“It would indeed be ironic if the Golden Compass train-wreck scared studios away from Narnia”
I think the fact that Compass and Caspian basically made the same amount of money meant the 1st Narnia didnt impress, and didnt establish with audiences that they needed to see a 2nd film.
The problem here, however, is deflation + big budget = toxic.
Speilberg and Peter Jackson just had their financing for RinTin fall apart.
Dreamworks2.0 cant find a penny in financing. They’ve mothballed and will try again in Q2 2009.
That’s 2 more giant examples of what’s going on right now.
In deflation, only a true fool spends large on a product that wont hit the market for upwards of a year. Deflation means the price pyramid is cratering. It means sticker prices are falling, and wages will race them into the toilet.
Treader was carrying a 200 million budget. No stars, so that was all going to end up on the screen. You could kill the budget, bastardize the original novel so the ‘expensive’ stuff gets written out ... and still you’ve got a 150 million price tag.
When the film comes out and tickets have deflated $1 or $2 per seat, and that price is a result of theaters chasing customers because no one is spending ... enjoy your bankruptcy.
I don’t think we are going to see that kind of deflation in the next two years. I guess the point is that nobody knows for sure, so nobody can take risks of that size.
Valid, but the situation is more complicated. GC and PC made similar amounts worldwide (and Compass may have been slightly ahead expressed as return on investment). But going back to my #25, what matters sequelwise is domestic Box Office, and Compass only made $70M - a half Caspian. That gave a Compass sequel no chance, while Narnia III was on the bubble.