DVDizzy Forum

I think that you have to consider other factors than just the numbers when considering something a bomb or not. The Black Cauldron might have not lost that much money, but poor reviews and the fact that a lot was riding on it being a success make it out to be worse of a flop than it actually was. I also wouldn't consider Cinderella II, or many of the DTV sequels, to be bombs. Sure, they may not be all that great, but they were cheap productions that would have easily made a profit, however small or large.

As for Mars Needs Moms...I have about 0 interest, sad to say.

dvdjunkie wrote:I think we can add Blackbeard's Ghost to the list of Disney bombs. I had never heard of it until I saw it offered on DVD.

Depends on your age perhaps. It was a childhood favourite of both myself and my brother, so very well known to both of us.

One of my favorite Disney flops are:

1. "Cinderella 2: Dreams Come True"
2. "Cinderella 3: A Twist In Time"
3. "Treasure Planet"
4. "The Black Cauldron"
5. "Annie" (1999)
6. "The Little Mermaid 2: Return to the Sea"
7. "The Little Mermaid: Ariel's Beginning"
8. The "Tinkerbell" movies

Those are my picks for some of the worst Disney films ever made.

The new Pooh film

Mayhem wrote:

DisneyJedi wrote:^You sure about Black Cauldron? That one only made back half its budget.

Nah, it made back its budget and much more. The only figures I can find are $25M budget and $21M US cinema revenue. Factor in the international markets and home releases, and I'm sure it probably made at least double the budget back. Depends if the budget figure also accounts for promotional costs or not.

If "The Black Cauldron" was a success financially, as you suggest, why was pronounced a flop?

The Black Cauldron was a HUGE flop. Not only did it NOT make a profit, it was beaten financially by the Care Bears movie, though that movie was made on a relatively smaller budget. Which was ironic, because while Black Cauldron was intended for a teenage audience, Care Bears was more for babies, which Disney was accused of appealing to at the time.

I never said it was a success, I was responding to the assertion that it didn't even make back its budget, which when I looked at the two available figures (as quoted), would demonstrate that it did make back its budget and more based upon assumptions for foreign revenue and home sales. But for a film to be "successful" and be "in profit" usually means earning at least twice to three times the budget (due to other costs such as promotion which usually are NOT rolled into the budget figure) which I would probably agree did NOT happen. Does that make it a flop? A lot of people would even assert that any film massively under-performing compared to budget, even when still in the black, is a flop, so yes.

I really think we should ignore any Direct to Video movies as 'bombs'. Mainly because most of them were made on a shoestring budget compared to the original. If they didn't get a theater release, they shouldn't be judged in the same breath as the DAC that received theatrical releases.

That's just my opinion. I have all my DAC in their proper order, and all the Direct-to-Video releases on another shelf, so not to confuse someone who is looking for the best movies, and not the tepid remakes, or sequels or even prequels.

Mayhem wrote:But for a film to be "successful" and be "in profit" usually means earning at least twice to three times the budget (due to other costs such as promotion which usually are NOT rolled into the budget figure) which I would probably agree did NOT happen.

Does that mean it must be a success domestically and international performance is meaningless?

Not meaningless, just not as much of a profit percentage wise actually goes back to the studio compared to the first two to three weeks of release in the States.

Even domestically, studios would prefer the bulk of the business to be in the first two weeks, as that is when they get a higher cut of the ticket sales. As an incentive to keep films out longer, after each week, the movie theater itself gets a higher percentage.

The Lone Ranger would count as a decent bomb wouldn't it ?

It does and it WAS!!!