Case Study: Estimating Film ROI - Crash (2004)

We often use box office receipts as a metric when we consider how much ROI investors in a film can expect.  Clearly the entire box office receipts don't magically appear in the production company's bank account - but how much does?

There are some lousy distribution deals ... but imagine that you have a non-studio film that distributors really want.  Let's even imagine that the film is successful - it covers the distributor's P&A spend and returns money. What could you reasonably expect your income from the film to be?

There are a few estimates out there - I've always used the 'one third of box office' guideline - so if a film makes $30 million in box office we can expect about $10 million to eventually filter back to the production company.  Clearly this guess has limitations - it won't work for a film that was a hit on DVD but a flop in the theatres.  But it is a start to estimating how much money will be coming in to pay back the production budget - hopefully leaving something over for the investors

But how accurate is this estimate?

How to get Benderspink to read your screenplay (Offer Closed)

Note - this offer is now closed.  It successfully raised over $8,600 for the Heart Foundation.  

Benderspink represents screenwriters as well as producing their own films.  They were behind the Oscar nominated 'History of Violence' as well as a pile of other successful films - 'The Ring' & 'The Butterfly Effect' are probably my favourites. (They were also behind 'Cats & Dogs' if you prefer family films)

Do you want them to read your screenplay?  Well, thanks to Daniel Vang & friend-of-the-blog Joe Nienalt, you have a chance to skip a gatekeeper or two.

If you wonder why Joe Neinalt's name sounds familiar - he's the writer who picked up a six-figure deal to write a movie to be filmed in Russian - despite not speaking a word of the language. (I had a chat with him here when the deal was announced.)

Here are the details from Joe:

The Catwoman/Clerks Paradox

Catwoman is famous as a financial disaster.  It was a film with a reported budget of $100 million(*) - but only generated $82 million in theatrical ticket sales.

Clerks is famous as a huge financial success.  Shot on a budget of only $27k(*), it still managed to bring in about $3.9 million in ticket sales.

Which would you rather have invested in?  There's an obvious answer.
Here's the real paradox - if you were a distributor (or an exhibitor) ... which film would you prefer to be showing?