Indiana Jones and The Dial of Destiny? More like Indiana Jones and the Box Office of Doom. Numerous entertainment outlets are reporting that the new movie with Harrison Ford, who celebrates his 81st birthday this month but couldn’t turn down playing one of his most popular characters for one last time, only managed to make $60 million at the domestic box office when it opened this weekend. That’s bad news for Disney and Lucasfilm, which reportedly spent over $300 million to make the movie.
Yesterday, I learned from a key source that Indiana Jones and the Dial Destiny, before $100M in estimated P&A, cost a mindboggling $300M-plus. Much higher than the $250M-$295M that’s been leaked out there. Disney doesn’t comment on budgets, and I’m getting some pushback. But the high price tag here is due to the start and stops of production during Covid, Harrison Ford’s $20M fee, which I’m told director James Mangold got a pretty penny, with Steven Spielberg reaping as is standard a huge producing fee. That said, it stands to reason Disney would invest greatly here to revive a franchise; they spent $259M on Force Awakens. The point is for what the studio spent — they’re not getting anywhere near Star Wars box office results.
Discussion (19 replies)
Join Discussion →Yikes... that's no good. I just think after the Pandemic people figured out they don't need to go to the movies to enjoy them.
And some of us figured that out loooooong before the pandemic.
I think the economy is slowing down. I know I am, i ran out of strategies to mitigate the hits of inflation. Bye bye eating out (/which i didn't do too much, but now its zero) bye bye thoughts of travel/ vacation , bye bye any thoughts of upgrades things like this, so on, going out for a movie, also bye bye.
That's a shame.
We watched it earlier today and it was actually good. I really enjoyed it.
I have fond memories of the first three, ranking them up there with some of my top "feel good" films (not best films, but top feel good ones)
I found the 2008 Crystal Skulls one with Shia LeDouche utterly unwatchable. Shia LeDouche's character was a total JarJar Binks experience for me, all but killing the entirety of the film.
This one is back up there. It doesn't have quite the mystique of the first three, but that was probably never going to happen unless I found a time machine, traveled back to the 80's and deliver it to my childhood self to watch it for the first time.
You just can't watch these with the same wonder as you did seeing them for the first time as a kid, but this 5th installment had some of that same feel again, and I appreciated it.
Also, it was a bit long. Needed a pee-break mid way through. Reminded me why I never buy the large soda, and why I never go to movie theaters anymore. Once I get my home theater back up and running, I'll probably never go again. Also, $200 for dinner, concessions and tickets for three people. Totally not worth it.
This was also the first film I've seen in AMC's Dolby theater. To me it was a mixed bag. I liked the large screen, and the suurround effects were cool, but it was SO DAMN LOUD. Like seriously, walking out of the theater my ears were borderline ringing. I bet they ran the damn thing over reference the entire time. I shouldn't have to bring ear plugs to a film, like one might to a rock concert...
Those were my thoughts.
I guess the TLDR one liner is that this one was WAY better than #4, and I liked it as much as I could possibly see myself liking any Indiana Jones film, once the magic of childhood is gone. (I seriously vote for removing #4 from both canon, and erasing it from history. It was awful.)
I will say I kind of prefer the rock concert volume levels... Ok not THAT loud but I want a experience better than I can do at home, that includes sound. And damn with how good a sound bar and a small sub sounds at home, that takes some real oomph to deliver.
I can still feel that sensitive borderline ringing sensation in my ears 4 hours after the end of the movie.
I like to benefit from good sound in theaters too, but the AMC Dolby settings seem like they are just a bit much to me.
That, and I would argue that "louder" doesn't necessarily equal "better". That line of thinking just brings us the loudness wars we had in albums in the 90's and early 2000's.
Just like in my albums, I think I prefer my films with dynamic range. Make non-yelling dialogue roughly equal to conversational volumes. Make explosions LOUD.
No, the actual few hit movies are proof that the economy is not slowing down. You can't have it both ways. If it was the economy then no movie would make a billion. People are loosing interest in bad, derivative movies designed to "kill the past".
I posit that people are less willing to see something they feel meh about where they would have before when disposable income was in greater supply.
Reduce disposable income the willingness to shell out to go see a movie reduces. Couple that with increased prices across the board and your chance for audience engagement drops further.
At least that's how I see it.
Or perhaps people are tired of Hollywood beating the horse.
It's dead. Stop it.
Oh daaaang, really?! Well hhhmmm... might have to check it out when the BD rips drop.
Gonna have to agree with you there.
HAHAHAHAHAHA I didn't even see what you did with his last name until I went back and re-read what you wrote!
Well sh1t man, that sounds pretty good!
GEEEEEEEEEEEEEEZUS!!!!!! You throw around prices like that, and I'm liable to faint like a southern belle in the hot summer who "got the vapors".
And here's another vote from me.
Reminds me of an experience my friend had. In D.C. there was a theater called Uptown (sadly closed now). It's one of those theaters where there is just ONE screen, but it is a huuuuuuuuuuge curved IMAX screen, the sound system is INSANE, and it seats a f*ckton of people (and I also recall it being quite expensive). My friend saw Dunkirk there. He said the audio experience made it feel like actually being in a war. He thought shells were exploding all around him, bullets whizzing past his head. The vibrations were shaking his flesh and bones like he was made outta Jello. He said he came outta that theater with actual shell-shock. He was pretty sure his eardrums exploded. He definitely had reduced hearing and ringing for a good long while after he said that movie. I have to admit though, it sounded like a pretty awesome experience. I value my ears and hearing too much to subject myself to that, but dang if that didn't sound like an incredibly immersive experience.
You know what... it could become Highlander 2. Where they made another one and just IGNORED 2. ;) ALIENS. really?!
I saw Dunkirk in IMAX, too, and had the same experience at first. At the beginning of the movie where it follows the one soldier racing out of the city on foot, and he gets shot at, I literally looked over my shoulder when the sound of the round went whizzing by. Some of the best sound I've ever experienced.
I've seen two movies in Dolby Cinema so far: Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness and Top Gun: Maverick. I didn't have any ill effects to my hearing after either of those movies.
The Dolby audio is good, but not as good as IMAX. The IMAX audio is direct while Dolby is expansive, so the former sounds more natural and just hits differently. As a result, my overall experience of Top Gun was better seeing it in IMAX compared to Dolby Cinema.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA, awesome!
Interesting. I've never heard the special Dolby setup, but I can definitely vouch for IMAX audio.
The feeling comes from a movie being good. The fact that you don't find it is mostly because there's so much suck in Hollywood. I know i got the feel good 'wonder' feeling with top gun maverick, but then again no woke bull kicked me out of the movie so there's that. I used to be fairly tolerant to now so called 'woke bs' but as they turned up the dial on it, now I'm way more sensitive and it kicks me right out of the movie.
Hmm.
Maybe it wasn't the Dolby then, but maybe it was the mix in this particular film? Or maybe the interaction of this particular film and the Dolby expansion tech?
The reason I suspect that is because a friend of mine had the same comments about the new Indiana Jones and Dolby. We saw it on different days this weekend at different theaters in different parts of the state.