CGI = $65 million.
Anatomy of a blockbuster
We've all heard about the hundreds of millions spent on 'event movies' - but where does the money actually go? Archie Thomas runs his eye over the books of one of this summer's biggest movies, Spider-Man 2
Archie Thomas
The Guardian, Friday 11 June 2004
Money spinner: Spider-Man 2
The major studios used to beat their chests in triumph about big-budget movies. In 1951, MGM took an ad in Variety to announce that it was spending a record $7m [£3.8m] on its period extravaganza Quo Vadis. Half a century on, studio execs are loth to reveal spiralling budgets, which are topping $200m [£108m] only seven years after the $100m [£54m] mark was passed. The abject fear in Hollywood of being responsible for a blockbuster that stiffs makes accurate budgets increasingly hard to discover, but industry gossip will always find a way.
But the modern-day blockbuster has become far more than just a movie. However strong the characters and storyline, none of the new breed of blockbusters gets the go-ahead unless it can justify itself in terms of its TV spin-offs, sequels, merchandising opportunities and DVD tie-in. It is no longer enough to get pre-programmed audiences crammed into the multiplex when they could be buying the toy, drinking the drink and wearing the T-shirt too.
Average total costs, including marketing, for a studio film recently soared 15% and topped $100m [£54m] for the first time ever.
Although studio executives protest that they are forever working at reducing production costs, there is a vested interest in big-budget, effects-heavy blockbusters. By pushing the cost through the roof, they keep a stranglehold on the capability to create grand scale projects and the access to the considerable financial upsides of the hits.
When they have a monster hit, as Sony did with Spider-Man, there is only one thing for it: bottle the winning formula by reuniting the cast and plough on with the sequel.
Before: the deals ($30M)
Script & development:
$10m
The script budget on a film is typically 5% of the total budget. In 1999, Sony inked a potentially revolutionary deal with 31 A-list Hollywood writers, promising 2% of gross receipts once the studio had recouped costs. Each writer was obliged to write at least one script for Sony over four years and could pass on a maximum of four projects Sony offered.
Considering Spider-Man made $821m [£446m] worldwide, writer David Koepp is considered to be the biggest beneficiary of the Sony deal, netting an eight-figure payday. Unsurprisingly, a batch of four fresh writers, including Pulitzer prize-winning novelist Michael Chabon - who are conveniently not signed up to the Sony deal - penned Spider-Man 2. In addition, it is likely uncredited but well-paid script doctors were drafted in to rewrite certain scenes.
Scriptwriters are notoriously at the bottom of the Hollywood food chain. Under the Writer's Guild of America basic agreement, writers are paid a minimum of $35,079 [£19,084] for an original screenplay. Known writers, of course, can command much higher fees, whether or not their scripts get made. Joe "Basic Instinct" Eszterhas has nine unproduced screenplays in "development hell", for which he has been paid around $23m [£13m].
Licensing:
$20m
Marvel owns the Spider-Man character. Since Sony bought the movie rights in 1999, there has been ongoing bickering and litigation between Marvel and Sony, pushing the licensing price up further. Marvel alleged that Sony was attempting to disassociate Spider-Man from its creator. Sony countersued, suggesting Marvel was kicking up a fuss to force a renegotiation of the contract.
Shared greed means differences have been placed on the back burner so as not to disrupt this year's marketing campaign. Plans for Spider-Man 3 are already at an advanced stage and a tentative May 4 2007 release date has been set.
Stan Lee, the co-creator of the Spider-Man comic character, acts as executive producer on Spider-Man 2. Marvel pay Lee an annual salary of $1m [£540,000], but Lee has threatened to sue for a share of profits from licensing.
During: the shoot ($100M)
The big money is doled out to the stars, the director and the producers who, like the less glamorous members of the crew, are still paid a traditional weekly wage for the length of the shoot. They are what's called "above-the-line" costs that the studios are committed to paying before the cameras even start to roll.
Producers:
$15m
"What is an associate producer?" Billy Wilder was once asked. "Anybody," he replied, "who will associate with the producer." Blockbusters spawn numerous producers who all expect a slice of the pie. Spider-Man 2 has two producers, one co-producer and three executive producers, and one of Hollywood's better-kept secrets is the phenomenal fees producers can get. Including performance-related bonuses, or "bumps", from Spider-Man reaching box-office targets, producer Laura Ziskin is rumoured to have pocketed over $30m [£16m]. The escalating fees paid to A-list acting talent are often reported, but the producers are among the richest people on the set.
Director:
$10m
In the age of studio-led blockbuster movies, the director has less and less autonomy, and is often brought on board after the studio has already completed casting. If test audiences dislike a scene, the director is obliged to cut or reshoot. For their pains, directors can still command a hefty fee.
For the first Spider-Man movie, then Columbia Pictures chairwoman Amy Pascal surprised the community by hiring Evil Dead director Sam Raimi whose biggest hit up to that point was Darkman [1990] which scored an unremarkable $34m [£18m] at the US box office. Pascal was convinced by Raimi's passion for the material and the savvy move kept above-the-line costs down.
Despite Pascal's big result with Raimi, skimping on the talent for a blockbuster is a risky business. To slimline the costs of The Alamo by a reported $25m [£13m], Disney did without Oscar winners Ron Howard and Russell Crowe, and ended up with John Lee Hancock and Dennis Quaid. The budget still came in at over $100m [£54m] and the lacklustre US opening weekend of $9m [$5m] underlined their shortsightedness.
The biggest upfront payday for a director is the $20m [£11m] plus 20% of the gross paid to Peter Jackson and his writing partners, Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens, by Universal for King Kong. Jackson had initially planned to follow up his marathon Lord of the Rings trilogy with a small, effects-free project but was lured back by the opportunity to remake the 1933 classic he loved as a child.
Cast:
$30m
Tobey Maguire landed the title role after first-choice Heath Ledger passed. His payday of $4m [£2m] for Spider-Man leapt to an upfront $17m [£9m] for the sequel, although it was not always a foregone conclusion he would keep the Peter Parker role. In fact, Maguire was fired, replaced, and then rehired. His fee was not the problem but Columbia felt his petulant behaviour during pre-production didn't reflect enough gratitude to the studio. Coming off the demanding Seabiscuit shoot, which had required strict dieting, Maguire persistently complained of a bad back. Unimpressed, top brass considered recasting the movie. An offer was made to Jake Gyllenhaal. This made sense because his turn opposite Jennifer Aniston in indie hit The Good Girl had made him hot property, and he was the new date of Kirsten Dunst, Maguire's ex-girlfriend. The move for Gyllenhaal was a shot across the bows for Maguire.
At that point, Maguire's team of representatives stepped in, as did Ron Meyer, president of Vivendi Universal, and father of Jennifer Meyer (Maguire's current beau). They all assured the studio that Maguire would behave, as would his achy back. Maguire agreed to medical tests that would prove his fitness for duty after Columbia took the unusual step of insisting that the renegotiated contract contain specific clauses stating that Maguire's back was in good condition.
Industry insiders estimate returning co-topliner Kirstin Dunst may have got $5-$6m for Spider-Man 2. New baddie Alfred Molina would be paid in the region of $1m [$540,000]. The rest of the cast will have picked up $3m [£1.6m]. Actors, agents and managers go home happy with a tasty 10-15% of their clients' payday.
Below the line:
$45m
"Below-the-line" costs are the physical production expenses of the shoot, including crew fees. The costs of hiring and operating state-of-the-art equipment, corralling and feeding armies of extras, occupying and vacating locations, and, above all, employing thousands of high-salaried crew members are enormous. And you can bet everyone got paid properly for the sequel to the biggest opening film in history. According to a source close to the more modestly budgeted Thunderbirds, "the daily burn rate for movie shoots is staggering. We were employing 870 people on an average salary of £200 a day, so you can see how the costs race up."
Principal photography on Spider-Man 2 began on April 12, 2003 in New York, where the production spent three weeks shooting at various locations. The shoot was tight as returning love interest Dunst was committed to begin the Wimbledon shoot for Universal in June. The film-makers chose to use more of the real city in the sequel, which would suggest an effort was made to keep the visual effects budget in check. The most demanding - and expensive - technical shot was a 2,400ft "Spidercam" wire shot dipping and diving over Wall Street.
After: the edit ($70M)
Special effects:
$65m
The lion's share of the post-production budget is now spent on special effects. Editing remains a sizeable chunk but, along with above-the-line costs, the effects budget on blockbusters is one of the big spends, and is growing fast.
In the first Matrix movie (1999), there were 412 special effects shots, compared with a whopping 3,000+ for the next two instalments. The cost: over $100m [£54m]. Rumours are that The Hulk visual effects ran way over budget and topped $100m [£54m]. Effects house Industrial Light & Magic needed $40m [£21m] just to create Bruce Banner's alter ego for the film.
Rival studios compete to bring groundbreaking effects to the multiplex, and blockbusters are increasingly sold as much on the magnitude of their state-of-the-art visuals as the attached talent. The trailer for The Day After Tomorrow is dominated by a computer-generated tidal wave sweeping through New York.
The first computer-generated (CG) creature was seen in Young Sherlock Holmes in 1985, but digital characters are now commonplace. Beyond the obvious CG characters, such as scene-stealer Gollum in The Two Towers, blockbusters are riddled with digital doubles integrated into digital environments. It isn't really Tobey Maguire crawling those walls. In fact, it isn't even the real Manhattan streets he is swinging through in some scenes, but CG set extensions. According to Raimi, "It is not absolutely real New York, nor is it some fantasy town."
It will come as no surprise that blockbuster directors are increasingly investing in effects facilities. Peter Jackson owns one-third of the New Zealand-based facility Weta, which is working on King Kong.
Music:
$5m
No more than 2% of the budget. Three-time Oscar-nominated Danny Elfman composed the music for Spider-Man 2 for a fee nearing £2m. Sony Music Soundtrax will put out the official soundtrack which includes tracks by Jet and Train. The first Spider-Man album debuted at no 4 on the US albums chart, and sold more than 2m copies worldwide.
The sell ($75M)
Prints & advertising:
$75m
The print and advertising (p&a) costs are not actually included in the production budget. Having already spent $200m on making the film, the studios are now committed to spending even more money on marketing it.
Global same-day release patterns, introduced to combat piracy, are inflating the print and advertising costs hugely. In 2003, studios spent an average of $39m [£21m] on p&a in the US alone, an increase of 28% over the year before.
In the old days, studios used to be able to roll out releases territory by territory, often building on the US opening and word of mouth. Nowadays saturation campaigns are a necessity to push the product and make sure it scores big on the all-important opening weekend.
Impatient studios adamant on a simultaneous release, or something close to it, pay top whack to complete dubbing and subtitling quickly, and are unable to recycle prints as they did in the past. Argentine cinemas used to get prints that might have gone right across the American midwest, but due to time restrictions, more and more new prints now have to be struck.
P&a costs are eased by a liberal dose of product placement. Samsung pumped a staggering $100m [£54m] into promoting The Matrix Reloaded, and Ford threw $35m [£19m] behind the wheel of Die Another Day. Studios assure audiences that placement is only considered if it is "an organic fit".
The Spider-Man 2 campaign has been relatively cautious but is now ramping up. Aware of the dangers of overkill, marketing chiefs chose not to take a US TV ad during the Superbowl, calculating that there is no real awareness problem with Spider-Man. Too much hype can undoubtedly damage a film's box-office business. Matrix Reloaded is often cited as an example of a film which was sold too hard and promised too much.
In a minor league upset for the Spider-Man marketeers, baseball fans rebelled when the Spider-Man logos were placed on the bases at 15 major league stadiums. Fans were furious that the hallowed turf had been sullied and the logos were swiftly removed from the field of play.
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tl;dr
Before: the deals ($30M)
Script & development: $10m
Licensing: $20m
During: the shoot ($100M)
Producers: $15m
Director: $10m
Cast: $30m
Below the line: $45m
After: the edit ($70M)
Special effects: $65m
Music: $5m
The sell ($75M)
Prints & advertising: $75m
