End of the summer
Every so often but especially at the close of summer, a Variety reporter or two will write a story about how the formulas or genres that seemed to be working a year or two ago don’t seem to be working any more. Trying to calibrate the willingness of ticket-buyers to line up for this or that kind of film based on apparent trends or sociological currents is horseshit, of course. Movie-making is about inspiration, talent and gambling, and either you get that and run with it or you don’t.
Most producers and studio execs don’t, of course. Most are afraid to even go in the water, much less take a dive off the high board.
The underlying theme of these boring-ass articles is that producers and studio execs are terrified down to their knuckles at the idea of getting behind a film (in an idea or script form) or making a decision to greenlight a film based on a love of what the film could be and a deep desire to see this potential realized. Almost nobody thinks or operates like this, of course — they all want insurance and safety and rules they can depend on. In my book, that makes them cowards, milquetoasts, dilletantes.
These end of-the-summer Variety pieces — this latest one is written by Ian Mohr — also tend to conclude that stars seem to be less and less of an assurance that audiences will show up in force. Only Adam Sandler delivers! And only when he’s in a typical Sandler-brand comedy. Which means (and you don’t have to tell Jeff Blake this) that Reign O’er Me, good as it is (with a truly fine Sandler performance at the heart of it), is no slam-dunk.
Click did alright, but not as well as Anger Management, The Longest Yard, and even 50 First Dates. Sandler’s star power is sliding.
Actaully, no, D.Z.
ANGER (135)
YARD (158)
50 (120)
Avg. gross = 137
Or what CLICK grossed this summer
Frankly, I don’t mind Sandler and obviously audiences still like him.
DZ will never give up the ghost on Sandler being either (a.) not actually very popular or (b.) at very least, fading in popularity. He has a gift for reading the grosses of every single one of Sandler’s eight hits since ’98 as evidence that Sandler is not, in fact, popular (despite having a better recent track record than all but a handful of other stars out there). It’s kind of amazing. Apparently, Wedding Singer and 50 First Dates were all because of Barrymore; Longest Yard was because of the sterling ensemble cast; Anger Management was all Nicholson; Mr. Deeds was all Winona Ryder shoplifting publicity. I’m guessing he’d attribute Click to either Christopher Walken or perhaps the Nick Swardson cameo.
(I’m with you, Dixon Steele; I don’t mind Sandler, but moreover, I can recognize that audiences like the guy in these movies, crummy or not.)
I said this before but the company that I worked for this summer did two tests on the new Adam Sandler movie and the audience loved it and loved him. It was high scoring and not a goofy comedy either.
So can someone explain the phenomenon that is Adam Sandler? What is it that audiences see in him?
I’m curious because except for Punch-Drunk Love and some of his work about a hundred years ago on SNL, I’ve never seen the guy in a movie. One look at the advertising for any of his hits is enough to tell me that I’m not his audience.
But who is his audience? For a long time I thought it was limited to dumbass high school boys, which is certainly a plenty big audience. Probably the biggest for opening weekends in theaters. But now I keep getting the impression that his audience is a lot wider than that.
I can understand Sandler’s appeal to his dumbass audience. But what does his wider audience like about him in film after film? What do women in the audience like about him? He strikes me as totally devoid of sex appeal. As I said, I’ve seen him in practically nothing, so I’m curious.
I’ll probably see Reign on Me just for Don Cheadle. I am definitely his audience.
Nemo, as someone who kinda likes Sandler, I think the depth (width?) of his appeal is based on two things:
(a.) His everydude persona. He’s become sadly skilled at letting the audience know he’s not too pretentious, too smart, or too challenging. His movies, especially his recent ones, are the model of giving the audience exactly what you expect, right down to the joke — a pure familiarity that I expect a large portion of his audience finds very comforting.
(b.) As to how that audience got so large: Successfully growing his fanbase. SNL gets the requisite audience of 15-25-year-olds. I was on the young end of that when he was on the show, and followed him to movies like Billy Madison and Happy Gilmore when I was at the perfect age to enjoy them (especially since SNL itself was in such a bad patch around then). Those early movies did OK at the box office, did well on video, and his next few solo starring vehicles were a lot bigger. During the second half of the nineties, his original fans were getting older but not growing out of his movies and younger fans were discovering his movies which are pretty accessible to kids. Now those 15-25-year-olds from ’95 are 25-to-35-year-olds and have settled into their own appreciation of mediocre familiarity… basically, by cranking out a whole lot of watchable (yet often mediocre) movies, Sandler has promoted himself without seeming like a tireless movie-star-ish self-promoter.
Some of his movies — especially Madison, Gilmore, and The Wedding Singer — are silly fun. I even kinda like Mr. Deeds and Little Nicky. In fact, it’s his everyman accessibility that I tend to find least interesting in his later, less eccentric comedies.
Hate to derail this topic, but…
http://viewaskew.com/theboard/viewtopic.php?p=1744859#1744859
Dixon: Click still made less worldwide than the last two films.
jesse: Actually, Click did well because of the premise, not because of Sandler or Walken. Anyway, if Carrey hadn’t blown it with The Cable Guy, Sandler’s career would probably be over like Dana Carvey, David Spade and Chris Farley before him.
D.Z., that’s right, I forgot about there’s ACTUALLY, factually, proof that Click did well because of the premise. After all, there’s a long history of smash hits about magical remote controls. I remember when Stay Tuned smashed box office records in ’92, which made it pretty predictable when Pleasantville passed $300 mil in 1998. In fact, compared to those two, Click is a major disappointment. Sandler’s career should be ending any time now.
Seriously, though, I can’t imagine what makes you look for reasons that Sandler is somehow not successful, to the point of myopia.
Chris Farley’s career ended because he died. His three starring roles were actually small hits (like Sandler’s first few).
Also, um, Jim Carrey? Dude has had his *three* biggest hits *after* the Cable Guy. Or do you have creative reasons that Liar Liar, The Grinch, *and* Bruce Almighty made over $180 mil apiece?
Stay Tuned was about a guy who gets trapped in a tv, while Pleasantville was about a couple of teens stuck in a 50′s sitcom. Click is about a guy who uses a remote to mess the real world, which is why movie-goers would relate. And the reason I don’t think Sandler’s “successful” is he doesn’t stand out like other comics.
Anyway, Carrey might have still had hits after the Cable Guy, but they weren’t as consistent as before. See The Majestic, The Truman Show, and Me Myself and Irene as good examples of disappointments.
DZ, you sound like Box Office Mojo’s Sunday-night “analysis” of why movies failed or succeeded at the box office, which inevitably say something like “audiences didn’t find the trailers appealing” or other purely speculative statements. Saying “moviegoers relate” to this or that is a hell of a lot harder to quantify than the track records of lead actors.
On the flip side, you also seem to consider Sandler’s success (or lack of success) purely a matter of opinion, rather than fact based on data. The guy’s got hits to back him up.
No, he doesn’t stand out like other comics… he’s more of an everydude who doesn’t seem like he’s trying very hard. I’m not saying this makes him good (or bad), but I think that could be a reason audiences do, in fact, show up for most of his movies.
And what Carrey had after The Cable Guy is what we call a career, not some kind of downward spiral. No, The Cable Guy is not a single non-hit on his resume. But to say that his career somehow went south after The Cable Guy because it ended him having NONSTOP hits is ridiculous. Can you name any actor that *does* have a nonstop string of hits, uninterrupted by any kind of financial or critical disappointment? Is Tom Hanks “over” because of The Terminal? Is Will Smith “over” because of Ali?
Oh, and The Truman Show is actually a terrible example of a disappointment, as it was not considered one financially (or critically, as far as I know). It made $120 mil in 1998, putting it in the range of The Mask/Dumb & Dumber/Ace Ventura 2 (basically all of his big hits except a Batman movie and Liar Liar — which also came after Cable Guy).
Who would you hold up as an actor with a strong box office track record, if not Sandler or Carrey?? No one hits it out 100% of the time, but those guys are both pretty damn reliable. Hell, Carrey got the completely forgettable Fun with Dick and Jane to $120 million.
“Saying “moviegoers relate” to this or that is a hell of a lot harder to quantify than the track records of lead actors.”
Airheads, Little Nicky and Punch Drunk Love don’t necessarily make for a good track record.
“Can you name any actor that *does* have a nonstop string of hits, uninterrupted by any kind of financial or critical disappointment? Is Tom Hanks “over” because of The Terminal? Is Will Smith “over” because of Ali?”
Not sure about Hanks, but The Da Vinci Code’s success had more to do with the fans of the book than the actor. With the possible exception of Charlie Wilson’s War, his next few projects seem low-profile. His career’s probably not over, but he no longer seems to be the reason people will see his films. Smith actually had three flops during the last seven years: Wild Wild West, Bagger Vance, and Ali. He seems to have rebounded from them, but whether he can sell I Am Legend will determine where he goes from Hitch.
“Oh, and The Truman Show is actually a terrible example of a disappointment, as it was not considered one financially (or critically, as far as I know).It made $120 mil in 1998, putting it in the range of The Mask/Dumb & Dumber/Ace Ventura 2 (basically all of his big hits except a Batman movie and Liar Liar — which also came after Cable Guy).”
It was the first time a Jim Carrey movie needed positive WOM for people to see it.
“Hell, Carrey got the completely forgettable Fun with Dick and Jane to $120 million.”
But it cost $100 million.
“Airheads, Little Nicky and Punch Drunk Love don’t necessarily make for a good track record.”
So while a Sandler starring vehicle like Click isn’t a credit to said track record, a supporting role in a 1994 comedy starring Brendan Fraser, before the dude had ever starred in a wide-release movie, is a blemish? You’re not being consistent at all.
I said it before. Just about every popular actor has flops. It’s not about getting a 100% on your career report card. If your argument is that Sandler hasn’t always, since his first film role, been able to turn ANY given movie into a $100 million hit, then you’re right. But that’s a pointless argument because every single major movie star has had almost exactly the small variety of flops as Sandler: the supporting role way before said star was big; the smaller, offbeat movie that was never really designed as an audience magnet; and an actual flop on his own terms (Little Nicky). You keep “refuting” me by saying “well, not every movie Sandler has been in was a huge hit.” Yeah, no shit. That’s true of everyone.
“Not sure about Hanks, but The Da Vinci Code’s success had more to do with the fans of the book than the actor. With the possible exception of Charlie Wilson’s War, his next few projects seem low-profile. His career’s probably not over, but he no longer seems to be the reason people will see his films. Smith actually had three flops during the last seven years: Wild Wild West, Bagger Vance, and Ali. He seems to have rebounded from them, but whether he can sell I Am Legend will determine where he goes from Hitch.”
I actually like this argument better because it seems to lean towards the idea that stars just aren’t that important or consistent. I think this is a little misguided/unrealistic, but at least more consistent with your Sandler-bashing than your specific arguments about how and why Sandler should somehow not be considered popular despite more $100 million grossers in the past eight or nine years than almost anyone else save Will Smith, Tom Hanks, and Tom Cruise.
As for Will Smith: yes, he had three misses. This is exactly my point: you don’t need a spot-free record to be considered a MAJOR movie-star. (In fact, one of the movies you count as a major miss, Wild Wild West, made $115 million; obviously it lost money and got lousy reviews, but imagine if it had starred someone else… it probably wouldn’t've cracked 50!) You seem to count every miss as debiting two or three hits — whereas in reality I think it’s more the reverse. One “Hitch” or “Men in Black” every few years more than counteract of a couple of Bagger Vances.
“It was the first time a Jim Carrey movie needed positive WOM for people to see it.”
Actually, you’re wrong again; Truman Show opened to around 30 mil, if I remember correctly. WOM certainly helped it get to $120 rather than 80 or 90, but its opening was consistent with his other late-nineties hits.
“But it cost $100 million.”
This is a common error: confusing popualrity with audiences with profitability of films. That is to say, Fun with Dick and Jane was a special-effects free comedy with crappy reviews, sold almost entirely on Carrey, and it made $120 million. Yes, it cost too much and that wiped out a lot of the profits. The lack of profitability on that movie was a big mistake on the part of the studio or the producers or someone, but it has nothing to do with whether audiences liked it.
I mean, if Pirates of the Caribbean 2 had cost $600 million by itself, would it be fair to say that its same $400 million gross means audiences didn’t like the movie? Because if they REALLY liked it they’d pitch in and help it make back its budget? Of course not.
If you want to say that high costs on a Carrey movie make him sort of a liability, I can go with that, I get what you’re saying. But to offer up the movie’s budget as proof that he’s not popular with audiences is ridiculous.