Chapter 179： Box Office Surprise

... After the release of Illusion of Death, thirty media outlets released film reviews. Two-thirds of them praised the film. Twelve media gave a score of 8.5, and the number of media recommended by five stars was 16. It can be seen that the reputation of "Death Illusion" is like the Sundance Film Festival, and it is loved by professional film critics.

Among the audience scores, the freshness of Rotten Tomatoes has reached 65%, which shows that praise has the upper hand. What is even more commendable is that in the IMDB scoring system, after more than 50,000 viewers voted, the score actually reached 8.1 points, and bravely broke into the P250, ranking 227th.

Different from the high praise of the film among the media, professional film critics and audiences, even if the word of mouth of "Death Illusion" is all over the place, this film is destined to be difficult to do at the box office. Just don't like it, no matter how good the reputation is, it can't change this fact.

Therefore, although the release time was chosen in the summer time slot of the North American box office, "Death Illusion..." did not care about the competitors in the same period, and other films did not pay any attention to "Death Illusion". Nearly there is "Rush Hour 2,

"Pearl Harbor...," "Jurassic Park 3", "American Pie 2", "Planet of the Apes" and other box office hits are released, and the "Princess Diaries" box office dark horse is galloping in the summer file "Death Illusion"

The cast and crew didn't take it to heart at all.

On August 16th, "Death Illusion" was released in 198 cinemas on Thursday. The first day's box office was 600,000, not even 1 million. It was only a fraction of the other box office blockbusters. The cumulative box office of the three-day weekend approached 2 million and came to a figure of 1.9 million.

Compared with other films, the box office hit 10 million in the first week, and even the 100 million "Death Illusion" box office score of 1.9 million is really unachievable. In the fiercely competitive North American summer box office rankings , not even the top 20 squeezed in.

But for 20th Century Fox, and for the "Death Illusion" crew, it was a surprise. Drew-Barrymore even proposed to hold a celebration banquet, which is absolutely abnormal.

But in fact, not only the "Death Illusion" is up and down, but even the media are shocked by this result, not because the box office results are too low, but because the results are unexpectedly good!

Although the reputation of the film itself is very good, but for such an obscure and incomprehensible film,

Even for a movie that can only be understood by logging on to the movie's official website to read the "Time Travel Upanishads", there is absolutely no way to equate word of mouth and box office. Therefore, this result is surprising.

Do two simple data comparisons, and you will know the result of this result.

First of all, "Death Illusion..., the investment of 4.5 million US dollars, plus the cost of publicity, does not exceed the cost of 5 million US dollars at most. Originally, 20th Century Fox had given up hope for the box office, mainly after the release of DVD. The cost can be recovered, and then the revenue can be created. However, I did not expect that in the first week of its release, the box office will be 1.9 million US dollars, and one-third of the cost will be recovered. Naturally, 20th Century Fox and Richard A Kelly delighted with the results.

Secondly, there are 198 venues and a box office score of 1.9 million, which means that the average box office of each movie theater has reached 9,596 US dollars. The box office of a single venue is approaching 10,000 US dollars, which is not comparable to the box office giant, but it is definitely a movie that the audience responded very well. It is not difficult to draw a conclusion that the good reputation of the movie still has an impact on the audience, which makes the audience go to the cinema to watch the movie one after another.

The release of the box office in the first week, as well as the favorable reactions from critics and audiences, made 20th Century Fox hurriedly change the screening plan and expand the screening in the United States. Any film distributor hopes that the film in their hands can make money - they don't buy the distribution rights to lose money. Previously, 20th Century Fox's positioning of "Death Illusion" was the DVD market, but it did not expect that there would be unexpected surprises after the public screening, so it is logical to expand the screening. The number of movie theaters showing "Death Illusion" in the United States increased to 250 in the second week.

In the second week, "Death Illusion" made another 1.5 million at the box office in three days, with a very small drop, and the box office of the nose accumulated has successfully exceeded 3 million, reaching the figure of 3.2 million.

In the third week, the sequelae of the CULT movie's difficulty in integrating into the public finally appeared, and the box office began to decline all the way, and the decline was very obvious. And the following fourth week continued to decline, which led 20th Century Fox to gradually recycle the venues that had to be released in advance: mainly to avoid unnecessary expense.

Despite a slight lack of stamina in the third and fourth weeks, "Death Illusion" stumbled past four million in one month's cumulative box office, and finally made 4.6 million.

Although "Death Illusion" was definitely not a miracle at the box office, it still brought a huge surprise to Richard Kelly, 20th Century Fotons. Four weeks later, Richard Kelly officially announced in front of the media that the cost of "Death Illusion" had been fully recovered, exceeding expectations.

It can be said that the "Death Illusion", which was even decided to be screened before its release, was not favored by anyone at the box office. Even the professional media with frequent rave reviews clearly knew that this film was difficult to spread widely because of the subject matter. Open, but will gain support among professional filmmakers, especially CULT filmmakers.

But after the film was released, it attracted attention by relying on Gu Luobei's influence, and drove the box office with good reputation, and finally gave a surprising number of box office. Recovering costs within four weeks of release is something Richard Kelly never dreamed of.

And 20th Century Fox was even more surprised and said that he had lost sight of it. Fortunately, at the insistence of Richard Kelly, 20th Century Fox finally decided to release the film, and then under the persuasion of Gu Luobei, the release time was advanced. To be able to achieve such a box office is indeed a joyous victory!

In the fifth week, the September 11th incident that shocked the whole world happened, and the entire entertainment industry was hit. The box office of "Death Illusion" did not have any accident and plummeted. Although "Death Illusion" originally involved the savior complex, the film unexpectedly gained popularity from some audiences and gave the box office a strange upward curve. They all shrunk sharply, and the rate of decline in the number of moviegoers was not relieved at all. Soon 20th Century Fox made a decisive decision and removed the "Death Illusion" from the screen of the movie theater.

In the end, "Death Illusion" was released for seven weeks and grossed over $5 million at the box office.

This box office result will definitely not do anything on the year-end box office rankings, and it is estimated that even the top 100 will be difficult. But for Richard Kelly and 20th Century Fox, it has exceeded expectations: for Gu Luobei, the good reputation of the film and the recognition of professional filmmakers are enough.

Facts have proved that Gu Luobei will also make a difference in the position of an actor. This is the part that Gu Luobei has been paying attention to before. As for the position of the year-end box office rankings, Gu Luobei never cared about it.

Later, the distribution rights of "Death Illusion" were also sold to other countries by Richard Kelly, but as expected, the box office still failed to do much. The best in the UK is only $800,000 at the box office. Still, Richard Kelly was profitable at the global box office of $7 million.

Gu Luobei knew that history had indeed changed. In the last life, "Death Illusion" made only half a million dollars at the box office. But this time, the achievement of 5 million in North America and 7 million in the world has already allowed Gu Luobei to take the most solid first step in the field of film.

The true brilliance of "Death Illusion", whether in the past or in the present, comes from the DVD release.

Twentieth Century Fox has received rave reviews for its movies, and soon released the DVD of "Death Illusion" in October, which has nothing to do with the decline of the movie market. , but at least not sharply withered. Like most CULT films, professional filmmakers enthusiastically showed great interest in the DVD of "Death Illusion", which made "Death Illusion" completely popular in the DVD market.

According to the statistics of 20th Century Fox, by the end of 2002, "Death Illusion" had made a profit of 15 million US dollars in the DVD sales and rental market in the United States, making 20th Century Fox a lot of money.

This is definitely another surprise for Richard Kelly who has already recovered the cost during the release process!

Corresponding to the popularity of the DVD market, more and more viewers voted for "Death Illusion" on the IMDB system. After that, more than 250,000 viewers rated the movie. This number of votes is also from the side. It shows the popularity of the movie in the DVD market, and the score of 250,000 viewers has reached 8.3 points, which is actually higher than when it was just released. Twenty-five, this is definitely the biggest affirmation for "Death Illusion".

Word-of-mouth critical acclaim: Box-office surprise: Riding the wind and waves in the DVD market.

After the release of "Death Illusion", the momentum is going up step by step, becoming an independent film,

The masterpiece among CULT movies!

With the success of "Death Illusion", Gu Luobei also officially entered the public eye as an actor. In the IMD system, in the occupation column of Gu Luobei's profile, adding "actor" is now side by side with "actor and singer".

The third update today, @.