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Rovio's Desperate Push For 'Angry Birds' Movie (venturebeat.com)
An anonymous reader writes:Last year Rovio "cut 213 jobs, affecting all departments except those working on the film and its related projects," remembers VentureBeat, describing their effort to make a movie about three outcast birds on an island of happier birds who all meet in an anger management class. But "Since Rovio funded the entire film, the directors didn't have to answer to an executive committee or a board of trustees..." reports VentureBeat, quoting director Clay Kaytis as saying "We had to make ourselves happy... We were making the films for [ourselves] instead of for a larger entity that expects something in return."
After working for four years from a script by Jon Vitti (a writer for both The Simpsons and The Office), and funding a marketing onslaught that lasted nine months, Rovio finally saw their Angry Birds movie open in this weekend's #1 spot, according to the New York Times. "Most of the 'Angry Birds' financial risk fell to Rovio, the Finnish video game company, which paid $173 million to make and market the movie. As such, Rovio will receive the bulk of any profit."
In China, McDonald's released special Angry Birds burgers with red or green buns...which at least one patron complained made the buns look moldy.
After working for four years from a script by Jon Vitti (a writer for both The Simpsons and The Office), and funding a marketing onslaught that lasted nine months, Rovio finally saw their Angry Birds movie open in this weekend's #1 spot, according to the New York Times. "Most of the 'Angry Birds' financial risk fell to Rovio, the Finnish video game company, which paid $173 million to make and market the movie. As such, Rovio will receive the bulk of any profit."
In China, McDonald's released special Angry Birds burgers with red or green buns...which at least one patron complained made the buns look moldy.
They risked and won, now would they hire those employees back?
...gis sdrawkcab (usually not responding to ACs; don't bother posting as AC)
Nerds don't care about video games or movies? Or records like "largest independent movie ever made"? From what I can tell, it's the biggest budget independent movie ever made, and if it does as well as they hope, will be the largest in the box office as well.
Though they'll never make a sequel. Based on history, either Microsoft or Disney will buy them for $10B if the movie doesn't flop, and doesn't look to be flopping so far.
Learn to love Alaska
Why does a mobile software shop even have 213 jobs to cut? What are those people doing?
I work in West Hollywood. Angry Birds has enjoyed a media blitz here courtesy of the industry at large. its just something that gets done for all films. it can be written off on studio taxes. its surprising to see something like this make #1 though? It certainly speaks to a very talented writers group.
what does not make sense is to go it alone, fire 200 people, and push to deliver a film solely by yourself. Unless,you're taking a page from some of the more cutthroat entities of US Capitalism. Yes, in the short term, doing this can net you a few million in revenue taxed at a very favourable US rate. However, you canned most of your game staff so now what? This was just one film. Blockbuster teams like Weinstein and Warner crank out 4 sequels a year and thats sometimes with recurring losses baked in. those sequels exist only to sell toys and shirts and food. Unless you plan to focus on franchising which takes way more money sunk into branding and advertising, im afraid you just sold the company down shits creek. Or did you want to be a film company? Was this an attempt to get around huge industry margins for films like those out of marvels wheelhouse? Those are unavoidable and it speaks to corporate greed if you did cartwheels to explicitly avoid players in Hollywood.
So yeah, whoever you worked with, it largely wasnt Hollywood. The films marketing consists of a billboard on la brea with a cryptic phrase and a billboard on la cienega with three birds and a charred facade but no mention of the film, its opening date, or even that its a film...
Good people go to bed earlier.
At a minimum, adults who have kids. Then there's adults looking for something light who are tired of car crashes and unfunny 'comedies'.
Maybe somebody can make a movie based on gorilla.bas. That's as good as 'Angry Birds' and it runs on my old PC-XT. Just a handheld VHS camcorder and my PC-XT. I guess it wouldn't win any awards for 'high budget.' And Microsoft would probably sue.
The real test of a movie is how well it performs in the first and second weeks after launch. Word of mouth and all that. Some films like How To Train Your Dragon can recover from a weak opening and show extraordinary strength down the road, but that doesn't happen very often.
The Tomatometer rates Angry Birds at a Rotten 43%. Zootopia, Fresh, at 98%, The Jungle Book, Fresh, at 95% ---- and. if you have taken your kids out to see Zooptopia and The Jungle Book, there isn't much of anything else out there for them right now.
Disney doesn't need Angry Birds.
Not when it is adding originals like Zootopia, Frozen, and Wreak-It Ralph to its animated cannon and vivid live-action remakes of films like Cinderella and The Jungle Book. Not after it after added Pixar, The Marvel Cinematic Universe, Star Wars and Indiana Jones to its roster.
Wait a minute, I was just able to enter "Alejandro G. Iñárritu" and all the cool little foreign hats on the "n" and the "a" showed up! Did something fundamental change at Slashdot? Have the Slashdot owners been meddling with the primal forces of nature?
You are welcome on my lawn.
If you call the Slashdot 800- number, they'll give you instructions on how to do that.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Not sure if he means anti-gamer or pro-women. Hard to tell those apart lately.
I am bored AF with all of those stories myself, they are boring and the people who submit them are boring. Just the same old tripe, hashed and rehashed. But nobody has chased gamers off of Slashdot. I am a gamer. I have been a gamer since I was a child, and I am willing to identify as a gamer in public. I have not been chased off of Slashdot. I have not even felt the slightest pressure to leave Slashdot because I am a gamer. Maybe that's because I'm not one of these "all women are teh evils only good for teh secks" types.
Not all Gamers are Gamergaters, and only the latter group has been hounded off Slashdot, to the extent that this is even true, which is it not. There are still plenty of them here, and sometimes they even leave a comment that proves it.
Not all Gamers feel butt-hurt by the SJW contingent. Some of us just roll our eyes like we did at the overly PC contingent that showed up in meatspace in the 1980s. I grew up in Santa Cruz, where there are (these days, but for some time) as many gay bars on the main strip as there are "normal" ones, and where hippie granola is crunching everywhere. Back then we had drum circles on the mall. People who think SJWs are new or novel are seriously fucking new themselves.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"