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Coming soon...the G&dd&mn Movie Business, from Frank Miller

David Mumpower: The Spirit, Frank Miller's interpretation of the classic Will Eisner comic strip character, earned $10.4 million over its first four days. Why do you feel this Lionsgate release failed to strike a chord with consumers?

Joel Corcoran: I think The Spirit's near-complete failure was a combination of at least three significant factors going against it. The Spirit is a comic-book movie without a present-day fanbase. DC Comics brought the series back to life about two years ago, but there simply isn't a critical mass of fans familiar with The Spirit like the fanbase that exists for Batman, Iron Man, The X-Men, or even The Avengers. The visual style is something we've already seen before - in Sin City and, to a certain extent 300 - so what might have been a unique draw five years ago, now looks like a worn out film-making technique. The advertising behind this film was atrocious. The movie posters were ugly and misshapen (and what the hell does "My City Screams" mean anyway?), the television commercials were dull at best (and confusing at worst), and nothing in the whole marketing campaign - absolutely nothing - created a "hook" to draw viewers into the theater. And on top of everything else, you had a horrible director at the helm in Frank Miller, which led to some scathing early reviews that unanimously panned the film.





Scott Lumley: Remember when the Matrix came out, and suddenly EVERY film had to have a bullet time effect in it? Remember the titanic yawns that all that emulation brought forth? The Spirit looked like a poor man's copy of Sin City with cheesier acting, a sanitized plot and a character few people even knew existed. Coupled with the very poor marketing campaign and some very weird casting (who in the Hell is Gabriel Macht anyways?) this film seemed doomed to failure from the get go. I'm probably going to watch this at some point, but that point probably occurs when I see it in a bargain bin and I need a new subject for Stealth Entertainment.

Joel Corcoran: Based on the numbers, The Spirit looks like an abject loss. Sin City had a $29.1 million opening weekend on a budget of $40 million and earned $74.1 million in the U.S. In contrast, 300 had a slightly higher estimated budget of $65 million, had an opening of $70.9 million, and went on to earn $210.6 million in the domestic box office. Figure that The Spirit had a budget somewhere around Sin City's, perhaps $45 million. If so, then the Spirit would need an internal multiplier of 4.33 just to break even. And at a more realistic ratio of around 2.0 (slightly better than Sin City's 1.9), The Spirit would hit within striking distance of $21 million, which would still be an abject loss at the domestic box office.

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