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You did, but I still don't understand -- WEEKS later -- what exactly you're trying to clear up.

You're cooking what for dinner?

Did you just imply that the second biggest domestic grossing film of all time, will do what other films do in the post theatrical markets? Really? Come on man. Come one. "BIGGEST DVD EVER" may be attached to TDK in future. Here's hopin!

Yawn.

From a purely business angle, this film will absolutely be limited by its content. Word of mouth about the personal and realistic violence of the film will keep women and younger kids out of the theater after opening weekend and waiting for DVD. And the length of the movie will cost a screening a day on opening weekend… more in big multis where four or five screenings a day will be lost. Obviously, there will still be plenty of room for a massive opening weekend gross. But the pre-word-of-mouth opportunity will be lessened. And no matter how good the film, the darkness will be a factor.

Had this been two 110 minute films, the box office for both would have been nearly identical, doubling the total revenue while increasing costs by roughly a third. A win all around.

That new Aimee Mann record is goood...

Filmsnob: WORD!

Rob: indeed it is.

If I'm reading this right, Dave, you're saying the studios are selling short by front-loading theatrical so they can cash in on nontheatrical, but the more genre-focused studios become with their wide releases, the more they are actually narrow-casting in the ancillary markets.

For example, theatrical TDK only has to compete with what else is playing, for once a person's decision is made to go to the theater, all other leisure choices have already been eliminated. But TDK on disc has shelf space with all other disc-based properties in the same store with the same target buyer, meaning its in competition with whatever new games are also being released. The caveat for TDK is that it is TDK, but that cannot be said for Hellboy 2, Inc. Hulk, Wanted, Hancock, Mummy 3, etc...all who will be hunting the same 14-35 demo which isn't as big as the 50+ audience that will not be renting any of the above titles, but the ones that are considered loss leaders. So Swing Vote may bomb in theater, but it will do exceptionally well on disc because it has an entirely new audience waiting, while genre titles are banking more on direct sales than rentals, in the age group where piracy is dominant.

From a microscopic perspective, it's all about TDK. From the macroscopic, it's about business. TDK is a fluke, a convergence of all things and highly improbable to happen again. You cannot quantify Ledger's death or the value of Batman89 with the right demo at the right time. So where you see Dave attacking TDK, I see a guy forecasting all the bad business model replicas that are going into the pipeline and how it can be a case of cutting your nose off in spite of your face, regarding loss leaders. The dismantling of the dependents is apart of the larger thought.

I would be interested to read DP's thoughts on what the implications of all of this is for actual production choices. It sounds like it means more of the same as far as reducing the 'middle class' of production and emphasizing budgets over $100m and under $10m, but is that really the case?

I ask because that's the aspect of this discussion that actually has implications in the real world as far as I'm concerned, specifically as far as which and what kinds of movies I'll be watching in theaters in the next several years. I could give a rat's ass about DVD profit margins except as how they relate to what gets greenlit.

Martin: very interesting stuff, but you forgot one key aspect in that disertation. The people who go and see genre movies... buy genre movies. While the 50+ crowd are still stuck in the old paradigms of renting and PPV.

So I get the point you are making Martin and the point you believe David is making, but genre films are bought on DVDs. So how is frontloading killing something, when everyone is going out on those TUESDAYS to buy those genre titles on DVD? It's like we have two frontloading business now: theatrical and DVD.

Finally Jeff (sorry for misspelling your name and all) there are films greenlit all the time with middle of the road bugets. Those budgets just happen to be getting bigger as well. So I would reckon that DVD profit margins and what not. Do play into how these middle of the road budget flicks keep getting made. It's not like Harold and Kumar 2 exist without DVD.

IO - The fact is that none of this was really about smacking Dark Knight. And that the DVD sales of the film will be similar enough to, say, Iron Man, that the variation is not going to be as electrifying as you'd like to argue.

This is not a flaw of The Dark Knight. This is where we are. If the film sells 20 million units worldwide, yes, it's a lot better than 14 million units worldwide. But you're talking about an $80 million variation in the revenue stream of over a billion dollars. And WB splits that with Legendary.

$40 million is $40 million. But WB will throw more than a quarter of that at a loss leader like The Women and half at a Best Picture campaign for TDK and that extra $10 million? Maybe they'll save it for Nolan's next deal.

And if WB wants to chase TDk being the biggest DVD seller ever? They will cut the price by a few more dollars and that $40m is down to $15m, even with increased sales.

And that's my point.

Why can't some of you see past the defense mechanism and grasp the bigger picture?

God Bless The Dark Knight!!! All hail!!!!

Shrek 2, the last #2 all time domestic movie, didn't keep DreamWorks from going out of business.

Get it?

David: it's rather simple. A spade is a spade is a spade. I have read you long enough and can sense your shenanigans coming from a mile away. If you do not get how that would get people's defense mechanisms going. You really need to think about how your actions effect other people :D!

Some seriousness and tail-end silliness aside; you have got to be kidding me with thinking Iron Man and TDK will even come close to having similar DVD sales figures. Seriously, this is what's so frustrating about you... you're too rigid. You fail to open your eyes to the whole picture, fixate on one part of the picture, and assume blowing up that one part reveals EVERYTHING! When really it's only a part of the picture.

So you stating that TDK and Iron Man will some how share the same space DVD-wise. Ignores the fact that one is a good movie and the other is a phenom. When have phenoms ever sold like good movies on home video?

Your whole thing about PRICING also ignores the market place. When was the last time you looked in a Sunday circular at DVD prices? IF you have the La Times lying around you house. Go look and notice the trend in DVD prices.

TDK and Iron Man will both sell for around 15.99 to 16.99 retail. Unless you go to those certain places that love to act like a single-disc for 20 bucks is a sale. The two-disc of both will sell anywhere from 22.99 to 24.99. I would reckon TDK would go for the two bucks more, but this movie is MODERATELY successful. SO I am thinking that they are going to price them along the same lines.

So what makes one different than the other? Hmmm. I wonder? See? THE BIGGER PICTURE always alludes you.

Yeah, Shrek did not keep Dreamworks from going out of business, because you know why. They made a bunch of bad choices. What does one have to do with the other?

IO - I agree about the purchasing of discs, but the piracy quotient is astronomical for genre movies compared to straight dramas, and that offsets a good chunk of TDK rentals. As you know, people who download TDK are more interested in the having it on hand than the watching it right then and there. It's a hoarding mentality and that does cut into rental numbers.

TDK will be big in moving units, but if WB puts out a bare bones disc like they did for Begins, Iron Man and possibly Inc. Hulk will bury it in actual purchases.

IO - I appreciate that you are being straight in this conversation, but you are obsessing on the trees and missing the forest. If you want to blame your alleged psychic insight into my "shenanigans" so be it, but perhaps you should abtually try reading what I am writing without your personal biases. WB had the worst summer in movie history two summers ago and all they did was to dump their marketing chief. If you want to narrow things down to "bad choices," yoou have ot be consistent to be fair.

You know, had Sharon Waxman and the NYT actualy followed up when the box office started turning up again, I would have forgiven them the idiocy of The Slump. But instead of just reporting towards the truth, as it happened, they kept selling the same shit and actually avoided teh upturn for four long months.

Of course TDK ad IM will have different DVD sales... but you are ripping into me after I wrote that one could sell 40% more units and still not change the bottom line in a way that would seriously change the studio bottom line.

My whole thing about pricing IS the market place, IO. You seem to be obsessing on The Dark Knight. What I am fully aware of is that TDK will be for sale at Blockbuster and elsewhere for under $10 by next January. And that's where the pricing problem for the industry is. And when TDK - or the next mega-smash - is delivered by internet, the price will not be higher than that DVD price. It can only be lower.

And J-Mc.the effect of this issue has barely begun to sink in yet. But yes, we are seeing stratification. Mid-range films are getting more expensive and lower-range films are simply not being made right now at studios... Warners, MGM, Sony (which was never really there, aside from hard genre), and Paramount are all out of the $6 - $18 million mainstream movie business. And because they so strongly dominate distribution, the fight for the new independents to fill that void has been unhappy to date.

I believe someone will eventually stop, think, and fill the future. There is a demand and there is money to be made. But a new idea of how to make it work financially will have to emerge.

Funny thing is, a couple of years ago, the big complaint was, before the dependents shifted from acquisition to production, the mid-range films had disappeared -- it was either high or low. Then, once the dependents started producing, with budgets ranging from $15M to $40M, the small films vanished and they were left with a less profitable model.

I still think that Roger Corman's old model, based around the idea that a $2M budgeted movie cannot lose money (between all the revenue streams it'll at least break even), is still dead-on.

What I am fully aware of is that TDK will be for sale at Blockbuster and elsewhere for under $10 by next January.

Yet, $10 is still more than the average ticket price, and January is still after the Holiday buying season.

And when TDK - or the next mega-smash - is delivered by internet, the price will not be higher than that DVD price. It can only be lower.

As manufacturing and shipping costs aren't factored in, and distribution fees are competitive. Damn right the price will be lower (and thus more accessible).

"I still think that Roger Corman's old model, based around the idea that a $2M budgeted movie cannot lose money (between all the revenue streams it'll at least break even), is still dead-on."

I used this very argument with a producer last week.

He gave me the impression that he'd find a way, though, for such a movie to lose money.

"Mid-range films are getting more expensive and lower-range films are simply not being made right now at the studios"

And DP, what do you think the implications of this are aside from 'somebody someday will pick up this money off the ground'? It seems like a genuine problem worth worrying about to me, and not just one of your two dozen 'it is what it is' topics.

Where do direct-to-video flicks fit into all of this? I was under the (obviously mistaken) impression that the majors had coooled on producing DTV titles. But just this month alone, there will be three major DTV releases: The Art of War II: Betrayal (with Wesley Snipes), Starship Troopers 3: Marauder (with Casper Van Diem returning from the first Troopers) and The Scorpion King 2: Rise of a Warrior (directed by Russell Mulcahy). And the latter two appear to be getting major advertising campaigns. (I think I saw no fewer than three TV spots for Scorpion 2 while watching a baseball game Saturday.) I know Snipes (like Jean-Claude Van Damme and Steven Seagal) has been doing DTVs for years, and I'm assuming his salary counts for more than half the budget of each one. But what about the F/X-heavy titles? What are the budgets for these things? What's the break-even point for them?

VAN DAMME = TOTAL OWNAGE.

Martin: you know everyone puts out the BARE-BONES disc and the TWO/THREE DELUXE discs these days. Iron Man has two versions coming out next month. Hulk will most likely have two versions as well. So Warners are just going with the flow. This does not change the fact that TDK will be on Itunes, and will make money that way. Thus leaving me wondering if the rental part of this discussion is a bit suspect.

David: YOU KEEP MAKING IT ABOUT TDK. I just keep trying to tell you that you should stop. I am simply making the point that you are hating.

You are also not in the business of used media. If you were. You would realize that something like TDK will usually hit around February. This is how it works, but the 10 bucks does not change anything. Only suckers buy 10 buck disc from Blockbuster. Do you like scratches on your DVDs? If so... I can clean them for you.

Nevertheless Heat, you are still underselling TDK's numbers, but this time on DVD. So excuse me for not pointing it out/

"So you stating that TDK and Iron Man will some how share the same space DVD-wise. Ignores the fact that one is a good movie and the other is a phenom. When have phenoms ever sold like good movies on home video?"

The Dark Knight is a phenom, but now you're the one understating things when you call Iron Man a good movie. It was its own kind of phenom until this MEGA-BALLISTIC-phenom followed in its wake. People were pissing themselves over Robert Downey Jr.'s performance before Ledger made 'em shit their pants too.

Hal: thanks for bringing that up. Here's my conjecture on this: Iron Man is being released in September. TDK is being released 17 days before Xmas. Outside of the fact that one is going to blow the other way on a box office and cinematic scale. TDK is a Xmas DVD. It will most likely be one of the KEY DVDs of this Xmas season. So this alone should help TDK sell more DVDs than IRON MAN by leaps and bounds. If this has still not explained it. I will work it out some more for you.

On a more somber note Morgan Freeman was badly injured in a car crash last night. It raises the spectre that "The Dark Knight" is cursed.

IO - yes, bare-bones followed by SE's are common, but Begins did not get one until a month ago. That's my suspect with WB. They like to wait it out, such as Superman and the 90's Batman SE's. If they go full-on with TDK it will be huge, but something is telling me it might only be for Blu-Ray, which is apparently the Inc. Hulk strategy.

Joe - Troopers is somewhere under 20Mil. Most was covered by presales. You're right that it seems expensive for a STV, so I'm wondering if it wasn't considered for theatrical at some point. IIRC, Scorpion King 2 was initially a theater release, but at some point Rock walked away. It was being poised as the "new" Conan for years.

IO - good point about release dates.

Martin: Begins actually got a special edition in 2005. They simply re-released the special edition last month with some movie cash and a TDK thumb-drive.

Chuck: 1997 Nissan Maximas are pretty tough cars, and I have seen one flip over with my own eyes. So I am hoping that the Maxima did enough of it's job, and kept Morgan and his lady-friend from getting severly hurt.

"If this has still not explained it. I will work it out some more for you."

Me? Don't need it. I wasn't discussing their respective DVD sales. Just putting a correction in on your estimation of Iron Man. I didn't see the need to be somewhat dismissive of its own success in order to make the DVD argument for The Dark Knight. As you've already pointed out, TDK having the Christmas season release date, in addition to other advantages, guarantees a certain level of dominance.

"In the movie business, The Dark Knight can still dominate at the box office. And in post-theatrical markets will look a lot more like other movies this summer than you might expect… because the post-theatrical marketplace has been commoditized much more so than theatrical."

Hey David, could you expand on this point? I don't understand how being commoditized would bring TDK's sales down to earth. Even granting that niches could cut into sales for blockbuster films, The Dark Knight seems like it would be an exception somehow since it touches on multiple niches in the market.

And I, umm, actually don't even understand the concept of a commoditized post-theatrical marketplace, so if you could do a quick "commoditized marketplaces for dummies" that'd be much appreciated as well.

Great question Joe. I'd tell you but then I'd have to kill you. No seriously, who the hell knows? There's no transparency, so there's uncertainty with the nano and the $6-18 mil movie. This is the area where commodification is most in question.

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