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Last weekend, OUR generation’s Conan: The Barbarian only made 10 million dollars at the box office, which to someone with zero million dollars still might feel like a lot of millions of dollars, but to someone who understands that there is such a thing as a return on investment, EEK! Not good, boys. Not that this should come as too much of a surprise, because it is the year 2011. Conan: The Barbarian? Seriously? You know, Hollywood should really think about doing some market research before they embark on big, expensive remakes of worn-out franchises. That way, when you ask “Would you be interested in a remake of Conan: The Barbarian in the year 2011?” and 100% of those polled answer “nope!” you can either rethink your decision, or at least not be surprised when it does not do well. ANYWAY, Sean Hood, a Professional Hollywood Screenwriter, took to Quora (whatever THAT is) this week to discuss what kind of Human Emotions one experiences when one has worked on a flop. Interesting! Much like reality television, most of us don’t really think too much about the HUMAN COST of these things. Sure, jokes about how Arthur is STILL the #1 movie in America, 103 weeks and counting, are still VERY HILARIOUS jokes! And I’m not worried about Russell Brand, or even Luis Guzman. But, you know, what about the Best Boy Grip on Arthur? How does HE feel? (I’m also weirdly pretty sure that Arthur wasn’t even a flop and did fine, AGAINST ALL ODDS, but I am not going to actually look that up either way and let’s just get back to the point, please.) Sean was one of three writers on Conan, and was brought in to fix the script after the movie had already gone into production. It’s just kind of interesting to read his thoughts about the whole thing! Here is an excerpt:
One joins a movie production, the same way one might join a campaign, years before the actual release/election, and in the beginning one is filled with hope, enthusiasm and belief. I joined the Conan team, having loved the character in comic books and the stories of Robert E. Howard, filled with the same kind of raw energy and drive that one needs in politics.
Any film production, like a long grueling campaign over months and years, is filled with crisis, compromise, exhaustion, conflict, elation, and blind faith that if one just works harder, the results will turn out all right in the end. During that process whatever anger, frustration, or disagreement you have with the candidate/film you keep to yourself. Privately you may oppose various decisions, strategies, or compromises; you may learn things about the candidate that cloud your resolve and shake your confidence, but you soldier on, committed to the end. You rationalize it along the way by imagining that the struggle will be worth it when the candidate wins.
You tell yourself to just enjoy the process. That whether you succeed or fail, win or lose, it will be fine. You pretend to be Zen. You adopt detachment, and ironic humor, while secretly praying for a miracle.
The Friday night of the release is like the Tuesday night of an election. “Exit polls”are taken of people leaving the theater, and estimated box office numbers start leaking out in the afternoon, like early ballot returns. You are glued to your computer, clicking wildly over websites, chatting nonstop with peers, and calling anyone and everyone to find out what they’ve heard. Have any numbers come back yet? That’s when your stomach starts to drop.
By about 9 PM its clear when your “candidate” has lost by a startlingly wide margin, more than you or even the most pessimistic political observers could have predicted. With a movie its much the same: trade magazines like Variety and Hollywood Reporter call the weekend winners and losers based on projections. That’s when the reality of the loss sinks in, and you don’t sleep the rest of the night.
For the next couple of days, you walk in a daze, and your friends and family offer kind words, but mostly avoid the subject. Since you had planned (ardently believed, despite it all) that success would propel you to new appointments and opportunities, you find yourself at a loss about what to do next. It can all seem very grim.
Before you BLOW YOUR BRAINS OUT (lol) it is worth pointing out that you should just go read the whole thing and that Sean Hood ends on a relatively uplifting note with an anecdote about his father’s trumpet (no oboe). It is also worth noting that regardless of the genuine FEELINGS that he is expressing her, one still has a hard time imagining joining the Conan: The Barbarian remake project “filled with the same kind of raw energy and drive that one needs in politics.” I mean, seriously? I’m sure it was a very nice paycheck, and everyone loves a great paycheck, so why not just leave it at that? The movie is finished, and it has already flopped, you don’t actually have to lie and say that you loved it at this point? On Quora, whatever Quora is? That part just sounds like nonsense. Also, maybe if Sean Hood had used the proper “it’s” rather than “its” the movie would have been a success. Now we will never know. I AM JUST TEASING YOU, SEAN HOOD! I STILL DO NOT UNDERSTAND HOW COMMAS WORK, REALLY. Anyway, go read the rest. If you want. Do what you want. Either way, it turns out we are all human beings struggling with the ups and downs of MTV’s True Life. (Via The Atlantic.)
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Maybe you guys will think about this before the next time you downvote me for my gentle humor.
He didn’t even mention that Ari Gold yells at you the whole time
“allow me to explain a process everyone knows about with an analogy to a process no one cares about” – Sean Hood, 2011
When asked what it’s like to work on a hit, Hood said “You know when you crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and hear the lamentation of their women? It’s like that.”
Can’t he just something something cocaine something something have a friend burn down his house and be all better? That’s what the Entourage taught us about the ups and downs of showbiz.
Remember that time when Conan had a bad opening weekend and we ended up in two unnecessary wars?
They filmed The Green Lantern outside of my office and the crew was really rude to pedestrians….so I’m glad to see this has all worked out
Sean Hood is100% right. First, I think that if a studio’s going to hand over a big project like this it would be to someone with passion and knowledge of the source material. Hood seems to fit that bill. And the truth is that the film is least creatively compromised at the writing stage (it’s still super compromised, just not super duper compromised). So I think a screenwriter would have an acute sense of how a film goes from inspiration to commodity in just a few steps. We all know the stakes are low (that’s how pop culture blogs work), but I think his sense of disappointment is valid.
Is everyone aware of Tom Lennon and Ben Garant’s book about how to write Hollywood hits? Unsurprisingly, passion and inspiration seem to be low on the list of necessary qualities. They seem very at peace with the idea that they write Hollywood schlock to make money.
I just did a quick Wikipedia search for Sean Hood. Here’s some of his work:
Halloween: Resurrection
Cube 2
Cursed
The Crow: Wicked Prayer
I guess if you want to know what it’s like to work on a flop, this is the guy to ask.
I want to see the article interviewing one of his “friends and family” on how it is to deal with someone who thinks all these projects will be successful time and time again
Damnfinecupofcoffee. I signed in just to upvote….So good.
This is evidence of what? That he had to write direct to video and sequel projects before he got to pen a major budget film?* Consider your case rested!
*Not that I’m arguing Hood is Charlie Kaufman or anything.
I’m holding out for CUBE 3D.
Sean Hood, I’m no Hollywood writer, but you maybe part of the issue is the projects you’re choosing?
Facetaco knows what I’m talking about.
This is the Great Illustrated Classics version of my comment.
I didn’t know that Helena Bonham Carter starred in The Crow: Wicked Prayer.
Come on, how can a sequel of the Crow starring Edward Furlong with David Boreanaeanaez not be great? Oh, wait, the same way Conan starring Khal Drogo can be terrible. I saw an advanced screening at a music festival this weekend and that movie was crayons. It’s like twelve movies squashed into one, without deciding whether to play it for camp value or play it straight.
Has it really been almost 10 years since Halloween: Resurrection? Now this whole thing is just making me feel old.
You guys I made a troll-bot friend. She replies to every one of my comments. I’m, well, I’m a little flattered.
I am a 26 years old nurse, young and beautiful. Now I am seeking an older gentle man who can give me real love , so i got a username An’nababe2011 on—a’ge’l’es’s’da’te. C óM—it is the first and best club for y’ounger women and older men, or older women and younger men,to int’eract with each other. Maybe you wanna ch’eck it out or tell your frie’nds.
Ian, I did this once. VG’s surprisingly alert robo-police blocked me, forever. I even emailed with Gabe (LADIES?!?!?!) and he couldn’t fix it. Nothing could fix it. Nothing. I had…I had to change my name. Change my password. Come back in disguise.
Point is, if “Ians” stars commenting regularly, I will understand. I will be the only one, I’m sure. Of course, I could just check any other post and see if you made it through, but I am not going to, because I am lazy and it would kill all of the drama.
Good luck, my friend. Good luck.
She sounds like a really nice young nurse though? Have you told your frie’nds yet?
Uhhh, what does it LOOK like I’m doing??
She and I met over a glass of 26 year old, beautiful highland Scotch whisky. I was wearing a nice blazer and some Tommy Bahama cologne I picked up at an upscale QuickTrip. She was wearing some sexy dress, but with an unsightly clear plastic coat over it. It didn’t bother me, she was bangin’ hot, bro. {High five.}
We gazed into each other’s'yeh’eyes’s, and she told me, “Mailman, I know about a club. It is, hands down the BEST club for younger women like me, and older men, like you.” I said, “My my, Ms. Skin Rug, that sounds appetizing. I’m impressed that behind this young face you could see that I am truly a 79-year-old man. But I have one question: What about younger men, looking for older women? Totally asking for a friend.”
She looked into my eyes, and I looked into her good eye, and she cooed, “Mailman, it is the perfect place for them as well’a'ella’ella’eh’eh’eh. Oh my gosh, I have forgotten the the most important part. Did I tell you that it is the first?”
“The first what? The first club?”
“Yes, the first club. The first club made with every single human in mind.”
I looked at her deeply, and suddenly I saw that her pupils involuntarily dilate. That’s when I fired. The bullet passed through the replicant’s chest out her back. Her already-dead expression went even deader. I took a sip of my whiskey, and chuckled. “Fucking idiot,” I said aloud, to no one.
I am glad that you decided to end things. It doesn’t really sound like she tides good fashion. At all.
“(no oboe)” might be my favorite parenthetical in the history of parenthesis. If I had a blog, I would blog about it.
I hope ‘no oboe’ becomes the ‘no homo’ of this year.
I of course mean fiscal year.
(no OBM)
As an oboist, it makes me both happy (no one ever talks about the oboe!) and sad (oh, no oboe? ok, then. I’ll sit outside until it’s ok to come back in.)
Sean is just upset because they didn’t like his idea where like, Conan is in his car, right, and he drives into a truck or whatever, and he’s like “I’m gettin’ too old for this shit”.
Boom. $100 million weekend.
…here, not her…as in “FEELINGS that he is expressing herE”
Unless you mean that he is expressing a woman. I’m not sure how you would express a woman. Maybe you mean expel? “FEELINGS that he is expelling her” Though in that case the sentence makes even less sense. YOU MAKE NO SENSE!
No you missed the point. SHE is a package. And HE is expressing HER. It’s a metaphor, dummy!
Well that just clears everything up!
Yup, I’m “The Clear-Upper.” I clear things up.
Remember Crystal Pepsi? That was me.
How’s that slayey pillagey thing workin’ out for ya?
Does anybody else find complaining about a film’s FIRST WEEKEND GROSSES kind of endlessly tacky? As if there haven’t been various films that score low numbers initially, before making huge bank in international, or through home entertainment venues, or even by– GASP– earning a high domestic multiplier. That maybe just MAYBE if you made a marginally entertaining and distinct product, it will eventually get a following, due to the basic mechanics of human attention and disposable income as they manifest in spacetime.
Basically, if dude needs instant gratification, maybe he should cram his face with marshmallows, just saying.
Yeah you’d think the opening box office shouldn’t matter but it actually turns out to be a remarkable predictor of how much a movie will make in total.
The studios have it down to a science, and can usually predict the final gross within a million dollars or so just based on the first Friday-Sunday. There are exceptions of course but mostly for small indie word-of-mouth movies, not big action movies. The only large movie I can think of that built on word of mouth and drastically beat expectations was Titanic, because tons of people saw it multiple times.
Sean Hood worked very hard on a project and has valid emotions about its failure which he expressed in a public and earnest manner. Let’s all make fun of him!!
Cube 2! Hypercube!! Ahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!
I literally have not seen one promo for Conan anywhere on TV in the last few weeks. Maybe I’m just watching the wrong (right?) channels, but I feel Conan’s producers have done an extremely poor advertising job. I actually had 2 people that were visiting us from out of town last weekend ask me if Conan was out and did we want to go see it, and I said, No, I don’t think it’s out yet. (Big oops! Sorry, Conan!)
Remaking ‘Conan’ makes slightly more sense (if just ever so) than the ‘Fright Night’ debacle. At the very least ‘Conan’ has a somewhat built-in fan base, what with the whole connection to Schwarzenegger, whereas the original ‘Fright Night’ has an even smaller cult following due to it featuring no recognizable names whatsoever. As a comparison, here are two hypothetical conversations:
A: Hey, remember ‘Conan the Barbarian’?
B: Um, yeah, the movie with Arnold.
A: Hey, remember ‘Fright Night’?
B: Um, yes? Wait … no.
So there you go, case closed, the Senator yields.
The original Fright Night has no recognizable names???
1) Herman from Herman’s Head is the star
2) Marcy from Married with Children is the love interest
3)The best ape from The Planet of the Apes is the mentor
4) The villain is the lesser half of Susan Sarandon
5) The best friend did a bunch of gay porn during the 90′s (No Hambone)
No recognizable names? HAVE YOU NO DECENCY, Senator?
“Sean Hood ends on a relatively uplifting note with an anecdote about his father’s trumpet (no oboe).”
hehehehehe
“Before you BLOW YOUR BRAINS OUT (lol)” Cause suicide is just so gosh darn funny, right? Hahaha.