttered.

So far, Universal’s top grosser of the year is The Interpreter. Unfortunately, while the movie took in $72 million domestically, it cost $80 million to make. Kicking and Screaming, starring Will Ferrell, limped to an unremarkable $52 million. And the Hilary Duff vehicle The Perfect Man grossed a measly $16 million (albeit against a modest $10-million budget).

However, the Universal underperformer that folks can’t stop talking about is Cinderella Man, an $88-million movie that so far has brought in just $61 million. Personally, I think $61 million is a decent gross for a two-and-a-half-hour period piece about a boxer no one’s ever heard of with “Cinderella” in the title. But based on industry expectations, the movie has been labeled a failure.

Universal’s head of distribution, Nikki Rocco, recently moaned to USA Today about Cinderella Man that "good movies are supposed to buck this [downward] trend. You hear how it's all about the product, but we have an excellent movie that people just aren't turning out for."

Reading this, it’s easy to understand why Cinderella Man hasn't done better. Universal thinks it’s “all about the product”. They’re leaving it up to quality to sell their movies. When the critical community rallied ‘round Cinderella Man, Rocco sent his marketing department home for the month and waited for the cash to roll in.

Conceivably this is also what happened with Land of the Dead, which was actually slightly better-reviewed than Cinderella Man (see for yourself, here and here). Why bother marketing a movie that’s so damn good? After all, what people want is quality, and as the reviews proved, this is what Universal was putting out. So why cut into the bottom line with ads and stuff?

The problem is, of course, that it’s not all about the product. If it were, then the movies with the great reviews would be making all the money. What irks me about Rocco’s comments is the blame it disingenuously foists on the marketplace, as if Universal had tried to introduce some quality to the mix and got swatted down. It's the folks who made these good movies, which Universal then failed to promote properly, who should be complaining to USA Today.

I just hope Rocco engages in a bit of self-criticism -- and maybe even some housecleaning -- prior to the releases of Serenity and Jarhead. If not, then let’s at least hope the critics hate these movies so that Universal will feel forced to try and sell them.