Uwe Boll Hates First Sunday

Uwe Boll’s name has become synonymous with “awful” in the movie world. So awful, that when positive reviews start coming out about one or two of his films, most people can’t believe it (A lot of respectable critics I know are hailing Boll’s new movie “Postal”). But that’s the price you pay when all the other films you’ve put out have been horrible.

This past weekend Boll released his new film “In The Name Of The King: A Dungeon Siege Tale” opened, and only managed to come in 14th place on the box office boards, pulling in a measly $3.4 million. This is heartbreaking for Boll, because I know for a fact that he really believed in this one.

Coming in at #2 at the box office this weekend was another opening film “First Sunday” which made $19 million. And as hard as it is to believe… the Uwe Boll movie is BETTER (not that it’s good… but In The Name Of The Kind was indeed a better movie than First Sunday). And Uwe is beside himself. Listen to his rant:

Uwe Boll: Now a few days before IN THE NAME OF THE KING gets out in USA I have to tell whats going on in the film industry. If you don’t get out with a MAJOR company the exhibitors and the TV and radio stations are not supporting you. This is the reason that independent movies are like self-fulfilling prophecies and they almost bomb all. Our competitor in USA FIRST SUNDAY with Ice Cube is a piece of shit and for NOBODY nearly so interesting as IN THE NAME OF THE KING. We have a better movie and a bigger movie with a better script, better cast and we proved in Europe that our movie has the power to stay 3 weeks in the TOP TEN and that we can get at least 50% good reviews. FIRST SUNDAY is a direct to DVD title in Europe but in USA Sony puts 40 mill. $ in advertising to win that weekend. And this is completely absurd. Sony will not even recoup the advertising costs with that movie. The MAJORS own the TV Stations and the Radio Stations and they use that for free advertising and so the wide audience believes at one point that FIRST SUNDAY is the movie of that weekend – and they go and buy a ticket.

Now, being sour aside, Uwe does bring up a good point. All other things being equal, there is no way for a film with limited ad dollars to compete with a film that the studio is putting $40 million behind in advertising alone. And sadly, most of the movie going demographic bases their viewing choices on how many commercials they’ve seen for a movie.

But sorry Uwe, it’s not just the lack of marketing that you have to fight against… you also have to fight against your own reputation that, unfortunately, you’ve built for yourself. (Source: Movieweb)

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8 thoughts on “Uwe Boll Hates First Sunday

  1. i go to the muvico palace down here in florida as do many other ppl the place is amlost always packed and they had a huge dungeon siege poster blocking an entire wall in the hall way. im sure alot of ppl saw that and still didnt see this movie, i now advertising is a big factor in how movies do, but unless uwe can remove himself from his movies all together than their always gonna bomb.

  2. I’m sure Uwe’s a nice guy, but just once…just once…could he possibly take responsibility for a film that underperforms? He has blamed investors, editors, producers, video game companies, gives out whiny, crybaby responses to critics of his work such as he did with “Wired”

    http://blog.wired.com/games/2007/08/you-dumb-fck-uw.html

    Well, shit on a brick and make it stick.

    What’s gonna happen when those German tax breaks go south? Is he going to whine about the evil politicians and bearucrats? Wouldn’t be shocking.

    Uwe is best when he gets his butt away from video games- oh, that’s right, what’s In The Name Of The King based on again? Now…I’m not commenting on how good or bad his latest film is. I actually even liked a little of Bloodrayne (a little!) and I have heard good things about Postal .

    Maybe he needs to do lower budget exploitation films, take a page out of Roger Corman’s mantra. He also needs to stop his bitching. THIS is what I hate about Boll. It isn’t that he makes a bad film or that he might get screwed by the video game companies. It’s the fact that he comes off as a whining bitch.

  3. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but Uwe’s right.

    @Kevin C
    There is no studio to force. HE is the studio. He finances his own movies and he can’t spend too much money in advertising.

    Juno and Little Miss were indeed good in finding their audience over time; however, Uwe mostly complains about the opening weekend and first weeks. And independent titles are indeed losers from this perspective – Juno debuted at 17 before climbing up. The truth is that Americans go see a lot of shitty movies based only on their marketing – just look at this weekend’s top 10 and basically any weekend before that. Even some movie fans (Kristina?) don’t go see a movie sometimes because “the marketing was terrible”. Uwe simply complains about the fact that people don’t go see HIS movies instead of other crappy ones – and he’s right about it. He also seems to believe that they’re actually better, but that’s not the point. He’s got a big fantasy movie, with big names in it, and in theory more people should have gone see it, no matter how bad the movie is. With few exceptions, most fantasy movies since LOTR were quite mediocre but they still managed to make a lot of money. What’s different in this case is indeed the marketing.

  4. Uwe is a hack who is full of shit.
    His movies just suck and I am 100% sure his new one is no exception. His movies bomb because they suck, not because they don’t get studio support.
    There are many Indie-films out there who make more than their costs back and bring in decent numbers.
    Look at JUNO. Look at LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE.
    Movies who are good find their audience, even if it takes time.
    Movies who are big bags of horseshit (Yes Uwe, I’m looking at you!) don’t get good word of mouth and get filtered down to the 5-Dollar bins very quick.
    It baffles me how this douche always makes up some bullshit excuses why his awful movies bomb.
    You are responsible Uwe and no one else!

  5. He just needed a better trailer. lol. You can make the crappiest movie look good in a trailer/tv spot.

    Once I heard that line, “…tend to your wounds.” I said to myself, “Now I know what I’m NOT watching this weekend.”

    But I am willing to at least rent the film on DVD. I’m weird that way.

  6. Why doesnt Uwe just FORCE the studio to market his film better. Threten to tear them limb from limb and offer them as a burnt sacrifice to the god of poor movies if they dont.

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