MovieChat Forums > Blair Witch (2016) Discussion > almost cracked $40 million worldwide!

almost cracked $40 million worldwide!

posted 8 years ago by OrdinaryDay
15 replies | jump to latest

According to todays listing on Box Office Mojo, it currently stands at $39,992,000 million dollars - it only needs $8000 more to crack the big four-oh!

In other words it will finish its cinematic run in the same tens of millions bracket that Book of Shadows did!

Suck on that, haters who predicted this to be an epic flop! An 'epic flop' is a movie like Pluto Nash or Battlefield Earth, where the studio loses tens of millions of dollars on it! Fpr example, John Travolta was SO SURE that Battlefield Earth was gonna be a hit and make Scientology respected in Hollywood that in early 2000 he bragged in interviews about how big it was gonna be and how they were gonna make two sequels and an animated TV show about it. Instead it did not even make 30 Mil world wide on a budget of much more, the studio lost millions and all plans of turning it into a franchise were axed!

The studio made a small profit on this and it will do even better on DVD! I wouldn't be surprised if they make another sequel after this, albeit a direct to DVD one!

An epic flop this was not! Suck on that haters!

Definition of troll on IMDb - anyone who expresses a view different to mine.

[–] Mr_Pipes 8 years ago

I can't see how anyone could call Blair Witch a flop. It's made eight times its budget back. Why wouldn't the studio want to capitalise on that and make another one? I think there'll be a sequel.

[–] pecinqa 8 years ago

I can't see how anyone could call Blair Witch a flop. It's made eight times its budget back. Why wouldn't the studio want to capitalise on that and make another one? I think there'll be a sequel.

That's because you're only looking at from the most basic perspective.

There's far more costs associated with the film than just that 5 million dollar production figure. There's still things like post, and marketing.

For example, The Blair Witch Project had a production budget of 60k, but really ended up costing between 500-750k when it was all said and done. I think it would be fair to say Blair Witch cost at least 10 million to actually make, but we don't know the real figure.

Furthermore, the studio only sees about half of the box office return, sometimes less in foreign markets.

So, with a cost of approximately 10 million dollars, they've seen roughly 20 million in returns. Take my estimations with a grain of salt, but there is big difference between doubling your money, and seeing 8 times your investment.

Certainly not a flop, but clearly they had hoped to do much more than this.

[–] IMDbGigalo 8 years ago

Book of Shadows made 47.7M in 2000. That's 66.7M today. It made more domestically (42.4M) than this one did worldwide.

albeit a direct to DVD one!

Maybe even a TV movie!

[–] tizerist 8 years ago

When the Blu-Ray ships it will overtake PoS in profit. Word is spreading about how good this is. With the other movie, wording was spreading about how BAD it was.
So it will ultimately be more profitable.

[–] IMDbGigalo 8 years ago

Word is spreading about how good this is.

No, it really isn't.

[–] OrdinaryDay 8 years ago

as of today Blair Witch has reached $42 million world wide with foreign box office earnings exceeding those of Book of Shadows!

Definition of troll on IMDb - anyone who expresses a view different to mine.

[–] bjderr 8 years ago

I think the movie is a success. Box Office Mojo updated numbers and Blair Witch stands at 42.1 million worldwide. Joe Berlinger recently said Blair Witch 2 made 25 million on Dvd/Vhs sales and his residuals paid for his daughter's college. Hopefully Blair Witch will do the same. Blair Witch 2 Made over 26 million domestic and over 21 internationally. Blair Witch is going to end up with a smaller tally but I do not believe they spent 20-30 million on advertisement as one writer has claimed. It seems to be following the path of Blair Witch 2. Generally studios get 55% of domestic gross and 50% of foreign. The Blair Witch franchise (which I love by the way) seems to be following The Exorcist Franchise with one film that exploded at the box office and the rest never regained that momentum. I think what they did with Blair Witch was trying to stay true to both new and old fans. I think to get the franchise going it is time to bring back Josh Leonard and Mike Williams, its the movies anything is possible. I would loved to have seen Josh with a long beard, long hair, dirty and tattered clothes just walking by in a trance in a scene. Blair Witch was tracking for a 10 million opening up until the last week and then a Lionsgate exec said it had the potential for a final haul of over 60 million domestically making investors excited.

[–] IMDbGigalo 8 years ago

You're numbers are incorrect. Studios get upwards of 75% of the domestic total the first week. It goes down after that as studios essentially have to pay the theaters to keep showing that film instead of another new film.

The general rule--and it's by no means concrete given all the variables--is that studios get 50% of the WW box office. This very loosely takes into account lower foreign box office take and the tiered take of US box office. The longer a film is in the theater, the less the studio gets. That is why it being pulled quickly is a factor. The theaters don't want to show it and the studio doesn't think it's worth it to take the lesser sum.

Blair Witch was tracking for a 10 million opening up until the last week and then a Lionsgate exec said it had the potential for a final haul of over 60 million domestically making investors excited.

There is no way they'd even know what to project for the initial home sales numbers. What's more, unless the DVD package has a ton of extras, they shouldn't expect it to do well given how people did not care for it.

20M sounds about right. People keep asserting that because the budget was small, the marketing budget is too. You have to look at the screening numbers to gauge what they'd spend on marketing. Blair Witch opened in over 3000 screens. Even nearly 8 years ago a 30s primetime spot was over $100K. You wouldn't believe how quickly it adds up with TV/Print/Web advertising.

[–] bjderr 8 years ago

what numbers are you saying are incorrect? I thought the general rule has been 55% of domestic gross and 50% of the foreign of the final gross. I have also heard that the worldwide home sales usually mirrors the domestic gross. I know there are variables to all of this. I am just curious I like to follow how much a film may of actually brought home and it has gotten harder over the last few years because rarely are we ever given streaming revenue. Any help would be appreciated.

[–] IMDbGigalo 8 years ago

The general rule is 50% total. There are a ton of variables that go into it. The take of foreign BO can be as low as 25%. The initial week of release, studios get upwards of 75% domestic. That's why opening weekends are so important. The longer a film runs, the less they get. For instance, something like Titanic runs for months and after awhile it's nearly 100% profit for the theaters.

Say two films make 50M over a month. Film 1 makes 35/10/3/2 and Film 2 makes 15/12.5/12.5/10. While they both made 50M, the studio would get more take from Film 1 than Film 2 because of the tiering. If you wonder why films are so front-loaded and sometimes studios will actually try to trick the audience by pretending a movie is something it's not, this is why.

Projecting home sales is more tricky and it all depends on word of mouth and reception. Blair Witch was not well-received by fans or normies. The first weekend day to day actually went down from Friday to Saturday. Fans of it have seen it 4 or 5 times. They're not going to buy 4-5 DVDs, though. A plain-Jane DVD release of Blair Witch should not be expected to sell well, not in this day and age of netflix and piracy. Book of Shadows did not have to deal with that stuff. My personal hope is the DVD contains a lot of extra footage. This film really does seem to be missing a half hour of the second act. It might be decent if some things were expanded on.

The studio will make money on it, though. Whether they make enough they feel a sequel would be worth it, that's harder to judge. Given the WOM of this one, they shouldn't feel confident it would do the same numbers.

[–] bjderr 8 years ago

Thanks for the info I appreciate it. The front loading makes since, I remember when Godzilla (1998) came out Sony was demanding 90% for first weekend. I wish there were open grosses with home video/tv rights/ect as there is with box office.

[–] Doom 8 years ago

Above $42 million now.

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Wait a minute... who am I here?

[–] WildCat_7 8 years ago

This movie is complete trash and no amount of money it makes can fix that. That in itself makes it a FLOP.

[–] tomholland2016 8 years ago

We're discussing a subject related to the box-office. So, if it makes twice the budget, then most probably it's not a flop.

Study more about it ;)

[–] IMDbGigalo 8 years ago

We're

You're not discussing anything unless you're a sock.