I genuinely do not understand how it can be more profitable to make movies and just throw them away over and over. I keep hearing something something taxes but I don’t think that’s how taxes work!
Hollywood accounting exists but is not the reason this is happening.
Trump changed the way you can write down a loss in business. The issue is that movies cost at least 50% - 150% additional dollars to distribute and market.
So spending $80m + $40m ~ $120m is seen as a bigger risk when you can simply take a full loss on the $80m immediately by terminating the “useful life” of a project (ie hurling it into the sun never to be seen again), and offset profits you had somewhere else. Like all your reality shows about children having to work in the mines or whatever ghoulish thing Zaslav made money doing.
The thing a lot of people don’t know about film is it takes about 3-8 (or more) years to make a studio feature film
Typically this type of flip flopping is a result of leadership change. The previous leadership approved it and has a vision for it. Zaslav came in and has a different view of its potential.
The tax change has accelerated how this happens. It used to be that a new admin would come in and bury a movie on straight to DVD or a shit release date with no marketing.
If the movie is already done and they have their own streaming service, shouldn’t they be able to just slap it on there for very little cost and not bother marketing it other than automatic in app suggestions?
Honestly the logic of streaming exclusives/originals is fucking weird.
As the whole point of things in streaming service is to make people join or not cancel.
The point of new shows is to make money by selling… SOMETHING.
I never understood the point of ALL of the Netflix originals. Like having a few shows a year, and mostly running a back catalog is a win-win for consumers, Netflix and show creators, as it’s basically just running shows in syndication.
For WB under the new management, after they said they wanted this movie gone, allowing someone else to have it… means a chance that Coyote movie may be popular. Which means Zaslav was wrong and is incompetent.
Presumably streamed movies’ effective revenue are a function of views and the streaming service price. It seems pretty likely that this movie (and especially some of the other canned movies, like Batgirl) would get enough views for the revenue to be higher than whatever they get from the tax write off, even without marketing. And I would think if they still make a loss on it, they can still write off however much the net loss was.
It must make sense to the bag men doing it, right? I figure there’s some voodoo magic the money men are doing to inflate the value of the loss they write off. If they sold it they wouldn’t be able to use their imaginations on say…(guessing here) lost potential international ticket revenue? Syndication revenue? Related toy sales?
Yea I’m no economist but it seems like an economic system where it makes more sense to spend 80 million dollars making something and then setting it on fire is the smart business decision it seems like the system and those business decisions are fucking stupid as dogshit.
I genuinely do not understand how it can be more profitable to make movies and just throw them away over and over. I keep hearing something something taxes but I don’t think that’s how taxes work!
Hollywood accounting exists but is not the reason this is happening.
Trump changed the way you can write down a loss in business. The issue is that movies cost at least 50% - 150% additional dollars to distribute and market.
So spending $80m + $40m ~ $120m is seen as a bigger risk when you can simply take a full loss on the $80m immediately by terminating the “useful life” of a project (ie hurling it into the sun never to be seen again), and offset profits you had somewhere else. Like all your reality shows about children having to work in the mines or whatever ghoulish thing Zaslav made money doing.
So is the actual concern that the marketing costs more than the expected return? If so why even make the damn thing?
The foundational question of filmmaking…
The thing a lot of people don’t know about film is it takes about 3-8 (or more) years to make a studio feature film
Typically this type of flip flopping is a result of leadership change. The previous leadership approved it and has a vision for it. Zaslav came in and has a different view of its potential.
The tax change has accelerated how this happens. It used to be that a new admin would come in and bury a movie on straight to DVD or a shit release date with no marketing.
If the movie is already done and they have their own streaming service, shouldn’t they be able to just slap it on there for very little cost and not bother marketing it other than automatic in app suggestions?
But no one is paying them.
Honestly the logic of streaming exclusives/originals is fucking weird.
As the whole point of things in streaming service is to make people join or not cancel.
The point of new shows is to make money by selling… SOMETHING.
I never understood the point of ALL of the Netflix originals. Like having a few shows a year, and mostly running a back catalog is a win-win for consumers, Netflix and show creators, as it’s basically just running shows in syndication.
For WB under the new management, after they said they wanted this movie gone, allowing someone else to have it… means a chance that Coyote movie may be popular. Which means Zaslav was wrong and is incompetent.
Presumably streamed movies’ effective revenue are a function of views and the streaming service price. It seems pretty likely that this movie (and especially some of the other canned movies, like Batgirl) would get enough views for the revenue to be higher than whatever they get from the tax write off, even without marketing. And I would think if they still make a loss on it, they can still write off however much the net loss was.
It must make sense to the bag men doing it, right? I figure there’s some voodoo magic the money men are doing to inflate the value of the loss they write off. If they sold it they wouldn’t be able to use their imaginations on say…(guessing here) lost potential international ticket revenue? Syndication revenue? Related toy sales?
Im no tax man but that’s my take
So basically The Producers scam?
it’s tax evasion by the larger capital formation of the studio system.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hollywood_accounting
Hollywood accounting is a thing but is not why this all is happening
Yea I’m no economist but it seems like an economic system where it makes more sense to spend 80 million dollars making something and then setting it on fire is the smart business decision it seems like the system and those business decisions are fucking stupid as dogshit.