519 replies to this topic

[Turn]

Undoubtedly, Barbara has risen to the occasion and she's shown a willingness to cut the apron strings when she feels an actor has been in the role long enough. They've refused to keep the same director churning out 5 films in a row, so that's a good thing. But I also have a Madonna/Whore complex where Barbara is concerned; on the one hand she's got a tougher, brighter business acumen than her father had, but on the other hand she mishandled the firing of Brosnan and the hiring of Craig, and her refusal or inability to widen the Bond brand with spin-off characters, and her elitist attitude toward the Garnder/Benson novels irks me.

I see some things differently.

For one, looking back now, the whole controversy regarding Brosnan's departure (I don't call it a firing as much as a non-renewal of a contract) and Craig's hiring was something of a masterstroke in terms of publicity.

Some of what Craig endured was downright nasty, but the old saying about even negative publicity being good publicity held true as it had people interested. Otherwise it could have been a case of "there's a new Bond, ho hum, I wonder what Brangelina is up to or what Britney or Anna Nicole is doing to screw up today." People were interested in the new Bond, some just to see if he would fail, and the success of CR and Craig came as a pleasant surprise to many and renewed or sparked new interest in the series.

I am not sorry there are no spin-off characters since I simply don't think any of them were strong enough to maintain such interest. Can you honestly say a Jinx film written by Purvis and Wade would have been a good addition to the Bond legacy? Wai-Lin, may have been acceptable, but likely forgettable. The 'stick with one thing and do it well' philosphy worked for Cubby and it still works. There's enough other Bond projects such as Young Bond, centennnary novels, video games, etc. out there to maintain interest and widen the Bond brand.

I've always thought the Gardner and Benson work could have had a fairer shot at being adapted to film as well. But, again, Cubby had the same attitude about the Gardner books and apparently never thought twice about freely borrowing elements from them for the films. There's a list out there somewhere, maybe even here on CBn, that compares all the elements from the Gardner novels that made it into Eon films.

[Double-Oh Agent]

Undoubtedly, Barbara has risen to the occasion and she's shown a willingness to cut the apron strings when she feels an actor has been in the role long enough. They've refused to keep the same director churning out 5 films in a row, so that's a good thing. But I also have a Madonna/Whore complex where Barbara is concerned; on the one hand she's got a tougher, brighter business acumen than her father had, but on the other hand she mishandled the firing of Brosnan and the hiring of Craig, and her refusal or inability to widen the Bond brand with spin-off characters, and her elitist attitude toward the Garnder/Benson novels irks me.

I don't want any films with spin-off characters from the Bond universe, but I'm all for Bond films based on the continuation novels.

Huh? Shirley you've made a typo. Under no box office accounting methods have I ever seen LTK declared the winner over AVTAK, even when adjusting for inflation. LTK was a bomb in every sense of the word.

Worldwide, LTK grossed a few million more. That point was following up on my point that TLD, in dollar terms, grossed comparably to OP (more, actually) and even to FYEO (only a few million less).

Since there's no question all five or six of the 80s films were profitable, I was making a point about how it must have looked on the surface. In light of that, I was wondering why almost all of the blame was so often conveniently placed at the feet of one man, Timothy Dalton.

I think it comes down to the front man factor. Much as a quarterback in (American) football gets too much of the credit when his team wins and too much of the blame when his team loses, so is often the case with film stars. Sean Connery, Roger Moore, Pierce Brosnan, and Daniel Craig were/are all popular with the fans and their films made lots of money so they get a ton of credit. Conversely, George Lazenby and Timothy Dalton were not as popular with the fans as the other four and their films were at least perceived as not making very much money, so they get a lot of blame.

[Royal Dalton]

And yet, both of his Bond films still made more money than Die Hard.

Well, there's a real reach, eh?

No, it isn't.

The 16th film in the series made $156 million dollars in 1989...a mere $16 million more than Bruce Willis' *FIRST* Die Hard film. Furthermore, in the U.S. Die Hard made 2.5 tims as much as what LTK earned.

You're trying to compare the beginning of one franchise with a film series that had been going on for 2.5 decades and should have had the formula down to perfection at that point.

Nope. I'm comparing the box office takings of Licence To Kill with one of the action films that Bond was supposed to be playing catch-up with back then. And, internationally, Licence To Kill beat Die Hard.

By your reckoning Die Hard was a 'flop', as well.

Die Hard was the #6 film of the year at the box office.(1988)
LTK was the #36th placed film of the year at the box office. (1989)
Die Hard 2 made $240 million worldwide, and $117 million in the U.S a mere one year (1990) after LTK. How do you like them apples?

I don't. They're sour.

Let's look at the films that LTK failed to beat in the summer of 1989:
Uncle Buck
Tango & Cash
Harlem Nights (and this at a time when Eddie Murphy couldn't even get arrested)
Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure (like, woah dude!)
Steel Magnolias (a chick flick! A chick flick!)

Do you know what was right underneath LTK? WEEKEND AT BERNIES and ROAD HOUSE. You can find them in the "B-list movies" section at your local Blockbuster.

But worst of all, let's look at the one movie that LTK went up against on opening weekend and could not compete with: WHEN HARRY MET SALLY.

WHMS opened on July 14th, 1989..the exact same weekend as LTK. Where LTK opened on 1,575 screens, WHMS only opened on 41 screens. LTK opened in 4th place to a disastrous 8.7 million dollars. WHMS opened to 1 million dollars. WHMS went on to earn $92 million dollars and become the 11th highest grossing film of the year, while LTK went tits up and ranked as the 36th highest grossing film of the year with a paltry $34 million dollars.

I mean, there's no easy way to say this: LTK got trashed by a film starring Meg Ryan and Billy Crystal, and directed by Meathead. That's more than a minor embarassment; it's damn near to a national disgrace.

And Quantum of Solace has been thrashed at the British box office by a Meryl Streep 'chick flick'. So what?

Well, you know what? Nobody gave a about LTK either, because they could've seen that exact same type of B-list film by going to Blockbuster and looking for anything directed by Andy Sedaris, or starring Michael Dudikoff. LTK was a cheap film, with cheap, no-name, talentless supporting actors, some of the worst acting in the series, manic directing, and a weak plot with character that nobody cared about.

You're entitled to your opinion. But don't dress it up as fact.

LTK was a total downer. It didn't have the sophistication of a Christopher Nolan or a Martin Campbell to help write and direct it. It's just a bad, bad film.

So you say. It still managed to beat Die Hard and Lethal Weapon 1 worldwide at the box office, though. And it got higher viewing figures than any other film shown on British television in 1994. Not bad for a film that everybody supposedly hated.

[dinovelvet]

Some of the movie looked cheap, including Moneypenny's office, which seemed to consist of a file cabinet, a desk, a chair, and whatever else the set decorators could nick from the nearby Ed Wood production offices.

LMAO! Damn you.

[Royal Dalton]

Gravity's Silhouette, it doesn't matter whether you think the film was crap or not. I don't even think it's that great myself. But it wasn't a flop, and that's all there is to it.

[Double-Oh Agent]

I would love to see a reasonable, logical answer for why LTK managed a paltry $34 million at the box office in the U.S. while WHMS made nearly 3x as much as Bond.

Why Licence To Kill only made $34 million? Extremely poor marketing and perhaps a glut of good action movies that left people tired of that genre by the time LTK debuted. I suppose you also can't discount a more serious film that departed from the Bond formula somewhat and perhaps some non-support of Timothy Dalton by the general public.

Why When Harry Met Sally did so well? Counter-programming. A well-made, funny chick flick in the middle of summer that drew in lots of women and couples. That, and of course, the absolute classic diner scene where Meg Ryan fakes an orgasm. That was worth the price of admission alone.

[Piz Gloria 1969]

"Madonna/Whore complex"

Why are people always dissing on Madge.....LMAO , kidding

So Robert Davi is talentless then *sarcasm* :/

Well , to be honest none of the Bonds have "Oscar calibre" acting so you might as well diss virtually the entire series then lol

[Christopher006]

Hey, folks; it's me, again.

To clear up a point about Licence To Kill: It wasn't a flop in commercial terms. No Bond movie has ever lost money at the box office. It did underperform by United Artists' standards and Bond fans (and experts) put the blame down to 3 factors:

1. A really poor marketing campaign which saw very few trailers for the movie hitting the theatres and virtually no supporting materials for publicity.

2. The beginning of the UA/Kevin McClory/Eon lawsuits which cast a shadow over the production and lasted for another 6 years, preventing any new Bond movies being made.

3. Knee jerk criticism. Because of reason #1, LTK didn't do that well in its first week at the box office so what did the press do? Blame the problem on the "dark tone", lack of humour and, eventually, Timothy Dalton himself. Forget the fact that LTK actually surmounted its problems and went on to do good business, in the media's eye the movie was a flop and audiences hated Dalton...which seems an odd conclusion seeing that The Living Daylights was a huge success.

So no Bond movies were made for 6 years and yet some movie critics still attribute that to LTK "bombing" and the public going off James Bond...convieniently forgetting that it was actually a lawsuit holding things up. A 3rd Dalton movie was being planned just after LTK to be released for 1991. One UA exec didn't like Dalton and apparently wanted him off future Bond movie but the truth is Eon plus the majority of the UA board wanted to keep him on.

It's funny how at the time of LTK, the press and some of the audience (I won't say "fans" because they clearly weren't James Bond fans; more like Roger Moore era fans) complained about the rawness of the movie, the violence and Bond being hard assed and yet these critics now praise Daniel Craig's interpretation. Moore fans are still seething though...they mutated into the "Craig Not Bond" nutters via an unhealthy obsession with Pierce Brosnan.

This is interesting and thanks for posting it Mr. Blofeld. I was 14 when Licence To Kill came out and I saw it in the theater one day before getting ill with the chicken pox. I will say that this Nick doesn't know what he is talking about. He doesn't understand that the general public are the ones who determine how well a Bond film will do at the box office, not the James Bond fan community. This Nick is also one of these idiots that act as if the Moore films were the only ones that were silly and ridiculous. Bond films were silly almost from the very start. Even the Connery pictures were about plots to take over the world, had bizarre and silly villains, stupid gadgets, and a lot of ridiculous humor and jokiness. Lazenby's film was also silly with its angels of death and bacteriological warfare plot. The "Craig Not Bonders" don't like the Craig films for two reasons, and they have nothing to do with their serious and darker approach. They don't like Craig because of his looks. Past Bonds were tall, thin, suave, dark, and were pretty boys. Many people including of course Craig Not Bonders believe Bond should have remained a tall, dark, and suave figure. Craig Not Bonders believe he is too buff, sloppy, unclean, rough, raw, short, and Blonde to be James Bond. Second of all, they did not want a reboot, which they felt was unnecessary. One could have still made a darker and serious Bond film with Daniel Craig without rebooting the series.

Let me start with #1: Everyone knew there was a Bond film coming out. Even with a weaker marketing campaign and a title change, it was no secret. IT'S JAMES BOND! Nobody was against the darker approach the Dalton films took and they did jump on current action film trends such as focusing on the drug war like the Lethal Weapon films had done. Although Dalton was considered by critics to be very bland and without a personality, he really wasn't the reason why Licence To Kill did badly at the box office. It did badly at the box office because it was released late in a summer that was packed with blockbusters and sequels. After Indiana Jones, Ghostbusters, Star Trek, Batman, Karate Kid, and Lethal Weapon, the general public was burned out on summer films and exhausted. If LTK had been released a month earlier and certainly before Batman, it may have done much better. It was the most chaotic summer ever with the most blockbusters and sequels than any year before it. And Nick is wrong about the trailers. There was plenty of them.

#2 This is simple to answer. Kevin McClory had nothing to do with the lawsuits in the early 90s. The legal problems were between MGM/UA and Danjaq.

#3 The second and main reason for why Licence To Kill failed at the box office in America was that audiences were tiring of Bond. With new franchises popping up like Lethal Weapon, Robocop, Die Hard, and Batman, and with the growing popularity of action stars like Arnold and Stallone, Bond was becoming less interesting to the general public. People were growing increasingly tired of the Bond films.

[Safari Suit]

"Nick" here clearly mistakes "coming up with a hypothesis" for "having knowledge".

Harlem Nights (and this at a time when Eddie Murphy couldn't even get arrested)

Not true, surely? HN was following Coming To America and Cop II which were among the biggest hits of their respective years.

[Mr. Blofeld]

"Nick" here clearly mistakes "coming up with a hypothesis" for "having knowledge".

I linked the thread from which this originated in my original post; if you want, you could check it out and respond to the man yourself.

[Safari Suit]

Thanks, but I am not registered there, and I don't want to just for the sake of basically starting an argument! (Not least as I strongly dislike Agony Booth) He is perfectly entitled to his hypothesis, and they are valid arguments, but they are not facts.

[Mr. Blofeld]

He is perfectly entitled to his hypothesis, and they are valid arguments, but they are not facts.

Very well.

[byline]

Would Brozza have saved the series. His familiarity with US audiences through Remington Steele might have increased TLD's numbers, but even in LTK, I'm not sure he would have made a big enough difference. He just would have been the latest star of another deliberately paced, filmed at Pinewood etc etc.

Had Brosnan gotten the role back then, TLD would've been slightly different, and LTK would have ceased to exist. It's possible, in retrospect, to think that maybe some of the drama around him not getting the role was subconsciously transferred to Dalton by the audience, who may have been looking at him as an interloper.

There's no doubt in my mind that that's exactly how some (many?) viewed him at the time. I can't tell you how many people I heard say, "Pierce Brosnan would be perfect for the role. I can't believe they've got this other guy playing Bond." And then, when Brosnan got the role, it was, "Finally, they got the right guy!" (FWIW, I'm an American who was living in a small town in western Kentucky at the time, so I don't know how accurately those comments reflect the bigger picture. But that's what I heard.)

[Revelator]

The Dalton Apologists Brigade loves to blame the film's failure on the heavy competition the movie was up against during the summer of 1989. What they conveniently leave out is the fact that most of that competition had come and gone by the time LTK debuted.

This line of reasoning seems a bit phony. Let's look at a chart of the yearly Box office for 1989 (source here.)

Rank * Total Gross/Theaters * Opening/Theaters *Opening date
1. Batman * $251,188,924/ 2,201 * $40,489,746 /2,194 * 6/23

2. Indiana Jones * $197,171,806/ 2,327 * $29,355,021 /2,327 * 5/24

3. Lethal Weapon 2 * $147,253,986/ 1,830 * $20,388,800 /1,803 * 7/7

5. Honey, I Shrunk the Kids * $130,724,172/ 1,498 *$14,262,961/ 1,371 * 6/23

7. Ghostbusters 2 * $112,494,738/ 2,410 * $29,472,894 /2,410 * 6/16

10. Dead Poets Society * $95,860,116/ 1,109 * $340,456 /8 * 6/2

11. When Harry Met Sally * $92,823,546/ 1,174 * $1,094,453 /41 * 7/14

16. Turner & Hooch * $71,079,915/1,888 * $12,211,042 /1,877 * 7/28

25. Star Trek V * $52,210,049/ 2,202 * $17,375,648 /2,202 * 6/9

33. The Karate Kid III * $38,956,288/1,569 * $10,364,544 /1,560 * 6/30

36. License to Kill * $34,667,015/1,587 * $8,774,776/1,575 * 7/14

LTK, like most of the action blockbusters (and unlike movies such as WHMS, whose business model is explained later), opened on a large number of screens and depended on a large opening gross, followed by diminishing grosses each week. But as we can see, it was already at a disadvantage, since it opened on fewer screens than Star Trek, Turner & Hooch, Ghostbusters, Back to the Future, Lethal Weapon 2, Last Crusade, and Batman--in the latter's case it had more than a 600 screen advantage over LTK. This disavantage can certainly be seen in LTK's low opening weekend gross. UA by now lacked the clout of a much bigger studio than Warner Brothers, and it certainly lacked their marketing staff.
Now, let's rearrange some of these films by their opening dates.

Indiana Jones 05/23
Star Trek V 06/09
Ghostbusters 2 06/16
Batman 06/23
Lethal Weapon 2 07/07
Licence to Kill 07/14

In other words, anyone, who says it is a "fact that most of that competition had come and gone by the time LTK debuted" is being disingenuous, especially since in 1989 films stayed in theaters far longer than they do today, now that DVDs and digital piracy are so prevalent. I still remember seeing Batman in October of that year in a well-occupied theater. Batman opened three weeks before LTK, and was a monster for many weeks afterwards. It had hardly come and gone, and the action audience still had Lethal Weapon to choose from if it wanted more action, and Indiana Jones was also still in many theaters. LTK came at the tail-end of this entire period. Unlike these movies, LTK was hampered by an unarguably poor ad campaign and by opening on considerably fewer screens. It came a little late to the blockbuster party. Had it opened in the fall, with a better ad campaign, it might have done much better box office. (It is no accident that the recent Bond movies have also opened in the fall.) But during the summer of 89, Americans were blanketed by sequels from much younger franchises, and Bond came after they'd had their fill. Compared to these series, Bond simply seemed old-hat, and the lower-key tone of both Dalton films, coming after the decadence of the Moore years, was in many ways exactly what the public wasn't looking for in a summer blockbuster.
What does seem to be evident is that the Bond films have usually recovered from lower box office by pastiching themselves and emphasizing their most formulaic qualities. This can be seen in most of the recovery films, such as DAF, TSWLM and GE. (CR was not a recovery film, since DAD had done quite well.) LTK instead went in the opposite direction and suffered. It was not "Bondian" enough to stand for the Bond brand-name, during a summer when brand-names were everything.

If WHMS can make $93 million in the summer of BATMAN, INDIANA JONES, GHOSTBUSTERS, and LETHAL WEAPON, why can't Bond?

Because WHMS wasn't an action movie, quite obviously. It's a movie for people who want to see something else besides explosions and he-men. LTK was competing against a score of hot new action franchises during a summer legendary for action blockbuster glut. By comparison, WHMS, the sort of film perfect for someone who didn't want to see a Bond film, started out in a few theaters, was built up through word of mouth, and earned its take gradually over the summer, whereas the action films all debuted across thousands of screens and depended on a large opening weekend, followed by smaller grosses each week.

The script was crap. The acting was crap. The direction was crap. The title song was crap. The title sequence was crap.

So much crap, and so little of its sticks. LTK had a more coherent plot than TLD, Robert Davi was one of the best Bond villains since Blofeld and only one or two of the other actors was particularly wooden, Gladys Knight made the most out the psychopathic lyrics of the opening song, and I appreciated seeing Maurice Binder's titles for one last time. I rank it considerably above TLD, which seems by contrast convoluted and lacking in heft.

Edited by Revelator, 29 December 2008 - 11:26 PM.

[HildebrandRarity]

I love your insightful post and analysis, Revelator. Well done!

If WHMS can make $93 million in the summer of BATMAN, INDIANA JONES, GHOSTBUSTERS, and LETHAL WEAPON, why can't Bond?

Because WHMS wasn't action movie, quite obviously. It's a movie for people who want to see something else besides explosions and he-men.

It's the same reason why Transporter 3 can't out do Mamma Mia!, Twilight and Sex And The City.

[Professor Pi]

Here's a link with all the Bond box office data:

http://www.the-numbe...s/JamesBond.php

Before Brosnan, Moonraker had the highest gross, both domestically and world-wide. I haven't done the arithmetic, but I constantly read that Thunderball is the highest grossing after adjusting for inflation. I like LTK better than both these films.

OHMSS, TMWTGG, and AVTAK appear to be the other box office low points, but LTK appears to have the lowest return on its budget investment dollar. Notice how the US gross seems to cover each films budget costs since about 1987.

[Professor Pi]

Found a link that adjusts for inflation:

http://www.universal...boxoffice.shtml

Thunderball, Goldfinger, and Live and Let Die are the top three.

Licence to Kill is dead last, I'm sorry to say.

[HildebrandRarity]

Found a link that adjusts for inflation:

http://www.universal...boxoffice.shtml

Thunderball, Goldfinger, and Live and Let Die are the top three.

Licence to Kill is dead last, I'm sorry to say.

The site does not adjust for currency fluctuations, it being a more important factor given Bond movies gross considerably more outside the US than within it - by a factor of more than 2 to 1.

The only true measure not requiring 'adjustments' for ticket prices and foreign exchange movements would be world-wide admissions.



Anyone come up with a site that shows total world-wide admission numbers?

[Revelator]

They may have stayed in theaters slightly longer then than they do now, but not by much. The after-theater home market was in full swing by then, and BATMAN came out on VHS in late October or early November.

Batman was storming theatres for at least five months. QoS by contrast has been out for about three and is getting harder and harder to find in the theaters--in my own town, San Francisco, it's playing in only one theater, and not for much longer.

This is a three-hankie post; I've practically used up all my Kleenex reading this sob story about how unfair it was to LTK to open it in the summer, against competition, with a weak marketing campaign. Sheesh. I mean, the excuses that get made for this film are just unbelievable.

What I find unbelievable is the sort of attitudinizing that insists on dismissing the obvious factors that were in play during the film's release. Artistically bottom-tier Bond films like TMWTGG or AVTAK made more money, though they were quite arguably much worse in quality (and as we've learned, plenty of lousy films make money when they've been hyped enough). It's not particularly debatable that LTK opened at the end of a summer where half a dozen newer franchises had already cleaned out the box office, that the film was saddled with a weak ad campaign, and that, in contrast to what was the reigning policy with blockbusters, it opened on far fewer screens than its competition. Anyone genuinely interested in the circumstances of the film's lack of domestic success has to take those factors into account, just as the considerations of timing, marketing, and theater placement would have to be considered in accounting for the success of LTK's competition. By contrast, your own denunciations seem neither convincing nor based on little more than your hatred towards the film.

If you can't stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen.

If you can't summon up anything more than platitudes, then the heat's gotten to you instead.

[Mr. Blofeld]

Batman was storming theatres for at least five months.

Yeah, blame it on Batman. Seriously, blaming LTK's failure on Batman has become the equivalent of blaming every bad thing in this world on George W. Bush.

Well, it's the truth, isn't it?

[Revelator]

Yeah, blame it on Batman. Seriously, blaming LTK's failure on Batman has become the equivalent of blaming every bad thing in this world on George W. Bush. The Bond brand had no trouble competing against TITANIC, LORD OF THE RINGS, HARRY POTTER, etc....I'm so sick and tired of people excusing LTK's pathetic performance because it was up against some competition.

What you are tired of is people trying to give a reason for LTK's performance, rather than just saying "because it sucked" Nor am I blaming Batman, though it was the highest grossing sensation of that summer. LTK was harmed by opening after at least half a dozen film franchises had monopolized the box office, and it was probably more directly hurt by Lethal Weapon II, which opened only two weeks beforehand. Batman itself is however notable because its box office depended on getting right everything that LTK got wrong--a hype-making promotional campaign, a large screen count, and better timing. And it's almost needless to say that Titantic and Harry Potter are not in the same genre as Bond--they're the sort of movies for people who want something different from Bond. I don't remember if any of the LotR films opened particularly close to any of the Brosnans, but all of the latter were much better timed and marketed in the first place.

The "fewer screens" argument doesn't hold water. That LTK opened on fewer screens than Batman is not significant; had the movie generated more interest and been better received the theater count would have been increased.

This ignores the fact that the opening weekend is what counts in the modern business model for blockbusters. If a film doesn't make enough money on opening weekend it won't open on more screens. It's something of a vicious circle, and it also demonstrates how interlinked promotion and screen count are--theater chains will be less likely to book a poorly promoted title in the first place.

And When Harry Met Sally opened on only 41 screens, yet expanded and went on to earn 93 million dollars. Bond got beat down by a chick flick.

I hate to quote myself, but this time I think it's justified.

HMS wasn't an action movie, quite obviously. It's a movie for people who want to see something else besides explosions and he-men. LTK was competing against a score of hot new action franchises during a summer legendary for action blockbuster glut. By comparison, WHMS, the sort of film perfect for someone who didn't want to see a Bond film, started out in a few theaters, was built up through word of mouth, and earned its take gradually over the summer, whereas the action films all debuted across thousands of screens and depended on a large opening weekend, followed by smaller grosses each week.

Edited by Revelator, 10 January 2009 - 09:45 PM.

[Safari Suit]

Yeah, blame it on Batman. Seriously, blaming LTK's failure on Batman has become the equivalent of blaming every bad thing in this world on George W. Bush.

I blame LTK's failure on George H.W. Bush.

[sthgilyadgnivileht]

Whether it was or not it was failure, Cubby Broccoli knew there were problems and said he MGW had to do 'some serious rethinking', (as quoted from his autobiography, and subsequently the DVD commentary).

I also think because it did not do so well at the box office, does not mean it was a bad film per se. There are many films that don't do well on release, but grow in popularity over time. Broccoli's own chitty chitty bang bang is a case in point. Equally there are films that do good business at release, and are forgotten a few years down the line, and certainly don't warrant a restoration by Lowry!

I personally think the film is an interesting entry but not a highpoint for me, although it is not a bad film either.
I do feel it has to be questioned why a film series like bond was forced to relocate to Mexico to save on a tight budget, when the series just ten years earlier had the world at feet with MR and one of the highest budgets of the series for its time.

[jaguar007]

Some are saying that LTK was not as successful because of timing and marketing and some are saying it is because Dalton/Bond being unpopular at the time. The fact is both are right. The marketing and timing was a problem with LTK as well as Dalton not being a popular choice for Bond. It is also not just Dalton's lack of popularality, but Bond's lack of popularity in the 1980s. They are all contributing factors to LTK's poor box office. I firmly believe that LTK could have done better with a bigger/better marketing campaign, but it still would not have done blockbuster revenue.

I saw several movies in 1989 and I never saw a trailer for LTK playing with any of them. I also only saw 1 TV commercial for LTK in 89 and that was during an ABC showing of TMWTGG.

While I am a big Dalton fan and really wish he had done more movies, I am also a realist. GE was successful because they cast a Bond the public wanted to see in 1987 as well as opening it when there was not much competition and they gave it a good marketing campaign. The movie also does not look underbudget like LTK did compared to it's competition.

[Turn]

I saw several movies in 1989 and I never saw a trailer for LTK playing with any of them. I also only saw 1 TV commercial for LTK in 89 and that was during an ABC showing of TMWTGG.

I saw the LTK teaser trailer with Rain Man the day it came out in 1988. I recall wondering if there was an outside chance I would catch one and there it was, to my surprise.

I also saw the official trailer in front of Road House (yes, I actually paid to see that film)in May of '89. Of course, Rain Man and Road House were both MGM/United Artists films.

As far as coverage that summer, LTK did get mentioned in the previews in magazines and summer movie show such as Siskel and Ebert. But not so much as a highlight film, just as another Bond movie.

Starlog Magazine, for instance, had articles about LTK, but films like Batman and Indiana Jones were on the cover. Same with Premiere Magazine in the U.S. There was that LTK graphic novel comic, but no tie-in magazine the way there was with the previous several films in the series.

TLD had the advantage of being the 25th anniversary film, a new Bond in the role and TV specials such as Happy Anniversary 007. I remember MTV having coverage of LTK on its film show, but don't recall much about TV spots at the time. There didn't seem to be many tie-ins, either. One of the more bizarre ones was a contest sponsored by Planters Peanuts.

There also wasn't a hot music video or band involved the way Duran Duran was for AVTAK, or to a lesser extent a-ha for TLD.

I still stick by my thought that Eon was coasting at the time. They had always had success and there was little reason for Cubby to think another film wouldn't succeed. He probably didn't anticipate the way the new breed of action hero was being perceived by the modern audience. Mel Gibson was hot at the time and a new Bond just didn't match up.

[Professor Pi]

I love Licence to Kill but reading all these posts has forced me to ask some hard questions about it which will probably knock it down a few pegs on my rankings. Like, I am beginning to believe the revenge angle as portrayed in this movie is a bit out of character, at least with what the public wants versus, say, QoS or FYEO.

But having seen most all those movies in that summer of '89, I had the impression then that LTK wasn't even the most Bond-like movie. Indiana Jones gave us the better set-pieces and treacherous damsel, Lethal Weapon 2 gave us better stunts (save Bond's great water-skiing escape) and villains, and Batman had much better production set designs and even a gadget-laden car. Bond had his work cut out for him. He didn't deliver to the casual fans, just most of the hardcore ones.

But let's still remember that as successful as Casino Royale was, it still got beat out by penguins with Happy Feet on opening weekend.

[jaguar007]

While I agree with Gravity to a certain extent, I recall in 89 mentioning to my boss that I was going to go see the new Bond movie and his response was "there is a new Bond movie out?". I also remember LTK being sold out at the theater I went to on opening day.

As I said earlier, I don't think it LTK's dissapointing box office is totally because nobody wanted to see the movie or the poor marketing - it was a combination of the two.

[Revelator]

You say Titanic, HP, and LOTR are not in the same genre as Bond, but neither was Ghostbusters II or Batman. And inherent in your argument is the belief that LOTR/HP-nerds don't watch Bond either; that they're exlusively loyal only to LOTR or HP. You know, some people are fans of multiple franchises.

Ghostbusters II is an action comedy and Batman is an action adventure film. Both are closer to the LTK than a romance film like Titanic, or fantasy films like HP or LOTR. Obviously some people are fans of multiple franchises, but in the bigger picture it makes more sense to open an action film against films from different genres, to fulfill different needs in the audience, rather than to foolishly open the film after half a dozen action films have already monopolized the public's attention. Lastly, it would help if you could name which Bond films opened at the same time as Titanic, HP, and LOTR.

I don't really dispute that. What I would say, though, is that there are films that start off in second place and after a few weeks move into first place; I think MY BIG FAT GREEK WEDDING was the only film ever to make over $200 million dollars domestically and *NEVER* land in first place in the weekly box office totals.

Wedding and Gran Torino both followed the WHMS business model: release it in big cities first--usually New York--to build up word of mouth and critical reviews, and then slowly roll out the film into subsidiary markets, heralded by its press and acclaim. In this model the number of opening screens is far less consequential, since the film is given time to build up small business in one area before it's opened in the next. In other words, the film is allowed to cultivate an audience in multiple areas at multiple times. LTK--and pretty much every other action film that summer--followed the opposite approach, where a mountain of hype is supposed to build up excitement to create the largest opening weekend gross possible, followed by steadily diminishing grosses. The film isn't allowed to cultivate an audience after release--after the opening weekend it's left to sink or swim, and the number of screens doesn't generally rise or fall by a great amount. LW2 opened on 1,803 screens and reached maximum of 1.830 screens. Similarly, Batman opened on 2.194 screens and reached a maximum of 2,201. LTK opened on 1,575 and reached 1,587. Regardless of the film's financial success, none experienced a vast rise between the opening and maximum screens. Limited screens don't limit a film's revenue when it's being nurtured through each segment of the national market, as in the WHMS model, where the opening number of screens just might been those in New York City and LA. When the film is expected to hit the entire nation all at once and then be left alone, the number of opening screens can be a significant factor, especially when in conjunction to its marketing and timing,

Your argument is that the fans didn't show up and that nobody wanted to see LTK. But even CR would not have been a huge success if only the fans showed up. It needed to attract the widest possible general audience. I think we can all agree that LTK was a vulnerable film, since TLD had not taken America by storm, and Americans had several homegrown franchises to occupy their attention. Given all of the above, was it really the wisest idea to release the film after all those American action films had already fulfilled the general public's desire for action, and with a poor ad campaign and on fewer screens than its competition? Obviously not. There's a reason Bond films are traditionally released in the fall, accompanied by a large pre-release marketing roll-out. If "nobody wanted to see LTK" then the film's quality doesn't have much to do with answering that question in the first place, and the discussion becomes a larger one about why James Bond was so unexciting to the general public in the summer of 1989. (It would also be helpful to look at how the film did outside of America.)

Edited by Revelator, 11 January 2009 - 08:18 PM.

[Mr. Blofeld]

If "nobody wanted to see LTK" then the film's quality doesn't have much to do with answering that question in the first place, and the discussion becomes a larger one about why James Bond was so unexciting to the general public in the summer of 1989. (It would also be helpful to look at how the film did outside of America.)

Let it become that discussion, then; as the thread starter, I give you free reign.

[plankattack]

There's a reason Bond films are traditionally released in the fall,

While I agree with much of your post, I think it's worth being careful about this assumption. From 79-89, Bonds had become summer releases in the UK and the US. I do believe that the switch(back) to fall/winter in '95 was a conscious effort to keep Bond out of the very competitive summer "tentpole movie" season. The decision has been the right one and I feel that switching back to the summer might not hurt ticket sales, but I don't see how it could improve box office.

That said, I still believe that LTK's anaemic numbers in the US were down to an almost non-existent ad-campaign, a competive market-place, and TD's failure to catch on. I like LTK, so the notion that's it's not a good film doesn't fly as a reason to me. Hey, nobody went, so how would they know?