"Is Canada ready for its own screen superhero?"

[Brazoo]

Weinsteins are the perfect example of what happens... You build something up like Mirimax and then sell it out a major company like Disney, who pretty much dismantle it. The story of what happened up here in the past decade is not dissimilar.

Why does Canadian film have to be considered small time in the first place amongst Canadians? you don't think it's odd to settle on a position of inferiority in what essentially is a huge expensive medium and industry? Why not shoot for the big screen distribution as film is ideally intended and optimally viewed, rather than settle for secondary markets like cable and downloads? It's one thing if it struggles as you suggest in the US marketplace amongst indie fare, but why handicap it here where it should be afforded the advantages of the home field?

What I'm arguing is that I think a Canadian 5 million dollar budget movie has the same disadvantage as an American 5 million dollar budget movie. In my mind I'm just comparing apples to apples.

I don't think there's a reason why Canadian production companies can't make $150 mil. movies - but I think producers have to start with smaller budgets and build up to that, because it doesn't seem like the currently established producers have the ambition or the talent to get to that level.

You say Canadian movies are restricted by uneven distribution - but it still seems to me that most 10 million dollar and under movies don't get wide distribution - and the only ones that do stand out quality-wise or marketing-wise.

that is the problem of an uneven playing field. Any film from a Hollywood studio gets screens in this country and a marketing push, no matter how good or bad, but our homegrown product has to earn it and prove it's merits via the american studios and their distribution system, just like their indies? That is really backwards to throw larger hurdles at our own stuff in favour of what is essentially foreign product, and then subject it to an America filter of approval on top of that before it's allowed more screens. the ladder they climb should be here, not down there. Otherwise our talent goes elsewhere as we see time and again... Entertainment industry brain drain

The huge hope of the original Alliance/Atlantis merger was that they would become a major Power player... Commercial production capability, coupled with the distribution network they built. The fallout of their sellout and dismantling was truly a huge blow.

They made "Foolproof", right? Because of that - as an outsider - I question that they knew anything about what they were doing.

There are not many popular under 10 million dollar action movies - there are SOME, but they have to pack a real wallop. They NEED to have incredible stunts or have an insanely great script.

This was a case where - in my perceptions as an outsider - a bunch of clueless decisions were made to try and cash in on a popular genre without understanding their market or how the genre works.

The marketing? Here's the poster they made:



HOW could a professional film producer sign off on this poster? It's blatantly wrong for so many reasons it boggles my mind. The stars look like they're high. Not high up on a building, like how it's intended to look - but high as in on drugs. They're both attractive people - how hard is it to understand that attractive people should look attractive on the poster selling your movie? It's not sexy - it's not exciting. Reduced and printed in black and white in the newspaper - which is how most people saw it - it looked like two people standing and one of them was reaching up to get something on a shelf. Because it's muddy - there's no contrast and the straps they're hanging on don't read. EVEN if the straps read in the image there's no tension because there's nothing to show us the physical danger they're suppose to be experiencing. It costs the same amount of money to design a great movie poster as a horrible movie poster - so budget isn't the problem here. It's all on the dumb dumbs who thought they could market a successful movie this way.

This movie also cost Canadians 4.4 million - and the backers probably got a hefty tax return for their failure - so my Canadian pride actually works the opposite way when I see things like this happen.

The thing that really blows my mind is the dude who wrote and directed this dreck was somehow able to write and direct another (relatively) big budget movie. Also a huge flop.

Stepping back and looking at how this movie failed I don't see a picture of Canadians rejecting "Foolproof" because of a perception that it was Canadian and therefore inferior - it was inferior and the producers didn't make it hard for Canadians to figure that out quickly.