This might sound like a weird item to blog, but it’s good news for Marvel comics fans. One disadvantage for Marvel in terms of movies and TV shows was that, lacking a corportate entertainment owner that kept all the character rights for themselves. DC, in contrast, is owned by Warners, explaining why they’ve been able to do team-up projects, like the recent Justice League cartoons, at will.
Lately, though, Marvel has been keeping character rights closer to the vest. Spider-Man is still currently ‘owned’ by Sony, film-wise, but as character rights return to Marvel, they’ve been keeping them. This is why it’s even slightly realistic to dream that they may someday make the dream project of many fans, including myself: An Avengers movie, featuring Iron Man, Thor, Captain America and the Hulk. Oh, and Ant-Man, of course.
Having made but a comparative pittance from the recent slew of often insanely profitable movies featuring their characters, Marvel decided to actually produce the films themselves, and raised a fund worth hundreds of millions of dollars to do so. Obviously the risk is as great as the potential rewards. Superhero movies cost a lot to make–Superman Returns‘ reported 300 million dollar budget is an extreme (and absurd) example–and should the first few they make tank Marvel would be screwed.
Luckily, Marvel seems to know what they are about. You can never tell what the public will want to see, but they are making every right move they can. Most impressive is the casts they are getting. First, to play the main characters in their Iron Man and Incredible Hulk movies for next summer, they have gotten people who are both appropriate for the parts, and even better, terrific actors; Robert Downey Jr. and Ed Norton, respectively.
Then they have continued to garner great actors for the supporting characters, including Gwyneth Paltrow, Jeff Bridges and (reportedly) Samuel L. Jackson for Iron Man, and Tim Roth and William Hurt for the Hulk. (Although frankly Hurt doesn’t fit General ‘Thunderbolt’ Ross as well as Sam Elliot, who played the role in Ang Lee’s Hulk film.)
[I will admit, however, that getting the director of The Transporter to make The Incredible Hulk does make me a little nervous. On the other hand, the film is attempting to counterbalance’s Lee’s perhaps too brainy predecessor by going much more in an action direction. We’ll see.]And let’s get back to the wrap of principle photography. Iron Man‘s active production stage is now complete with nearly an entire year until it’s release date. With modern special effects films, you need a huge amount of time to complete and insert the digital effects, and to properly integrate them into the film without corner cutting. Iron Man now has lots of breathing room in this regard.
The perils of not having this lead-time are especially evident this week, with the bombing of last weekend’s Evan Almighty. Despite coming in first place with over $30m, the film’s eye-poppingly gigantic $175-200m budget has sunk it. One major reason the budget was so high is that they set a release date before they were ready to film. By the time they got going, they had little post-production time to get all the special effects work done. This meant paying huge overages in overtime and whatever, and drove the budget up to insane levels.
Thus the importance of Iron Man‘s director, Jon Favreau, noting that he finished principle photography “on time and on budget.” I also admit that I have a preference for the sort of disciplined directors who can get the job done in this fashion. Clint Eastwood is the best example. A big name who could demand whatever he wanted, he’s never gone over-time or over-budget on a single movie he’s directed.
Of course, despite all of this, Iron Man could still suck. However, that would now solely be because of a catastrophic failure on the part of the filmmakers, and not because of any logistical problems. And really, I’m hoping for the best here.
