M: The Golden Compass way over budget

[Will]

I'd heard a few mentions of this previously; especially in the article about New Line's recent financial woes which said that The Golden Compass has "soared over its original $180-million budget because of re-shoots."

Now it's confirmed the movie has indeed flown miles over its initial budget. It was actually initially $150 million - which, for reference, would put it at the same level as Transformers, PotC 3 and Troy.

Remember that "travelling compass" story about New Line promoting the film in the Far East? When I posted it, NL's representative was in Manilla; a report from the Phillipines turned up later where it was revealed exactly how much the budget has grown:

The studio has spent $205 million on it [so far]. The special effects alone cost over $80 million."

That makes it the 3rd most expensive film ever made. The two above it are King Kong, which was rather something of a pet project for Peter Jackson who could command anything he wanted after LotR; and Spiderman 3, which is solid gold banking-wise. Is TGC really going to pull in that many viewers?

[Rachaman]

This isn't good news. NL has banked a lot on this, just as it did with LotR. However, with LotR, it had a lot of foreign market deals locked in to defray costs, and they did principle photography on all three films at one go.

This means that Golden Compass is going to need to do excellent American Box Office numbers. They really bet that they could get lightning to strike twice.

[jessia]

do we know how much kidman and craig are each getting paid for their roles? and weitz for direction?

[Will]

This article says she was pulling in $16-17 million per movie in 2006. She's the highest paid actress in Hollywood after all. Daniel Craig meanwhileis sitting on $10 million for the next Bond, but in that case they have to pay more for him (to keep the same actor).

[jessia]

but they've already been contracted for the next two films, so craig's rates shouldn't have gone up too much yet right?

it's strange kidman earning so much when she has so little screen time.

[Will]

We still don't really know at what stage they signed up for all 3 though. Kidman has the power to wait until she's made the movie before agreeing to do the next two. It's really rare for an actor to do so many movies in the same series and to be signed up so far in advance; so they take more caution.

Considering Weitz apparently went begging to New Line to do the film (which is sweet); I doubt he's pulling in mega-mega-bucks.

[Rachaman]

This is even assuming they make the next two films. The North American box office (which is where they make the most money) is going to have to be very good in order for that to happen.

You'll be able to track this when the time comes on http://www.boxofficemojo.com

[Kyrillion]

Blimey - it's good news in terms of this film pretty much getting everything money can buy. But there's gonna be a lot of pressure to perfrom, you're right... and it does put the sequels in jeopardy.

I don't know anyting about film marketing of course but it seems a tad ambitious to me. And needless. LoTR didn't have a massive budget and achieved excellent special effects and had big-name actors...

I hope this doesn't result in any last minute bottling out of the still anti-Christian theme or trying to broaden the appeal in any other way. This sort of panic attack will only lead to a film that satisfies no one.

[Mockingbird]

I don't know anyting about film marketing of course but it seems a tad ambitious to me. And needless. LoTR didn't have a massive budget and achieved excellent special effects and had big-name actors...

I don't think it's the marketing so much as the actual production, and I should think that the production challenges/costs are rather higher than for LoTR. Each daemon probably costs like a $1M to create. Also, I don't recall that the LoTR stars were big names in the Hollywood sense until after that franchise, some of them were acclaimed but they weren't 'It' actors like Kidman and Craig.

But this is awful. It practically means that if this movie isn't like the biggest box office hit ever, it will be a disaster. How will they ever recover this cost otherwise?

On the bright side, they've certainly spared no expense. Just like how Dr.What'shisface spared no expense when he created Jurassic Park and we all know how that turned out.

[Will]

LotR certainly saved money by not having 'major' stars in it. I've always thought New Line hiring such a high-profile few cast members betrayed an insecurity on how the film would be received.

I'm sure people have already cottoned on, but this budget is getting close to the total LotR had, for all 3 parts. If New Line are going to make all this money back, they're surely going to have to get a bunch from merchandising.

[tato]

WOW, i always think that the 150 was already too much, now those 208 million. ok, everbody knows that the major boxoffice is the US, BUT, i think tgc will be sucessfull. its VERY dificult that the filme dont pass the 100 milion mark in the us, wich doesnt mean a BIG sucess, but its okay, cause we have the europe, a grand place that tgc will certain get 200 milions easily; i think in us that they get about 250 milions, i hope...

[jessia]

i think films are just more expensive to make these days, especially those produced by the major studios... i'm hoping it's because they have higher standards of pay for those more ordinary crew people working on the film and dependent industries rather than just the top people in the top wage/profile-tier.

[BenMech]

As I've said before, HDM doesn't have the years of love and buzz that LotR did in the US.

It's considered a very very very minor genre trilogy, whereas it is a full entity in the UK.

Sure, I want everything to succeed, and everyone who has been watching the marketing and BttS promotion has loved it, but it will need BIG BIG BIG buzz in December

[jessia]

i think this kind of expenditure alone is worthy of creating a great deal of industry/media buzz.

[Aurone]

Putting over $200 Mil these days seems questionable to me. Granted you've had some heavy hitters like The Pirates Trilogy and Spider Man Trilogy, but we've also had some major misses like Superman Returns and King Kong that where over that much money and didn't make the return prophet.

I'm not holding my breath just yet on the sequels, they had Eldest planned after Eragon, but after a decent Box Office and numerouse bad reviews, it's doubtfull we see it.

[moyeongsu]

So, everyone is in agreement to go see the movie as many times as possible to boost it's numbers? I have a feeling I'll see it atleast 10 times in theatres

[Aurone]

I'm trying to get my whole family to come, do a family outing at the late night show that often costs about 8 bucks per person, and there's 4 of us. I also ahve some on line friends who're interested, so hopefully that'll help.

[Somewhat]

I can imagine TGC being another Hook, a box office flop on a grand scale. The trick with PotC3 and Spiderman 3 is that they were the last films of a trilogy. I can imagine NL spending two hundred million on TAS, but not on this. I have a feeling that what actually happened was that NL agreed to give Weitz his pet project, make a very cool audience-attracting big-bears-and-hot-chicks-and-all movie, then backpedal and not do the other two movies. TGC can admittedly stand on its own, even if I'd rather it didn't.

The other possibility is that HDM goes the way of the Matrix trilogy. Er... I mean 'awesome movie and two other random films that are not in any way related to it'.

[Gabe]

i think films are just more expensive to make these days, especially those produced by the major studios... i'm hoping it's because they have higher standards of pay for those more ordinary crew people working on the film and dependent industries rather than just the top people in the top wage/profile-tier.

Eh, unfortunately the trend has been extremely inefficient...at least on the effects end. On movies like the last two Pirates they throw a ton of money at the effects, but with poor planning...it's extremely grueling work for the artists as it always seems to them like an iffy crap shoot if they get things done on time. It's what happens when you have idiot executives see things like War of the Worlds and its extremely short production and post production and expect the same results. It completely ignores the fact that Spielberg and the people he works with are the best in the industry and have everything planned out well ahead of time and everything is done very efficiently. Things are really teetering...a lot of effects places are closing or switching business because they can't keep up with what the execs want.


But anyway, I don't know that that's what's going on here (though I am reminded of why Weitz left to begin with, and can't help but wonder). Rather I think of the three main effects companies they hired for the CGI...all doing major work. If there are any complications with any of them then that could easily bump up the cost. (Though at least they seem to be on a bit more practical a schedule then Pirates)

The other issue though is the reshoots they did...if I recall much of the extra budget was for that. Typically reshoots are small studio type things, but the reshoots they did for TGC were on location (a difficult location) which is always expensive.

So yeah, I'm worried...I just hope that the movie itself is fine because it's going to be very difficult to make back that money.

[spyfly]

Personally I think its wonderful that they are throwing $200M+ to make my favourite book into a movie.

Have faith people!

Imagine the complaints here if they were trying to do this on the cheap. Some people are just never pleased.