Evening Standard: Harry Potter vs Lord of the Rings: Battle of the franchises
TAKE your seats for Battle of the Hollywood Titans, Part II - another blood-and-guts fight for world domination between a young wizard called Harry Potter and his deadly rival Frodo Baggins. David Rowan reports
Almost exactly a year after they first squared off at the box office, the second Lord of the Rings film is about to go head-to-head with Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets - and although the Hogwarts hero emerged the billion-dollar winner first time around, experts suggest that this season's rematch will be a much tougher fight to call.
There could not be more at stake for the film industry. The Fellowship of the Ring might have won the critical acclaim in round one - four Oscars and five Baftas to Potter's empty slate - but it came a poor second in the numbers that impress the studio accountants.
So far, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone has earned Warner Bros an astonishing $961 million (£619 million) - making it the second-highest earning film ever made behind only Titanic. By contrast, the first Lord of the Rings film had to settle for a mere $861 million (£554 million) - again, a huge bonanza for its producers, but still some $60 million behind Star Wars: Episode 1 - The Phantom Menace.
With this much money at stake, the studios are pulling out all the stops to lure ticket-buyers to the sequels. Even as filming began on the new Potter film last November, the studio marketing execs were plotting how best to exploit their "franchise", as they call films they can repeatedly milk for value.
Although Chamber of Secrets does not open in Britain and the US until 15 November, they decided that one way to generate early demand was to start selling tickets in September. "Advance booking has been a phenomenal success," explains Richard Storton, brand manager for the Odeon chain. He expects advance tickets to go on sale next month for the Tolkien sequel, which opens in Britain on 18 December.
That delay of more than a month could give Chamber of Secrets a vital edge, according to Robert Mitchell, box-office analyst at Screen International magazine. "The Potter film does have the advantage of being out first," he says, "but that's because Warner Bros controls which screens it gets, and can demand the film stays there for a certain number of weeks."
IN fact, the five-week gap between the two openings is a deliberate ploy to help both films maximise their box- office impact. Although they will be competing, the studios behind them are not really rivals at all: Warner Bros, which makes the Potter films, and New Line Cinema, behind Rings, are both part of AOL Time Warner.
"The company wants both films to do well and not kill each other," Mitchell explains, "but they'll quite happily kill everything else." The main victim is expected to be the 20th James Bond film, Die Another Day, released a week after the Potter movie.
But then Potter and Baggins will themselves face tough competition as Hollywood targets some of its hottest releases at the Christmas market. Paramount, for instance, will be releasing the Star Trek follow-up Nemesis in the States on 13 December, followed a week later by its animated feature The Wild Thornberrys and Oscar hopeful, The Hours.
So how will the Potter sequel perform against such competition? "I don't think it will be the biggest film of the year, and I'd be shocked if it surpassed the first one," says Steven Gaydos, executive editor of the film bible Variety. "The novelty of the first Harry Potter movie was a huge onetime bonanza, and this time the gap with Lord of the Rings will be smaller."
Yet Warner Bros will emerge a winner, whatever happens. "Just look at what it has to do to be profitable," Gaydos explains. "The film cost around $130 million, with a further $30 million or so for promotion. Because of other expenses, the studio will need to earn more than twice this amount to make a profit - and this is where the Potter franchise cannot fail. Let's say - conservatively - that the film takes $500 million. Now, video and DVD sales will add at least another $250 million and then there's the incredible merchandising."
LAST year, licensing experts estimated that Harry Potter tie-ins were worth up to $1 billion. Even if year two brings in just a quarter of that, it will add a further $250 million to Warner Bros' coffers. "So now you've got a portfolio that's generating another billion dollars, even if the movie is only half as successful as last year's," says Gaydos.
The more interesting battle will take place next year. Although the third Lord of the Rings film is expected to open in December, Warner Bros has other plans for November 2003 when its "Harry Potter slot" will be taken by The Matrix Revolutions - another second sequel. The next Potter film is not expected until mid-2004.
Still, shareholders can relax in the certainty that JK Rowling will continue to turn out Potter stories for the foreseeable future, whereas JRR Tolkien made a fundamental strategic error: even before he sold the film rights 33 years ago for a sum reported to be as little as £10,000, he decided to make the Lord of the Rings a mere trilogy.
Now where on earth does the franchise factory go after that?
(Evening Standard, October 17 2002)
Almost exactly a year after they first squared off at the box office, the second Lord of the Rings film is about to go head-to-head with Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets - and although the Hogwarts hero emerged the billion-dollar winner first time around, experts suggest that this season's rematch will be a much tougher fight to call.
There could not be more at stake for the film industry. The Fellowship of the Ring might have won the critical acclaim in round one - four Oscars and five Baftas to Potter's empty slate - but it came a poor second in the numbers that impress the studio accountants.
So far, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone has earned Warner Bros an astonishing $961 million (£619 million) - making it the second-highest earning film ever made behind only Titanic. By contrast, the first Lord of the Rings film had to settle for a mere $861 million (£554 million) - again, a huge bonanza for its producers, but still some $60 million behind Star Wars: Episode 1 - The Phantom Menace.
With this much money at stake, the studios are pulling out all the stops to lure ticket-buyers to the sequels. Even as filming began on the new Potter film last November, the studio marketing execs were plotting how best to exploit their "franchise", as they call films they can repeatedly milk for value.
Although Chamber of Secrets does not open in Britain and the US until 15 November, they decided that one way to generate early demand was to start selling tickets in September. "Advance booking has been a phenomenal success," explains Richard Storton, brand manager for the Odeon chain. He expects advance tickets to go on sale next month for the Tolkien sequel, which opens in Britain on 18 December.
That delay of more than a month could give Chamber of Secrets a vital edge, according to Robert Mitchell, box-office analyst at Screen International magazine. "The Potter film does have the advantage of being out first," he says, "but that's because Warner Bros controls which screens it gets, and can demand the film stays there for a certain number of weeks."
IN fact, the five-week gap between the two openings is a deliberate ploy to help both films maximise their box- office impact. Although they will be competing, the studios behind them are not really rivals at all: Warner Bros, which makes the Potter films, and New Line Cinema, behind Rings, are both part of AOL Time Warner.
"The company wants both films to do well and not kill each other," Mitchell explains, "but they'll quite happily kill everything else." The main victim is expected to be the 20th James Bond film, Die Another Day, released a week after the Potter movie.
But then Potter and Baggins will themselves face tough competition as Hollywood targets some of its hottest releases at the Christmas market. Paramount, for instance, will be releasing the Star Trek follow-up Nemesis in the States on 13 December, followed a week later by its animated feature The Wild Thornberrys and Oscar hopeful, The Hours.
So how will the Potter sequel perform against such competition? "I don't think it will be the biggest film of the year, and I'd be shocked if it surpassed the first one," says Steven Gaydos, executive editor of the film bible Variety. "The novelty of the first Harry Potter movie was a huge onetime bonanza, and this time the gap with Lord of the Rings will be smaller."
Yet Warner Bros will emerge a winner, whatever happens. "Just look at what it has to do to be profitable," Gaydos explains. "The film cost around $130 million, with a further $30 million or so for promotion. Because of other expenses, the studio will need to earn more than twice this amount to make a profit - and this is where the Potter franchise cannot fail. Let's say - conservatively - that the film takes $500 million. Now, video and DVD sales will add at least another $250 million and then there's the incredible merchandising."
LAST year, licensing experts estimated that Harry Potter tie-ins were worth up to $1 billion. Even if year two brings in just a quarter of that, it will add a further $250 million to Warner Bros' coffers. "So now you've got a portfolio that's generating another billion dollars, even if the movie is only half as successful as last year's," says Gaydos.
The more interesting battle will take place next year. Although the third Lord of the Rings film is expected to open in December, Warner Bros has other plans for November 2003 when its "Harry Potter slot" will be taken by The Matrix Revolutions - another second sequel. The next Potter film is not expected until mid-2004.
Still, shareholders can relax in the certainty that JK Rowling will continue to turn out Potter stories for the foreseeable future, whereas JRR Tolkien made a fundamental strategic error: even before he sold the film rights 33 years ago for a sum reported to be as little as £10,000, he decided to make the Lord of the Rings a mere trilogy.
Now where on earth does the franchise factory go after that?
(Evening Standard, October 17 2002)
posted by David Rowan at Thursday, October 17, 2002
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