Twilight has fallen on the land, and is busily sprinkling Hollywood with dollar signs. But of the many stories of this latter-day Titanic (and by some measures, the films are quite similar), let’s shine a light on this one:
Paramount had the movie rights to Stephenie Meyer’s book before it even hit shelves in 2005. They had a screenwriter do a couple of drafts and then put the project in turnaround. Depending on who you believe, Paramount production chief Brad Weston either killed the project or at least “questioned its commercial prospects.” Either way, in a Nov. 17 installment of his column “The Big Picture” entitled “How the Big Studios Missed the Boat on Twilight,” the Los Angeles Times’ Patrick Goldstein writes that the film reminded Weston of Cursed (2005), which Dimension Films produced during his tenure there.
Paramount let their option lapse, Fox Atomic passed on the project and it ended up with Summit Entertainment. The rest is history, and there are a lot of executives in this town second-guessing themselves right now. As well they should…
Whatever the specifics of the decision-making that went on, Goldstein’s excellent piece has me thinking about a mistake made by many execs and producers in this town, time and time again:
They blame bad movies’ genre when they tank, not the fact that they are bad movies.
Let’s say Paramount passed on this property because Cursed made just $19.2 million in its domestic run (and to be fair, Box Office Mojo lists it as one of its “Similar Movies to Twilight”). I’ll assume the thought process was that the two films would be materially similar and thus, an apt comparison could be made. Okay, how are these two films alike? Well, Twilight and Cursed are both teen-oriented and about two of the classic supernatural archetypes, vampires and werewolves. Beyond that, are there any major parallels? Frankly, I don’t even think these two movies are even in the same genre. Cursed is not a supernatural love story, it’s a horror film. Twilight somehow got a PG-13, but I bet you could broadcast it on any TV network at 8 p.m. without cutting a damn thing. This is not horror, people, unless you find pretty, moony-eyed teens gazing into each other’s eyes horrifying.
“Nah, let’s not make Twilight. Look at how Cursed underperformed.”
So why exactly did Cursed tank? I’m not going to launch an investigation, but I’ll throw out a few possibilities. Sometimes there is a backlash among horror fans to a PG-13 rating. Maybe the marketing campaign is partially to blame. Maybe America had something more compelling to watch that month. All that being said… it’s a bad movie. According to IMDb, a pretty egalitarian measure, it rates 4.8 out of 10. (For perspective, Humanoids from the Deep, which I’m pretty sure netted no Oscars, gets a 5.2.) Let’s not even BOTHER with the Rotten Tomatoes meter.
Cursed’s director, Wes Craven, is a rightful denizen of horror’s Olympus, but his movie cost way too much and delivered way too little. Sure, it lost money. But was it because the movie was teen-oriented and about one of the classic supernatural archetypes?! Really? At the end of the day, no pun intended, what’s this got to do with whether or not to make Twilight?
Amazingly, in this case the fallacy of blaming genre for a bad movie superseded Hollywood’s desperate, appropriately vampiric and potentially eternal love affair with underlying properties.
The primary value of an underlying property — a successful book, comic, video game or brand of puppy chow — is a built-in audience, a fan-base, and a larger awareness of the property even among non-fans. I’ve never watched an episode of “Streets of San Francisco” in my life, but if you’re developing a reboot you don’t have to market it to me cold because I already know it’s a cop show. That’s brand awareness. Stephenie Meyer may have only sold 5% as many books as J.K. Rowling, but Twilight came with one helluva stronger underlying property than Cursed. (An original screenplay by Kevin Williamson, of Scream fame.)
So it looks like a couple of studios (at least) made a bad call here. Trouble is, I’ve seen bad movies that failed invoked in explanations for passes repeatedly over the years. And not just when someone is trying to give a script a soft pass, groping for a reason that doesn’t make them state the weaknesses of the script. It’s a broad-brush approach to material and it’s a mistake, as the proceeds of Twilight should make perfectly clear.
By now you may be asking, “How can we, as writers, counteract this kind of thinking?” Well, good luck. It seems pretty ingrained. But here are a few ideas.
If you’re unrepresented, come out aggressively in your cover letter with one of those “it’s X meets Y” lines, using movies that made a lot of money. “It’s Twilight meets Tropic Thunder!” (Kidding.) Create a comparison in the reader’s mind with specific, successful movies so they have to dispel your association before they can create a new, less favorable one.
If you’re in a pitch meeting, bring some numbers about your script’s genre and casually throw them out. Certain genres are almost inherently profitable. The list of theatrically released but terrible horror movies that have made adequate to substantial profits is extraordinarily long. Generally speaking, you have to try really, really hard not to make money with a horror film. (Especially a legitimately teen-oriented horror film.)
Depending on your confidence in your material and your rapport with the exec(s) you’re dealing with, consider invoking the specter that may haunt you. Do some research and identify any under-performing films that execs might compare your project to. (Unfortunately, as Twilight indicates, they can cast a mighty wide net with their comparisons.) Explain why your project is different and how the prior failure does not represent a trend. A trend is six or ten demonstrably similar films. One bad teen-oriented werewolf movie shouldn’t speak for all teen-oriented werewolf movies, let alone a genre. (Never bash a movie, not even Cursed, because you may be in a room with someone who worked hard on it. Bad movies are just as hard to make as good ones. Often, harder.)
Present yourself as savvy about what the money folks are trying to do with their investment of resources. Knowing who you’re going to market to, and how, is what matters in reaching an audience. If you can communicate both why your script is original and how it follows in a tradition of success, you can overcome their instinct to make unflattering comparisons just to get the script off their desk.
I conclude with a word to the execs themselves. If your marketing department tells you they couldn’t sell this movie if you threw in a trip to Aruba with every ticket, fine — pass on the dog and let someone else clean up the mess. But every movie is unique, and should be judged on its own merits or flaws. If a certain brand of hammer isn’t selling at a certain hardware store, it doesn’t mean people don’t need hammers. It means people are going somewhere else to get better hammers, pay less, or both. Maybe it means the store needs to advertise its wares better. But what it definitely does not mean is that the world has decided, “To hell with those fancy-schmancy hammers. Let’s just go back to using big, sharp rocks.”
How well the Twilight adaption turned out is another conversation (at press time, the masses are giving it a lukewarm 5.9 on IMDb — Humanoids is giving it a run for its money), but this is clearly a case where apples still ain’t oranges. One bad movie can’t predict the box office of another, let alone forecast the prospects of a genre.
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