The short answer is, it depends on a number of factors, but a rule of thumb seems to be that the film needs to make twice its production budget globally.
That means for your 1% investment you would have spent $115.2 million, received $119.5 million back and made a profit of $4.3 million (i.e. a profit margin of just 3.7%).
Most films lose money. Indeed, 80% do. The fundamental reason for this phenomenon is simple. If you were trying to impress someone at a cocktail party, what would you rather say: “I make movies” or “I make widgets”?
The standard rates of return are anywhere from 110% to 125%. This means, should your film make enough money to pay your investors back, they can expect 100% recoupment of their investment plus an interest of 10 to 25 percent (depending on your offer). Of course, you can go lower or higher.
It was given a limited U.S. release on Sept. 25, 2009, and then a nationwide release on Oct. 16, 2009. Based on return on investment, this horror movie with a $15 million budget is the most profitable film ever made, earning $193,355,800 worldwide.
One of the most successful low-budget films was 1999's The Blair Witch Project. It had a budget of around $60,000 but grossed almost $249 million worldwide. It spawned books, a trilogy of video games, and a less-popular sequel.
The more a film costs to make (and market), the more it has to make to avoid flopping at the box office. Film studios are making fewer and fewer movies as the years go by, but they tend to cost much more over time, so perhaps it's not surprising that there seem to be more and more flops.
Arrangements differ. However, the movie studio usually gets 60% of the proceeds from American box offices or anywhere from 20% – 40% overseas. This depends on the film distribution arrangements, agreements, and other costs associated with foreign distribution. Theaters receive the remaining 40%.
Using my 'Insider' dataset of 279 Hollywood movies I found that overall 51% made a profit and 49% made a loss. This pattern of 50:50 seems to be the common understanding of movie economics among the insiders I spoke to.
For indie films, there are several VOD release strategies: day-and-date (movies released simultaneously in theaters and VOD), day-before-date (VOD before theatrical), and VOD-only. Many films that don't have the special effects and big-name stars to lure people to the theater often profit from this model.
In the film and media industry, if a film released in theatres fails to break even by a large amount, it is considered a box-office bomb (or box-office flop), thus losing money for the distributor, studio, and/or production company that invested in it.
Can You Sell a Screenplay Idea? No, generally producers don't listen and buy movie ideas because of legal reasons and you cannot copywrite an idea. But if your idea has some type of influence such as a famous actor, producer or intellectual property attached with a film treatment then yes.
What is the most expensive part of making a movie?
Post-production: This stage is one of the most expensive parts of film creation, as it includes special effects and post-production work like editing, sound design, or color grading. The expenses involved in creating films during this phase are influenced by the film's scale and the special effects required.
A general rule of thumb for qualifying a movie as a “financial success” is to compare its gross revenue to twice its reported budget - in other words, an ROI of at least 1. A movie “doubly” is successful if it performs well both financial and critically while deem it a “total” failure if it loses money and is panned.
No-budget films are commonly submitted to film festivals, the intention being to raise widespread interest in the film. No-budget films are financed out-of-pocket by the director, who typically takes on multiple roles, or else uses a crew of volunteers.
There's some conjecture as to what the low-budget movie range is (especially when accounting for inflation) – but most analysts agree anything below $5 million USD can be characterized as low-budget. Examples of low-budget movies: Primer (2007) – Budget: $7,000. Monty Python And the Holy Grail (1975) – Budget: $400,000.
But the movie industry was hoping for more. Tom Cruise's seventh “Mission: Impossible” spectacle, which arrived in theaters on Wednesday and cost at least $400 million to make and market, was supposed to mark a turning point at the troubled summer box office. Death-defying stunts!
90-degree rule The camera may never be placed 90 degrees facing the subject, but rather set off the center to give an illusion of depth. actualités Events filmed as they were happening, events that would be happening even if the camera weren't there.
The rule of thirds involves mentally creating equally spaced vertical and horizontal lines on a potential shot or image, then placing points of interest on this grid's lines and intersection points. The theory is that the filming style will create more pleasing visuals to the viewer's eye.
Plot. In 2014, a political party called the "New Founding Fathers of America" are voted into office following an economic collapse and pass a law sanctioning the "Purge," an annual event wherein all crime (including murder) is legal, and emergency services are unavailable for 12 hours.
