The Full List of "Crimes" Committed by Fox's Tom Rothman

[I Am The Knight]

Honestly, Drangoball(s) is looking to be a bomb on the level of Speed Racer - One of the biggest bombs in history!

 

[dark_b]

with speed racer they at least tryed something new. they tryed to bring something new to the movie from the anime.

 

[hammerhedd11]

Well, even it isn't a big hit, Australia was really good and doesn't really have the mark of a Fox movie.

 

[I Am The Knight]

Oh I loved Speed Racer, but financially, what a disaster. Dragonball(s) will probably be the same, and should be!

 

[dark_b]

Oh I loved Speed Racer, but financially, what a disaster. Dragonball(s) will probably be the same, and should be!

i am no movie expert but when i watched speed racer i was not suprised that it bombed.
and i like the movie. but dear lord how can anyone expect 200 milions domestic?

 

[Theweepeople]

Well, even it isn't a big hit, Australia was really good and doesn't really have the mark of a Fox movie.

You're right except Fox made two blunders with this film. First off the release date sucks. How many artistic films of this nature have done well with this release date? Secondly where was the marketing? We are talking about a film with a budget of 150million and I barely saw a commercial for this picture. One of my friends who is a Hugh Jackman fan had no idea what I was talking about when I mentioned this film.

Finally, I just find it funny to see another one of Rothman's predictions to turn out wrong. In an interview a few months back he tried to downplay last summer's disaster by predicting a strong boxoffice gross for Fox movies during the fall and winter periods. Since the summer Fox has released one moderate flop(City of Ember), one lukewarm boxoffice gross(Max Payne), and one film(Australia) that appears to be the biggest flop of the year.

Right now Fox is the only major studio with one film to break 100million domestically. The Day the Earth Stood Still will be Fox's last chance at avoiding having the lowest collective box office gross for 2008.

 

[TheVileOne]

A lot DB's budget probably went into getting it out in front of the cameras before the strike.

 

[Spade]

It'll have a huge opening, thanks to the fans. But I see a really big drop in the overall take past that. The kids from the era when Dragon Ball Z was popular are gradually growing up, and fellow fans are not liking the bits and pieces of what they see so far.

 

[DorkyFresh]

A lot DB's budget probably went into getting it out in front of the cameras before the strike.

ding, ding, ding!!! we have a winner! that's why they got Stephen Chow to make some changes and James Wong to pretty much rewrite the script. they don't strike me as part of the Writer's Guild.

 

[Spade]

I think safe to assume, based off of what passed as a first draft, that the final product will be slightly better than the Kamen Rider series The CW's going to be airing. Maybe.

 

[TheVileOne]

Thing is, I was one of those kids who 8-10 years ago absolutely loved DBZ. I watched every episode. Bought the toys, tapes, DVD's. Read the manga. Now I just can't ****ing stand DBZ. Actually, these days its more like I'm tired of it. I mean I like DBZ, and I'm thankful it got me into anime more, but I really have no desire to enjoy it anymore or even have any interest at all in this bomb of a movie.

Also, a fanbase for an animated show, even a really popular one does not guarantee tons of box office dollars.

DB is a huge worldwide brand that is still very popular. Significant fanbase yes. But if the movie is God awful, it will still bomb.

 

[DorkyFresh]

I think safe to assume, based off of what passed as a first draft, that the final product will be slightly better than the Kamen Rider series The CW's going to be airing. Maybe.

i guess...it really doesn't matter to me anymore. this Dragonball movie is about as close as anyone could get to raping my childhood. the only thing that could be worse is if the Last Dragon remake (which i'm looking forward to) happens to suck *knocks on wood*. luckily, Fox has nothing to do with that movie.

 

[Doctor Jones]

Yep, I remember DMZ. I loved it as a kid. I'm now grown out of it. But I won't be seeing this film. It just looks like crap.

They should of made a DBZ film. I don't care about how Goku came to be. DBZ was the most popular.

Anyone remember in some movie magazine they had casting ideas for a DBZ film? If done right, a DBZ film could be really great.

 

[Spade]

It could, but- unfortunately- the people behind it went in with a script that celebrates nothing from Toriyama's series. This reminds me of the Godzilla remake. That film had potential, but instead of looking at what made the first Godzilla movie classic they chose to make it MTV fodder. Look how that turned out.

I still love the manga. I liked the anime, but if you want a good story without all the filler the manga's the way to go.

 

[Shifty]

And now he wants to remake Conquest of the Planet of the Apes. And reboot the franchise, again.

 

[DACrowe]

Meh, I don't hate Rothman. He's just a businessman looking at the bottom line.

I actually think when it comes to prestige pieces or risky pictures Rothman has some guts to go with what the director or filmmaker wants. For example he gave Baz Luhurman pretty much free reign on Moulin Rouge, which is a very odd picture and I'm sure the dailies were scary as ****, but it was IMO one of the best movies of the decade (I still need to see Australia). It probably comes from being one of the execs who put their head on the chopping block for Titanic in '97 and stood by Cameron and it paid off.

But when it comes to blockbuster movies and escapist cinema, he views them as nothing more than money making machines. When it comes to the studio's prestige movies, he is far more considerate. But with these he wants them short, stupid and easy to make money. That I dislike as he shows a lack of value for the audience (and fans for that matter of built-in franchises) and thinks they want dumb quick entertainment.

It is unfortunate, albeit he may be right about fans because no matter how much he butchers X-Men or FF, they still show up, don't they?

The worst cases I have seen (besides Norrington, but I never thought Norrington was that good) was his continual antagonization of Bryan Singer that led to him losing a true auteur two-thirds through a solid trilogy and then to show Singer up, rushes a mediocre third installment to theaters with a terrible screenplay and mediocre director. And he knew it was bad, he just didn't care, because he knew if he threw in more SFX and made a kickass trailer that made this look like ROTK, the audience from the first two and then some would be there. And he was right.

Still that was lowly. The other is Ridley Scott's Kingdom of Heaven. First, he is forced to use Orlando Bloom instead of his rumored choice of Paul Bettany. Okay, that sucks but I don't know if it was Rothman who came down on pushing for Bloom.

But the worst thing is they keep telling Scott and Monahan to dumb down the screenplay. Scott keeps his intricate script mostly in tact (though Guy has gone from a complex character to a caricature villain) and shoots the movie. They show it to Rothman and the execs. at Fox who wave their contract to insist on a 2.5 hour movie.

They make Scott cut out almost all of the subplots not pertaining to the action and dumb down all the characters, most especially the two leads (so much so, Eva Green refused to promote the movie) and turn a complex epic drama about religion, war and the Middle East into a 2 hour and 15 minute action/adventure movie. Scott's real movie, the 3 hour and 10 minute cut gets released the following Christmas in one theater during, if I remember correctly, Christmas week.

That is inexcusable and what would have gone down as one of the better epics of the last ten years is going to be forgotten as Rothman and Fox saw a Ridley Scott opus as nothing but a bottom line action movie. **** with Story's Fantastic Four all you want, it is still going to suck no matter what. But a Ridley Scott movie about the Crusades? Really?

AVP was a terrible idea, so I don't mind and while I dislike him cutting DD down to a 100-minute movie (albeit it turns out Johnson isn't a very good director and the 2:15 cut is only marginally better) and turning FF into a sitcom.....that is just his studio's decision. I really don't see the need to hate a man viscously over that. Just don't see those movies.

Who knows, maybe The Dark Knight being the highest grossing movie the decade will inspire Rothman and the like to strive for more out of their "popcorn" entertainment? Probably not.

 

[dark_b]

so if he did that to R. Scott then what would stop him to destroy Camerons AVATAR?

ridlley maybe didnt make 1 bilion dollars to FOX but they guy has talent. and you dont doubt ridley scott for christ sake.

 

[danoyse]

Well, even it isn't a big hit, Australia was really good and doesn't really have the mark of a Fox movie.

And it looks like it had decent opening weekend after all:

http://www.usatoday.com/life/movies/news/2008-11-30-boxoffice_N.htm

Baz Luhrmann's Australia exceeded expectations by about 20%, landing at No. 5 on both the three-day ($14.8 million) and five-day ($20 million) chart, while Gus Van Zant's acclaimed Milk, a drama about the assassination of San Francisco supervisor Harvey Milk and mayor George Moscone, opened on just 36 screens but took the crown for per-screen average with a whopping $52,627 over five days for a $1.9 million total.

This is more a Baz Luhrmann movie and not so much a Fox product - at least in the sense that we all know and mostly despise. Baz has a lot more control over the stuff he does.

 

[I Am The Knight]

so if he did that to R. Scott then what would stop him to destroy Camerons AVATAR?

ridlley maybe didnt make 1 bilion dollars to FOX but they guy has talent. and you dont doubt ridley scott for christ sake.

I think Cameron is too powerful to let Cockman f*** with him. Ridley, not so much.

(He's still great, though)

 

[dark_b]

I think Cameron is too powerful to let Cockman f*** with him. Ridley, not so much.

(He's still great, though)

and Rothman looks like he is more crazy every year.

i just hope for the best.

 

[I Am The Knight]

and Rothman looks like he is more crazy every year.

You could say the same about Cameron

Anyways, I think Avatar will be fine. It's all the other Fox movies we need to worry about.

 

[Theweepeople]

And it looks like it had decent opening weekend after all:

http://www.usatoday.com/life/movies/news/2008-11-30-boxoffice_N.htm



This is more a Baz Luhrmann movie and not so much a Fox product - at least in the sense that we all know and mostly despise. Baz has a lot more control over the stuff he does.

Okay? So the movie actually made a couple million less on both the 3 and 5 day prediction that comingsoon.net made a few days ago and usa today says it exceeded predictions by 20%?

http://www.comingsoon.net/news/weekendwarriornews.php?id=50757

Last time I checked 22.3/15.4million is greater than 20/14.8million. Furthermore, the movie is making money at a pace that would put it's domestic boxoffice gross around a total of 40-50million once it exits the theaters. These numbers are lousy for any film with a budget well over 50million.

 

[Kahran Ramsus]

That is inexcusable and what would have gone down as one of the better epics of the last ten years is going to be forgotten as Rothman and Fox saw a Ridley Scott opus as nothing but a bottom line action movie. **** with Story's Fantastic Four all you want, it is still going to suck no matter what. But a Ridley Scott movie about the Crusades? Really?

I agree with this. What he did to Kingdom of Heaven is his biggest crime, because it really could have (and the DC is) fantastic and he ruined it. Someone as big a name as Ridley Scott should have had more pull than he ended up having. Most of the other things he messed up were unlikely to ever work anyways or were silly popcorn films.

 

[Theweepeople]

And now he wants to remake Conquest of the Planet of the Apes. And reboot the franchise, again.

Fox ran out of property rights to screw up. I guess it's time for them to further screw up everything they still own.

 

[Theweepeople]

You could say the same about Cameron

Anyways, I think Avatar will be fine. It's all the other Fox movies we need to worry about.

Avatar may turn out to be a good movie but, I'm concerned about the budget. It was rumored to be somewhere in the range of 250-300million without marketing costs a few months ago. The movie doesn't come out for another year and the budget may continue to skyrocket out of control. This film may not be very profitable for Fox unless it easily breaks the 400million barrier domestically.