137 replies to this topic

[Peter T Chattaway]

For what it's worth, my son is watching the original Cars as we speak, and I'm "noticing" some of the lowbrow humour here that many people seemed to think was so new in Cars 2. There's the part where a rhyme is clearly leading up the phrase "freeze your nuts" but someone interrupts just before the word "nuts" can be spoken, and there's the part where a car that owns a gas station says she has "lots of gas" and Mater chuckles and makes a farting sound with his lips. There might be others, I dunno.

... Oh, wow, literally, Just This Second, I was about to mention another gag I remembered, and at that very moment, the DVD got to the gag in question, where Lightning McQueen mentions the Piston Cup and Mater says "he did what in his cup?" I kid you not. Anyway.

(I remember there being quite a bit of innuendo in the Toy Story 2 end credits, too, but those were the end credits, so... not quite part of the movie, per se. Arguably.)

Edited by Peter T Chattaway, 20 August 2011 - 01:34 PM.

[MattPage]

We saw this on holiday and despite not getting the references my 3 year old loved it. My 5 year old seemed to enjoy it at the time, but also found it too scary which kind of ruined it for her. I enjoyed it actually. I don't know whether all the criticism set my expectations really low, but it's weak points tended to be true to the genre and to the talking cars concept. Both of which I had come to terms with in advance. I agree TS3 is better, but I see that as marginal rather than the gulf between potential oscar winner and total trash as appears to be the prevailing view.

And I think the lesson learns lightning learns is different from the first film. There it was, do you need friends, community. Here it was more about learning to accept those in your community. Two uite different lessons in my book.

Matt

[Peter T Chattaway]

Peter T Chattaway, on 20 August 2011 - 01:34 PM, said:

For what it's worth, my son is watching the original Cars as we speak, and I'm "noticing" some of the lowbrow humour here that many people seemed to think was so new in Cars 2. There's the part where a rhyme is clearly leading up to the phrase "freeze your nuts" but someone interrupts just before the word "nuts" can be spoken, and there's the part where a car that owns a gas station says she has "lots of gas" and Mater chuckles and makes a farting sound with his lips. There might be others, I dunno.

... Oh, wow, literally, Just This Second, I was about to mention another gag I remembered, and at that very moment, the DVD got to the gag in question, where Lightning McQueen mentions the Piston Cup and Mater says "he did what in his cup?" I kid you not. Anyway.

Ah yes, and then there's the bit after the end credits where we revisit the two cars who are lost in the desert, one of whom begins a sentence by saying "For the love of Chrysler..." So many car companies she could have referenced there, but the one she chose was the one that sounds rather similar to "Christ".

[SDG]

Peter T Chattaway, on 25 August 2011 - 01:50 PM, said:

Ah yes, and then there's the bit after the end credits where we revisit the two cars who are lost in the desert, one of whom begins a sentence by saying "For the love of Chrysler..." So many car companies she could have referenced there, but the one she chose was the one that sounds rather similar to "Christ".

Ah, reminds me of a joke my "Reel Faith" co-host David DiCerto cracked about the sequel's Pope-mobile being the "Vicar of Chrysler."

[Peter T Chattaway]

FWIW, of the 12 films Pixar has produced so far, Cars 2 is the second-lowest-grossing of them all, domestically, even before inflation is taken into account; the only film behind it is 1998's A Bug's Life.

Overseas, however, Cars 2 currently ranks 6th, and it will soon rank 6th worldwide, too:

• 2010 -- Toy Story 3 -- 415.0 + 648.2 = 1063.2 million
  
• 2003 -- Finding Nemo -- 339.7 + 528.2 = 867.9 million
  
• 2009 -- Up -- 293.0 + 438.3 = 731.3 million
  
• 2004 -- The Incredibles -- 261.4 + 370.0 = 631.4 million
  
• 2007 -- Ratatouille -- 206.4 + 417.3 = 623.7 million
  
• 2001 -- Monsters, Inc. -- 255.9 + 269.5 = 525.4 million
  
• 2011 -- Cars 2 -- 187.4 + 334.6 = 522.0 million
  
• 2008 -- WALL-E -- 223.8 + 297.5 = 521.3 million
  
• 1999 -- Toy Story 2 -- 245.9 + 239.2 = 485.0 million
  
• 2006 -- Cars -- 244.1 + 217.9 = 462.0 million
  
• 1998 -- A Bug's Life -- 162.8 + 200.6 = 363.4 million
  
• 1995 -- Toy Story -- 191.8 + 170.2 = 362.0 million

So it's way down at the bottom in North America, but it's in the top half in the rest of the world. Make of that what you will.

[Peter T Chattaway]

Apparently someone at Disney doesn't want Cars 2 to go down in history as the first Pixar film to gross less than $200 million since the '90s. So Cars 2, which is currently playing in only 233 theatres, will expand to over 2,000 theatres this weekend. (Have any other Pixar films been given a boost like this during their initial theatrical release?)

Hmmm. Or maybe someone at Disney is also concerned that Cars 2 will be only the second film in Pixar's history (after Ratatouille) that failed to crack the Top Five of the year:

• 1995 -- #1 -- $191.8mil -- Toy Story
  
• 1998 -- #4 -- $162.8mil -- A Bug's Life -- behind Saving Private Ryan, Armageddon, There's Something about Mary
  
• 1999 -- #3 -- $245.9mil -- Toy Story 2 -- behind Star Wars: Episode I: The Phantom Menace, The Sixth Sense
  
• 2001 -- #4 -- $255.9mil -- Monsters Inc. -- behind Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, Shrek
  
• 2003 -- #2 -- $339.7mil -- Finding Nemo -- behind The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
  
• 2004 -- #5 -- $261.4mil -- The Incredibles -- behind Shrek 2, Spider-Man 2, The Passion of the Christ, Meet the Fockers
  
• 2006 -- #3 -- $244.1mil -- Cars -- behind Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, Night at the Museum
  
• 2007 -- #11 -- $206.4mil -- Ratatouille -- behind Spider-Man 3, Shrek the Third, Transformers, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, I Am Legend, The Bourne Ultimatum, National Treasure: Book of Secrets, Alvin and the Chipmunks, 300
  
• 2008 -- #5 -- $223.8mil -- WALL-E -- behind The Dark Knight, Iron Man, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, Hancock
  
• 2009 -- #5 -- $293mil -- Up -- behind Avatar, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, The Twilight Saga: New Moon
  
• 2010 -- #1 -- $415mil -- Toy Story 3
  
• 2011 -- #6 so far -- $187.4mil so far -- Cars 2 -- behind Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2, Transformers: Dark of the Moon, The Hangover Part II, Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, Fast Five

Thing is, Cars 2 is currently $22.5 million behind Fast Five, and of course there's no telling what other very-popular films might come out around Christmastime and bump Cars 2 even further down the list.

[Peter T Chattaway]

Hmmm, and how have the Pixar films ranked worldwide?

• 1995 -- #2 -- $362mil -- Toy Story -- behind Die Hard with a Vengeance
  
• 1998 -- #5 -- $363.4mil -- A Bug's Life -- behind Armageddon, Saving Private Ryan, Godzilla, There's Something about Mary
  
• 1999 -- #3 -- $485mil -- Toy Story 2 -- behind Star Wars: Episode I: The Phantom Menace, The Sixth Sense
  
• 2001 -- #3 -- $525.4mil -- Monsters Inc. -- behind Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
  
• 2003 -- #2 -- $867.9mil -- Finding Nemo -- behind The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
  
• 2004 -- #4 -- $631.4mil -- The Incredibles -- behind Shrek 2, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Spider-Man 2
  
• 2006 -- #6 -- $462mil -- Cars -- behind Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, The Da Vinci Code, Ice Age: The Meltdown, Casino Royale, Night at the Museum
  
• 2007 -- #6 -- $623.7mil -- Ratatouille -- behind Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Spider-Man 3, Shrek the Third, Transformers
  
• 2008 -- #9 -- $521.3mil -- WALL-E -- behind The Dark Knight, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, Kung Fu Panda, Hancock, Mamma Mia!, Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa, Quantum of Solace, Iron Man
  
• 2009 -- #6 -- $721.3mil -- Up -- behind Avatar, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, 2012
  
• 2010 -- #1 -- $1063.2mil -- Toy Story 3
  
• 2011 -- #7 so far -- $522mil so far -- Cars 2 -- behind Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2, Transformers: Dark of the Moon, Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, Kung Fu Panda 2, Fast Five, The Hangover Part II

Interesting. So in North America, Pixar films have always been the top-grossing cartoons of the year (except for 2001, 2004 and 2007, when the Pixar films were beaten by the first three Shrek movies) -- but globally, they have been beaten by the first two Shrek sequels, by the two Ice Age sequels, by the Madagascar sequel, and by both Kung Fu Panda movies. Indeed, in 2008, Pixar had only the THIRD-highest-grossing animated film of the year, globally speaking.

On the other hand, every Pixar film has ranked in the global Top Ten (whereas, domestically, Ratatouille finished in the #11 spot). But on the OTHER other hand, FOUR Pixar films (prior to Cars 2) have fallen outside of the Top Five, as opposed to the single film that fell outside the Top Five in North America.

[bowen]

Peter T Chattaway, on 02 September 2011 - 10:39 AM, said:

Apparently someone at Disney doesn't want Cars 2 to go down in history as the first Pixar film to gross less than $200 million since the '90s. So Cars 2, which is currently playing in only 233 theatres, will expand to over 2,000 theatres this weekend. (Have any other Pixar films been given a boost like this during their initial theatrical release?)

The original Toy Story seems to have actually left theaters on its 23rd week, only to come back released into 823 theaters in its 24th week, but the movie business was pretty different in 95-96 than it is today. Also Toy Story was a huge hit. In general a bump from about 200 or 300 theaters back to 500 or so is pretty common for successful movies as they enter discount theater chains. A bump all the way to 2000 theaters is extremely uncommon. This isn't the ordinary path of discount theater expansion; something very strange is going on. My guess is that you're right and that it's an effort by Disney to pad the movie's mediocre box office performance. Somebody's going to lose money to do this; per-theater last weekend Cars 2 only averaged about 100 tickets for the whole weekend in the theaters where it was showing, and adding more theaters generally means fewer people per theater. Lots of movies could sell more tickets than Cars 2 at this point, so it isn't clear how Disney got them to take it. Maybe Disney bribed the theaters with a deal on a future movie. Maybe they bribed them with cold hard cash. No way to know really.

[Peter T Chattaway]

bowen wrote:
: A bump all the way to 2000 theaters is extremely uncommon. This isn't the ordinary path of discount theater expansion; something very strange is going on. My guess is that you're right and that it's an effort by Disney to pad the movie's mediocre box office performance.

I'm reminded of how The Dark Knight got a late boost in distribution to get it past the billion-dollar mark worldwide (and perhaps to capitalize on an Oscar nomination that never came). Apparently the film only made an extra $2 million in North America -- and apparently that was in its 28th week, and it went up from 6 screens to only 350 screens -- but since the film was at $997 million worldwide before it got that boost, it didn't take much to push it past the hump. It now sits at $1,001.9 million.

[bowen]

Well, the Friday numbers are in at Box Office Mojo, and as you would expect, you can see how bad the expansion was for theater owners. Over the previous 3 weeks, the theater owners kept the per-theater revenue from dropping too much by cutting theaters (concentrating the shrinking audience into fewer and fewer theaters). Three weeks ago, Cars 2 made $394 per theater on Friday in 1763 theaters; two weeks ago it made $329 per theater in 926 theaters, and last week it made $330 per theater in 494 theaters. Friday this week, with the expansion, it made only $105 per theater in 2043 theaters. No way to run a theater business, unless Disney did something to sweetened the deal for them, so that they got about $3 from Disney for every $1 the movie brought in. However, such a deal only makes sense for Disney if they wanted Cars 2 to make money, even if overall Disney lost money from the deal. Yeah, I'd say that it absolutely looks like somebody at Disney considers the movie's box office performance an embarrassment.

http://boxofficemojo...date=2011-09-02

Edited by bowen, 03 September 2011 - 04:03 PM.

[Peter T Chattaway]

Wow. It didn't even crack the top 20, despite showing in more theatres than any film in the bottom half of the top 20. (It's even playing in more theatres than the #4 film, The Debt.)

[Christian]

Well, I may be forking over $12 to see it with my two boys tomorrow at the second-run theater.

[Peter T Chattaway]

John Lasseter finally comments on the negative criticism that this film got, in an interview with the New York Times ... and it's fair to say that he's in denial. (The reporter might be, too; he keeps calling the film a "megahit" or saying the film's $550 million worldwide gross is better than that of the original Cars -- the latter of which is true -- but he never compares this film's box-office performance to that of Pixar's OTHER films, nor does he acknowledge that the film did just a little better than Rio worldwide and still lags well behind Kung Fu Panda 2, etc.)

My favorite quote: "I typically don’t read the reviews. I make movies for that little boy who loves the characters so much that he wants to pack his clothes in a Lightning McQueen suitcase." A discerning audience, I see. (For the record, one of my sons has a Cars backpack and lunch kit, and the other son's favorite toy just might be the Megablok Lightning McQueen that someone gave us a few months ago. Merchandise sales have NOTHING to do with whether or not the people who buy or use the merchandise thought any particular installment in a franchise was any good.)

ETA: I mean, seriously, even with the 3D ticket surcharges, Cars 2 made less money worldwide than any other Pixar film in the past decade, with the slight exception of WALL-E (which is behind Cars 2 by so little that 3D surcharges alone could probably account for the gap) and the more significant exception of the original Cars. And Lasseter wants to say "I think it’s clear that audiences have responded" as if their response was basically POSITIVE somehow?

Edited by Peter T Chattaway, 17 October 2011 - 06:19 PM.

[bowen]

Peter T Chattaway, on 17 October 2011 - 06:06 PM, said:

My favorite quote: "I make movies for that little boy who loves the characters so much that he wants to pack his clothes in a Lightning McQueen suitcase."

"We make our movies for ourselves – they’re the kind of movies we like to watch. And it’s really important for us to have these films play for everybody. They’re not just for kids."

–– John Lasseter, 2008

Guess there's been a change of direction at the top of Disney/Pixar.

Edited by bowen, 17 October 2011 - 08:37 PM.

[Peter T Chattaway]

That quote -- the one from the new article, I mean -- is especially cute in that it comes just several paragraphs after the other quote where Lasseter adamantly denies that the film was made because the company wanted it for merchandising reasons. The two quotes don't necessarily contradict one another -- it's possible that Lasseter was so keen on merchandising these characters for his own reasons that the company didn't have to tell him what to do -- but still. (Actually, if you read the section around the first quote more closely, Lasseter never denies that Disney initiated Cars 2; he only denies that the film was "forced" on him.)

[Peter T Chattaway]

Aaron Peck @ High-Def Digest raises many of the age-old questions about the world of Cars (who makes the cars, why are there sidewalks, etc., etc.) and makes one kinda funny point that hadn't occurred to me before:

In ‘Cars 2′, there’s a mention of fossil fuels, which could only have been created by organic beings living on the Cars World at some point. What happened to those beings? Were they dinosaurs? And if so, would they be engineered to look like cars if we were to see them?

[SDG]

Peter T Chattaway, on 04 November 2011 - 02:01 PM, said:

Aaron Peck @ High-Def Digest raises many of the age-old questions about the world of Cars (who makes the cars, why are there sidewalks, etc., etc.) and makes one kinda funny point that hadn't occurred to me before:

In ‘Cars 2′, there’s a mention of fossil fuels, which could only have been created by organic beings living on the Cars World at some point. What happened to those beings? Were they dinosaurs? And if so, would they be engineered to look like cars if we were to see them?

Really? That hadn't occurred to you back in Cars, with Lighting and Chick competing for a lucrative Dinoco sponsorship (dinosaur logo and all)?



Apparently dinosaurs in the Cars universe looked like ... dinosaurs. At least, the Dinoco logo is as dinosaury (in a 1950s upright T-rex sort of way) as it is in the Toy Story films.

Edited by SDG, 04 November 2011 - 02:10 PM.

[Peter T Chattaway]

SDG wrote:
: Really? That hadn't occurred to you back in Cars, with Lighting and Chick competing for a lucrative Dinoco sponsorship (dinosaur logo and all)?

Actually, no, oddly enough it hadn't.