Any theories on poor US and good non-US box office ? - Stardust (2007) Discussion

[–] 13 years ago

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[–] Zen-2-Zen 13 years ago

Shouldn't all this apply to international release as well?

I can explain the flop at US box office just on the basis of some quite visible character and plot design and direction mistakes. What I can't explain is that non-US release fared substantially better.

Some spectacles do tend to do about twice better in non-US but that's usually for action based flicks and when there's a strong promotion and a timely distribution in China and this one did 2.5 times better without China.

Do you remember that maybe there was a substantial backlash in US that was barely noticed outside? A gay captain in PG-13 is patently offensive in US but non-US could have read it as just an abstract weirdo without any correlations.

I could try to speculate a few things but they would be mutually contradicting.

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[–] raven1066 13 years ago

It's a tough question, one that has been asked many times on this board. I remember threads like this when the movie was in the theater. And of course this has happened to several movies. Many do fantastic overseas but don't perform well domestically (U.S.) I don't think anyone knows for sure of course but I stated then, and still believe that the movie was just a hard sell. 'Stardust' is a tough movie to sum up or hype in a short trailer. The first time I saw a trailer for the film I thought it was great but one of my best friends that was w/me at the time said "skip it." I just don't think the ad campaign contected w/enough people here in the States. That and, unfortunately, not enough people that did see in the theater in the U.S. recommended it. Which, IMO, is very sad, since I believed then and believe now that 'Stardust' is one of the best films made in that decade.

"Time is the fire in which we burn"

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[–] moundshroud 13 years ago

Many people have said they never saw any publicity for this movie. I'm an avid movie-goer, and I do recall seeing trailers for it in the theater over the summer. However, I don't recall seeing any tv commercials for it (though it's quite possible I wasn't watching the type of programming that they advertised it in).

Quite honestly, for me the trailer made it look like it could have been quite good or quite lousy. The August release date definitely tipped my expectations to the low side. August is traditionally the month that studios dump their summertime stinkers, but I know that sometimes a gem emerges (The Iron Giant, for example). So I went to see it (the major alternative being Rush Hour 3 - no thanks!) and was pleasantly surprised.

Stardust's larger foreign box office take was greatly boosted by the $30 million it took in the UK. My general observation is that literary-based fantasy movies tend to do proportionately much better in the UK than the US, especially if the author is from the UK.

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[–] 13 years ago

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[–] cookiela2001 12 years ago

<< A gay captain in PG-13 is patently offensive in US but non-US could have read it as just an abstract weirdo without any correlations >>

Sure. It was all Teh Gays' fault.

Stay classy...
.

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[–] jolszews 13 years ago

Publicity, or lack thereof?
I never even heard of this movie until 3 days ago.

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[–] iLoVeMuchAdoAboutNothing 13 years ago

Neil Gaiman (author of Stardust, the book) is pretty famous, but I feel like his stuff has always been bigger in the UK (since that's where he's from). Another one of his works was a mini series in the 90s and a movie of one of his YA books. Those were never released in the US. He's getting more popular now (especially with the release of Coraline a couple years ago) but he wasn't really known well when this came out.

I think that and the fact that this wasn't really publicized well and the fact that it didn't have any big name actors for leading roles (which I don't care about, but a lot of american movie goers probably look for that when judging whether to go see a movie).

------------------------
The Truth is Out There.

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[–] suzannetf 13 years ago

I'd never heard of this movie until recently. Although I do go through periods of time where I'm too busy to keep up with what is at the box office. But I've only heard one person ever talk about this movie!

I agree with whoever said it was a "DVD" movie. By that I mean, for example, that the special effects didn't seem on par with a lot of the fantasy movies that are in theaters. The effects seemed on par with the tv mini-series The 10th Kingdom (which I really liked) and maybe a bit below Nanny McPhee and The Mummy(which I also liked).

I think The Princess Bride worked better because they didn't rely so much on effects that were (I'm assuming) CGI. The age makeup they used in that film worked way better (Billy Crystal and Carol Kane).

I know everyone can't have big budgets, but sometimes if can't go big you might need to keep it simple because lower budget effects really show and don't age as gracefully.

I can't compare it to the book, which I have never read.

Overall, though, there was something a bit off, though, and I can't quite say what (although what I discussed above probably accounts for a lot of it).

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[–] tf424 13 years ago

1. Advertising. I never heard of it until it showed up on cable, and I'm a Claire Danes fan!

2. No target audience. It crossed too many lines and didn't fit well with any of the major target audiences: teen boys, tweens, or adult couples.

Teen boys want adrenaline, sex, and dead bodies. With downplayed special effects, only a hint of sex, and no real gore, that was a complete strikeout.

But it was a little too "adult" for tweens, especially with older actors and the whole gay captain storyline. No tween idols like Hilary Duff to get the tween fans engaged.

Adult couples were probably turned off by the fantasy element, which is not common in today's rom-com genre. Period pieces were perfectly okay, like "Shakespeare in Love" but fantasies have never fared as well.

3. Americans who read the book were probably not enthused to see the movie, because the book is decidedly dark and mostly cheerless. It does not have the "happy ending" that was created specifically for the movie. Better marketing and word of mouth *might* have saved it, but it didn't happen for some reason.

Anyway, the book left me basically cold, because of the ending and because Evaine was basically a pawn without any control or input. There was no real magic to her at all. In the movie, her character and her magic play a much larger part of the story, making it much more of an interesting love story than the book.

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[–] TheGuardingDark 12 years ago

Neil Gaiman (author of Stardust, the book) is pretty famous

Gaiman is internet/nerd famous, or was at the time the movie came out. Coraline didn’t set the box office on fire either.

It might have done better overseas because it was marketed to families. I think it was rated PG or equivalent in most countries outside the US, which is what it deserves. If Toy Story 3 can get a G rating with a character like Ken then everything De Niro does is well within the limits of a PG.

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[–] TigerWarg 13 years ago

I seem to remember that it was very, very badly promoted. I missed it in the cinema and initially saw it on a transatlantic flight. I then had to go see it on the big screen as a 10" back of a chair screen didn't do it justice.

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[–] Nbrayton17 12 years ago

Probably just the publicity.

Keep It Reel-Movie Reviews kirreviews.wordpress.com/

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[–] jacieh 12 years ago

Lack of advertising.

The movie just wasn't promoted over here. I never heard of it before it hit my Netflix DVD queue. Now you can find it in the $5 rack at Target. After market it has gained a certain popularity, but most American viewers say "Why didn't I know about this?"

It had nothing to do with the actors or the content. DeNiro and Pfeiffer were big enough names to be known by Americans, as is Clare Danes. It was all down to the striking lack of advertising. A few trailers in the theater is not enough to sell a movie because people just don't go to the movies regularly enough to remember what's out.

2007 was already a pretty packed summer for family fantasy movies. You had Transformers, Pirates of the Caribbean At World's End, Harry Potter Order of the Phoenix, Fantasic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer and Ratatouille. They sucked up all the market. Had Stardust come out another season that year, it would have gotten noticed.