The following was sent to my by Joel:
No, Tom Cruise is not making a film called Unemployed, he’s actually facing some serious career choices. To get his act together AND agree to a smaller paycheck or get a job somewhere else. This is the result of all the Cruise-isms over the last years. news.com.au gives us this:
The Hollywood studio that bankrolls his films is not backing any more Cruise movies until he agrees to a significant pay cut.
The 44-year-old actor is eager to get back to work to put behind him disappointments such as Mission: Impossible III, but last week his 13-year deal with the Paramount studio was allowed to lapse. Executives say Cruise faces a “financial adjustment and reality check” before he can continue his illustrious career
…and this:
Hollywood studios are influenced by Q Scores, an annual poll of a celebrity’s likeability. In the last poll, the percentage of Americans who liked Cruise fell from 30 two years ago to 19, while people who disliked him jumped from 14 to 31. The next Q Score, due to be released confidentially to the studios next month, is expected to be even worse.
This is a good thing. I love this. With Hollywood losing money at the rate they are, they should look into the paychecks that goes out actors and directors. Even though the director is the backbone of the film, there are some directors (I won’t mention Spielberg by name) that pulls in obscene amounts.
Now with the success of Pixar and films like Superman Returns the studios are beginning to realize that the name of an A-list actor isn’t necessarily money in the bank. John’s been saying this for years and I think we all agree that it’s about the story and how you tell it.
Just my two cents…
/Joel
Related links:
Cruise joins the jobless
Q Score at Wikipedia
Cool site. Thanks.
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Very good site. Thank you:-)
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I have experienced the worst loss of human rights since the holocoust. Without redress from any government agency or court system in Florida or the US anyone can be shot beaten tortured and jailed for life with no criminal charges no weapon no threats no dangerous or strange activity no criminal or dangerous history simply if the police wat to make an arrest to bump up their carees. You also can be jailed with no judge no jury no lawyer no rights is the police claim there might be a crime or threat in the future this iscalled preventive detention in florida and it is done toover 116,000 citizens who are now attempting to emigrate to a free country after being released after up to 15 year in jaif with annual fees charged fro the incarceration because withot a crime or trail the State of Florida has passed laws making preventive detention a civil arrest. I lost a total of $1,600,000 at age 64 and there is no country that will accept a person my age with no money and no health insurance. I wrote an original movie UNLAWFUL ORDER about these events and ofset the shock to the conscience with originalhumor and hoping Tom Cruise could be enticed to produce the movie I validated Scientology and merged it with theology using String Theory which as a retired nuclear physicist I know merges all four basic force in the universe proving God is a scientist. Copies of the script are with Script Pimp Script Page, CCHR and Church of Scientology. The script eas properly formated via David Trottier.
Wow. I think this is a move in the right direction. Now, if only they’d do this to that dude Tucker something or other.
Personally, I hope this forces Tom to take some smaller, challenging, dramatic roles. He’s a great actor and given the right motivation and script, he can pull out some amazing performances. I think this might be the incentive to get him into the Oscar categories again. This might be a hidden gem for him. I hope he takes full advantage of it.
Marty
You make a fair point, but with all the money Tom’s been donating since Risky Business, he should be the Pope of Scientology by now. Best seat in the house!
Also, I think it’s good to sit far away from Xenu, lest he gather you into his evil rocket ship and dump you in a volcano. No, Xenu, that’s a bad Xenu!
???
“With the success of Pixar and SUPERMAN RETURNS …”
I’m not sure what planet you’re living on, but there are HUGE demographic reasons why Pixar films do well compared to Tom Cruise pictures “doing well,” and RETURNS was hardly successful in the world of Hollywood accounting, so you might want to rework your argument with better facts … however, I still agree with your central point that Cruise needs a reality check. He’s needed one for years, though, as his one dimensional character (and abilities) really only lends itself to a single picture a year.
Hey, Black Steven, Cruise doesn’t need the money but a big chunk of his earnings go to Scientology. He takes a pay cut they might end up demoting him. He’ll have to sit at the back of the church in the cheap seats, far away from Xenu.
man i am just sick of toms antics what he is doing and he deserves a paycut he should be trying to work out his acting carrer rather than his antic in magazines and on tv show he is just a werdio now.
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http://moviesandcomics.blogspot.com/
Surely Tom Cruise has enough money by now. Now that he’s crazy and unpopular, I’d like to see him ditch some of the mainstream stuff he’s involved with and be a little more creative with his career. Why not try a few more roles along the lines of Magnolia or Collateral? Do some independent films, work with Kevin Smith, play an eccentric loon for Wes Anderson, whatever. This is a great chance for the cruiser to be an actual actor. He won’t get paid as much, sure, but does he really need it?
John, I tried to find a good number for the insane ammount of COLD HARD CASH that Warner Brothers made off of the SUPERMAN MERCHANDISING JUGGERNAUT, which in my opinion, should be taken into account for anyone thinking this movie was a flop.
I tried and failed. I’m sure someone better at Google search who really really wanted to prove superman returns to be a “flop” would look into it before taking the low road to attack a movie completely seperate to the subject at hand…
….THE SUBJECT AT HAND IS THAT TOM CRUISE IS A DOUCHE. And his movies, though good, cannot MAKE UP FOR HIS DOUCHENESS…
…his career will survive. He’s a smart guy ( sometimes. ) Even he knows when he has to shut the heck up and play the piper ( whatever that means )
The reason superman is a FAILURE of a movie is because it was so god damned expensive to make AND it looked like SHIT most of the time…movies in the early 90’s had just as good computer fx as some of the Superman…the cost to product ratio is way off…and the movie was for the most part boring and inconsistent…takes him 15 minutes to stop an aluminum plane full of 100 people to stop falling (bitch don’t grab the wing grab the fucking hull) but he can lift an entire planetoid full of krypotnite out of the deepest part of the ocean and chuck that shit into space after getting stabbed with a sun recharge…boo
i swear in every post I make…I swear when I talk….i am a swearer.
This should become the John/Alfie Movie Blog. Every comment is met with response even though the argument just seems to go round and round. And when the F word is shouted over and over to prove a point. The point being made is lost.
Go look at any of bays films….I would hardly say his films are well known for their great scripts……
I enjoyed the rock but on all of his films the script is an afterthought…the script is just a few words to fit in around his fucking rad explosions and flipping cars.
the guy is a fucking terrible film maker…
he knows how to make things pretty and that is it.
armageddon is fucking atrocious
….bad boys 1 and 2 were both awful.
pearl harbour was a travesty on a whole new level
and I personally doubt he even knew what date it happened on before he made the film…..
He makes brainless films…..as i said before the scripts
are an afterthought for this guy……
there is definitely a place for it …I am not being a film snob..I love mindless action flicks when they know that is what they are but I don’t think bay does.
I think he thinks he is making something more than a brain dead action film….thats why he tries to turn armageddon into a fucking tearjerker at the end….the one time he actually starts to get it right, the island, which has great first half and is actually half way intelligent he “transforms” it half through into a completely different film which totally detracts from what took place before…
see with transformers you can get away with mindless action and i hope he doesn’t try to get all deep and make some kind of metaphor about the war on terror or some shit like that because he is far to heavy handed and just not clever enough of a film maker to do things like that with smashing the audience over the head with it…..
I seem to remember John saying that Chris Tucker did the right thing and that the studio are morons for giving him that money (thus postponing Meg). He also said that Tucker didn’t deserve that amount of money. This is not a contradiction.
Hey Alfie,
I still don’t see it. Where did you read that Michael Bay doesn’t care about the script?
Say what you want… I still LOVED “The Rock”, I thought The Island was great (but too long) and Armagedon is one of my major guilty pleasures.
But Bay did screw the pooch on Bad Boys and Pearl Harbor for sure.
Still… even Spielberg had his “The Terminal” Uggg… I get nasty shuters when I think of that horrible film.
Hey Alfie,
I’m not really sure what you’re saying isn’t pretty much what I’m saying. Oh well… let’s leave it at that.
As far as Chris Tucker goes… yes, I bashed him… but a part of that (which I’ve said multiple times) was this his stupid and outrageous demands were causing delays in production. That, i blame him for.
As far as the studio caving in… that, I blame he studio for.
if a writer can get to a point where their name above the title of a movie on theposter can get bums on seats and make a string of hundred million dollar hits then yes…you will see them get paid more but unfortunately studios do not value writers as highly as they should…..films for me live and die by the script….you have a bad script generally you have a bad film…..very few bad scripts have made good films……
and thats why I worry about tranformers…..
michael bay doesn’t seem really give a fuck about the script hence his body of work being pretty much pretty looking but garbage……
just random thoughts john…..just a thing I hate…when people talk about movies and accuse an actor or director of doing something for money….not really connected to the article just freeforming.
but don’t try and deny you have complained about actors getting huge dollars before john…you have mentioned several times…..chris tucker for one you attack him when in reality you should attack the studio….anyway there is no way you are going to comeback and acknowledge that…as you are never wrong apparently…..
anyway onto superman
for me a hit film is one that makes money…superman returns hasn’t even broken even yet.
It is fine for you to call it a hit but you know who won’t be??
warner brothers and that is why they have yet to greenlight a sequel…..they haven’t done that yet because it isn’t a hit!!
why would they be delaying the green light if this film is the hit you claim it to be?? they were talking abou the sequel before the film came out and now nothing….well actually not nothing as I thought there might be a big announcement at comic con maybe but what do we get?? singer himself saying the sequel looks iffy now due to the poor box office.
why would a studio delay a sequel to such an obvious hit??
300 million worldwide is a great amount of money but not for a 300+investment especially when warners only wind up seeing around about 50 percent of that…plus studios offset their bombs with money from their hits and this year warners have had a bad bad run……..
plus take into account that they see even less of foreign then they do domestic. for years studios only really cared about domestic money as that is where they saw th ebigger chunk of the change…foreign only really kicked in on gigantic super nits..the e.ts, star wars etc etc modest hits the overseas money is so broken and spread out through som nay different avenues that the studios just don’t wind up seeing much of it….
but as domestic box office falls foreign is actually growing so studios are now renegotiating their foreing deals to get a bigger cut then they did before……
i guess our defintion of hit is different but i would guess that my definition falls more in line with warners….and at the end of the day if we are to see another superman film warners have to be happy with the performance of this one and so far it is fairly obvious they are not or a sequel would have been announced already…..
I am guessing they probably will make a sequel once the dvd makes a shit load but it will be with a much smaller budget and I wouldn’t be surprised to see them drop singer too…..
maybe they will bring in ratner??….his x men is the most successful of the 3……
It’s been said before on The Movie Blog that there are few real banable actors out there. Not even Tom Hanks can guarantee money in the bank. Ladykillers anyone? Johnny Depp describes his career as “My career of failure”. Sure he’s bringing in money at the moment, but up until now he has chosen to play odd characters in films that by no means impressed at the boxoffice.
Some actors/directors may very well deserve the money they are making and no one is blaming them for taking the money that’s beeing offered to them.
The point of the post is that Hollywood executives are beginning to question the vages of the actors/directors and that is a sign of mental health and hopefully a new trend.
More focus should be on the story. What about the writers? Maybe we should send some money their way? :)
/Joel
BTW: I used Superman Returns as an example of a big budget movie with mostly unknown actors and even though it should have been done for half the money, it’s still a success.
What a human tragedy.
I’m sure the church of scientology can use another altar boy.
Hey Alfie,
You said:
“plus the studios don’t have to say yes..they can always say no…..”
I totally agree. This story is just pointing out that the studios are indeed starting to say “no”.
You also said:
“i hate hearing when people complain about someone doing something for the money…..like thats a bad thing….hey I only go to work for the money…..because to clothe and feed my family you need money”
I also agree on this point too. It’s their job. We do our jobs for money. It’s their living… they just make more than we do.
But I’m not totally sure how any of that has anything to do with Joel’s post? Could you clarify?
~John
If a director has a proven history of cranking out hit films why shouldn’t he get paid big dollars??
same for actors…why shouldn’t the likes of tom cruise, who have made the studios a lot of money over the years, get paid lots of money….they bring people into the cinemas….
adam sandler is another one….say what you want about his work and his films he is probably one of the most important stars to studios right now because his films are relatively cheap to make and they make a bundle…in fact he probably gets paid half of the entire budget and why not….
people go to HIS films…he has hits with filsm that are hits entirely due to his presence…the conspts are awful…the films are weak but people still flock to them because of him…so I don;t blame studios paying him huge dollars…..
once the people stop going and his films stop making money he won’t get paid the way he has in the past…..
I know you didn’t write this piece john but you have said the same thing before about actors etc getting obscene amounts of money ….
plus the studios don’t have to say yes..they can always say no…..
if someone whther it be a directo or actor has a proven hit record they should get all they can….no one stays on top forever….and the entire business is about making money…..
i hate hearing when people complain about someone doing something for the money…..like thats a bad thing….hey I only go to work for the money…..because to clothe and feed my family you need money…if i could get 20 mill a job from my boss I would too!!!
Hey Alfie…
Yeah… cause $190 million domestically and $337 million world wide is soooo “poor”.
Did it meet their expectations? No way.
Is it a “poor” result? Not a chance.
Expectations are subjective to each film. The hard B.O. numbers are not. $300+ million is a massive hit film by any language. Just because the studio was stupid enough to expect even more… is their problem.
Did it meet expectations? Nope. You’re 100% right about that.
Was it still a hit? At $300+ million? You bet your ass.
Cheers.
I highly doubt studios are looking at superman returns as some kind of example of great business sense……
pixar sure but i find it strange to use superman the way you did joel considering it it is one of the most expensive films ever made and is in fact a great example of studios stupidity…sure it is a great film but it really didn’t have to cost close to 300 million….
and remember singer himself said at comic con that a sequel looks iffy due to the poor box office and warners have so far not greenlit another one…..`
mind you this is the movie blog….when it comes to superman returns success this place is like the iraqi minister of information when america were invading……..
as for cruise….up until now he was one of the surest things you could get….he has made a lot of people a lot of money due to his success but now his star is falling i am sure his paychecks will reflect that but remember …all it takes is one hit to be back at the top….he needs to take more risks like magnolia and fuck with his image a bit…..but his weirdness has definitely cost him big time
It will interesting to track what sort of economic adjustments that everyone with Hollywood will have to make in the next decade. Should be an eye opening experience for many.
I like Cruise as an actor so I hope he gets over this whole public mental breakdown thing he’s got going on and keeps his mind on the movies. I’ve liked his last few films but the publicity shite is hard to ignore. Maybe this’ll knock some sense into him.
“Now with the success of Pixar and films like Superman Returns…”
I’m sorry but I wouldn’t count Superman Returns as a glorious success. In terms of movie making on a large scale, it most definitely is a success. But in terms of box office, after a 41 day release it is showing a profit of ~$77m.
Don’t get me wrong, I liked Superman Returns very much (I have seen it 3 times in theatres) but I would certainly not use this as my example of a “success” using an unknown actor in the lead role. Perhaps Spider-Man would be a better example.
Also to counter your argument, Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest. After 32 days of release that is showing a profit of ~$548m.
In the case of Superman Returns, it rounded out with a score of 76% on Rotten Tomatoes. Dead Man’s Chest got 53%.
That would be about right in my estimation. Superman was the superior film. Pirates was more fun, yet you’d imagine that they would balance each other out (quality vs. quantity).
Q. What swung it for Pirates?
A. Johnny Depp (A-list actor)