"Is Canada ready for its own screen superhero?"

[Brazoo]

http://www.toronto.com/article/737043--is-canada-ready-for-its-own-screen-superhero

[samurainoir]

I think Alpha Flight is most likely to make it to actual movie screens first, and that would be as supporting characters in any Wolverine sequel past the next one based in Japan.

The biggest problem with a Canadian produced Low budget indie film now is that we've sold out our theatrical distribution channels so that even the biggest "names" (like Paul Gross or Sarah Polley) can only get a couple dozen screens across the country Max. Theatres are already block booked with Hollywood product way in advanced, so that the latest Adam Sandler film for example is guaranteed to open on hundreds of screens across the country. The exception being French language cinema which has managed to hold it's own ground.

Case in point. Take This Waltz. A film starring SETH ROGEN, and MICHELLE WILLIAMS, released AFTER her Oscar nomination. Has anyone here even HEARD of this film, let alone realize it had a very small theatrical release? This is a marketable film!

http://boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=takethiswaltz.htm

If Captain Canuck does get shot, you are most likely to see it at a film festival or if you are fortunate enough to live in a big city, but the main audience would find it on DVD/bluray, cable (Cancon!) or the Internet/netflicks.

Here is how the last Canadian superhero film fared... Defendor starring Woody Herrelson, released to three theaters 4 months after Harrelson's Zombieland was a big cult hit. it also co-starred Sandra Oh, who had a huge profile at that point because of Grey's Anatomy. Kick ***, with a similar "home made Superhero" premise was released two months later and did well theatrically.

http://boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=defendor.htm

[Brazoo]

I know we've discussed this before, and I see your point, but I still think a bigger problem is that there haven't been any stand-out great Canadian movies in a long time. I WANT them to be great - I root for Canadian movies - but they just aren't.

I was actually anticipating "Take This Waltz", but the trailers made it look like an A-typical dime-a-dozen cutesy arthouse style movie - so I decided this was more of a Netflix movie for me. While most critics seem to like it - the audience feedback on Rotten Tomatoes and IMDb gave it a barely passing grade. It may be marketable because of it's cast, but having a big cast doesn't guarantee an audience either. Seth Rogen has had flops - for example - and this isn't even a movie specifically for Rogen's fan base anyway.

"Defendor" was a pretty good movie quality-wise, but the marketing was horrible. It was released on the heals of "Kick-***" which made it look like bit of a cheap knock-off, even though it came out earlier. From the ads it seemed very similar to another movie called "Special".

To clarify, here's what I mean by horrible marketing:

From this poster can you tell what this movie is?! Woody Harrelson is not recognizable, even though they're featuring his face. He doesn't look like a superhero, so they're not even pushing the main premiss of their film properly. He's just standing there, it's not very exciting:


You know exactly what this delivers the second you see the poster. Superhero kids, fun and violence:


To be honest, I'm not sure how wide an audience exists for "Defendor" anyway. With that movie's budget they maybe should have compromised a few things to make it more fun and crazy to stand out. Like, instead of making him mentally disabled - which added a little too much pathos (in my opinion) they should have just made him really dumb - it would have been funnier. They could have also made it more gory to give it more cult-movie appeal. Maybe that wouldn't jibe with the director's artistic vision, but to be perfectly honest one of the movie's problems for me was that it thought it was a lot deeper than it actually was - so maybe taking itself a little less seriously would have worked in it's favor.

Hopefully we'll have a few drinks and you'll beat me up for saying this, but HOW does a star of Grey's Anatomy help sell a dark super hero movie? The audience don't cross-over in any way. Besides, it's very rare when TV stars lend cache to movies - which brings me to another thing that irritates me about Canadian movies ---

Paul Gross is NOT a movie star. Producers have to stop treating him like he might be a movie star. Let him do more TV - he's passible as a TV star. It took George Clooney like, 7 movies to change his image from a TV star to a legit movie star, and he was THE biggest TV star around when he started. Gross didn't have that kind of head start - so it's time to just realize he's never going to make it.

[BlackKnight]

I thought Wolverine was Canadian.

[BlackKnight]

I thought Wolverine was Canadian.

[Hector]

Is there an echo in here?

[ctc]

>there haven't been any stand-out great Canadian movies in a long time.

Hmmmm.... I think part of the problem THERE is that Canadian films, no matter the subject, tend to get a little arthouse. Anything with mainstream appeal gets bought by an American company right away.

>"Defendor" was a pretty good movie quality-wise, but the marketing was horrible. It was released on the heals of "Kick-***" which made it look like bit of a cheap knock-off, even though it came out earlier. From the ads it seemed very similar to another movie called "Special".

Yeah. For Defendor though, it's NOT a superhero movie. It's pretty much an anti-superhero movie. So for a superhero fan it'd strike all the wrong chords. No word of mouth, coupled with being buried by the company means poor audience turnout.

>He doesn't look like a superhero, so they're not even pushing the main premiss of their film properly.

Yeah, but I could see the ad guys not knowing what to do with it. If you make him look all superheroey, then folks are gonna be cheesed after seeing the film 'cos that's not where it goes. Even Kick-*** gets all superheroey at the end. So if you want to play up the edgier, grittier side of the film folks are gonna get cheesed THERE, too since a lot of it features people talking.

>With that movie's budget they maybe should have compromised a few things to make it more fun and crazy to stand out.

I don't think that's what they wanted though. The film asks the question "who would be a superhero" and answers it with "an idiot." Hence why I say it's an anti-super film; not a sendup, not a parody, not a deconstruction.... it's a statement of how dumb the genre is. (Not that I'm arguing for or against that point; I'm jujst saying that's what it looks like they were going for.)

>to be perfectly honest one of the movie's problems for me was that it thought it was a lot deeper than it actually was - so maybe taking itself a little less seriously would have worked in it's favor.

With audiences, yes. It'd be more like what they expect, but not what the producers wanted. Comparing it to Kick-*** is pretty astute, since they're the polar opposite. Kick-*** was the underdog story, playing up the chop-sockey levels of violence and mayhem, and showing how the hero becomes (bafflingly) the hero at the end. Defendor was about a schmo, who tried being a hero because he didn't know any better, and never really got the hang of it. (I don't want to say too muchn in case someone hasn't seen it yet.) In Defendor, the only reason he doesn't get caught right away is 'cos the bad guys think he's too much of a joke to care about. Kinda like Kick-***, but in this case they're right.

As for your deep comment; I didn't see the film as trying to be particularly deep; although it ended up with a lot of the trappings associated with such things. I found everything right out in the open, but the message was one we don't often see so it was tricky to deal with.

>HOW does a star of Grey's Anatomy help sell a dark super hero movie?

Source Amnesia. You knwo the name, you might not know where, your brain fills in the rest. "I heard of them! They must be good!"

>I thought Wolverine was Canadian.

Depends on who's writing him.

Don C.

[BlackKnight]

Is there an echo in here?

Yeah ..., It's called my Computer hasn't really liked this new site upgrade since it launched.

[Brazoo]

Yeah, Wolverine is technically a Canadian born character - and movies like "The Incredible Hulk" were filmed here, but they're not Canadian owned properties or Canadian film productions, which is what this article is mainly about.

Maybe Marvel/Disney could try to make Alpha Flight with some kind of Canadian co-production deal - but I don't think it's too probable given the amount of $$$ required.

[ctc]

>Maybe Marvel/Disney could try to make Alpha Flight with some kind of Canadian co-production deal

Awwww.... does it HAVE to be Alpha Flight? Y'know; Mr Monster is technically Canadian.

Don C.

[Brazoo]

>Maybe Marvel/Disney could try to make Alpha Flight with some kind of Canadian co-production deal

Awwww.... does it HAVE to be Alpha Flight? Y'know; Mr Monster is technically Canadian.

Don C.

Hey, if it's up to me I'll greenlight "Reid Fleming, World's Toughest Milkmen" in a second before I'd even look at Alpha Flight.

[babycyclops]

Hey, if it's up to me I'll greenlight "Reid Fleming, World's Toughest Milkmen" in a second before I'd even look at Alpha Flight.

That would rock, but who could possibly play Reid Fleming

Wasn't 'Super' with Rainn Wilson and Ellen Page set in Toronto? It's similar in tone to 'Defendor' and perhaps a shade darker than 'Kick ***'.

[samurainoir]

I know we've discussed this before, and I see your point, but I still think a bigger problem is that there haven't been any stand-out great Canadian movies in a long time. I WANT them to be great - I root for Canadian movies - but they just aren't.

"Good" is such a relative term, particularly when it comes down to individual tastes. What I'm talking about is the even larger problem of the business end of things. Even if there was a Canadian movie you thought was good, or someone whom you considered to be a movie star... The likelihood of that film being seen by a large enough audience in the theatres, where films should be experienced IMHO, is slim and none because you don't have a proper distribution channel for even the audience to vote with their dollars. Without the distribution channel, you don't even have the marketing dollars to run any kind of real campaign. It just gets dumped straight to DVD and you rely purely on word of mouth.

Let's face it... The majority of Hollywood product that gets released to screens across Canada for the most part is mediocre at best. Yet why is it that every Dawg Awful Kevin James movie is guaranteed to be on hundreds of screens?

Many people can say Canadian Television sucks for the most part, or Canadian music, but I think you can pretty much say that about 90% of anything, no matter what country it comes from. The biggest difference is that we protected our homegrown tv and music industry with a Canadian content requirement, which for the most part (yeah, there are hiccups along the way... Brian Adams had a right to be ****ed) has been successful in keeping our talent employed and creating our own content. And thus success can spring up in this environment and find even larger audiences in the international marketplace. SCTV, kids in the hall, Barenaked Ladies, etc.

Paul Gross aside, the last time any purely Canadian film had any chance of modest success was about ten years ago... Men with Brooms, which got on a significant amount of screens with a significant anoint of advertising budget attached as a result.

http://boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=menwithbrooms.htm

It was around this time that our distribution was completely sold out. Note the producer of Men with Brooms is Robert Lantos, formerly a distributer (Alliance) who tried to protect and nurture homegrown product when possible.

Here is what could have happened in the old days with Defendor (again, not discussing the merits of the film, we're talking business) before block booking closed off the theatrical channels. Zombieland hits. Seeing an opportunity, the Canadian distributer could take advantage of that and strike more prints of Defendor and negotiate a wider release to the chains and indies, come up with the Marketing campaign to take advantage of this... "ZOMBIELAND'S WOODY HARRELSON... Not shooting zombies this time, he's an offbeat Superhero!". And remember, it doesn't matter if it's a different kind of movie... Hollywood trades on name brand star recognition all the time, whether it is the previous hit movie, or a bankable television star (how many Bad movies has Grey's Anatomy's Katherine Heigl done?). Superbad isn't Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist nor is it Juno, but marketing does take advantage of the fact that it's Superbad's Michael Cera... Or TV's Michael Cera from Arrested Development. But this scenario can't happen now. Why? Because Mall Cop or Zookeeper has been booked and guaranteed to open on however many hundred screens.

[samurainoir]

Here's an example of the cult status of the Popular Canadian teen girl werewolf franchise Ginger Snaps... It became popular via world of mouth on home video and cable. These movies should be much bigger hits on the big screen with it's crossover audience of teens and horror fans. These are marketable films for a theatrical audience.

http://boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=gingersnaps.htm

http://boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=gingersnaps2.htm

Although we do have the modest hits that are coproductions... But it isn't completely homegrown indie. This is more in line with needing to go to the US to be recognized for success in Canada. Like Shatner, Mike Myers and Jim Carey. Although whether a Cronenberg fan or not, you have to give it up to the man for trying to keep it in Canada whenever possible.

http://boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=easternpromises.htm

Speaking of Cronenberg, We've also got the heyday of the Canadian tax shelter films of the seventies, a period where more bad Canadian films were produced than any other point in history. But in that environment, you got ridiculously popular and successful commercial hits as well.

http://boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=meatballs.htm

http://boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=scanners.htm

Sarah polley's directorial debut, Away from Her was originally released on twenty or so screens across the country. However, the gift of Oscar nominations brought it back into wider release, and gave it an additional audience in the US. Again, This is a case of having to go the the US for affirmation. Part and parcel of the problem that we Canadians suffer from.. The inferiority complex of "Canadian Films Suck". Oh wait.. Maybe not, according to the Oscar nomination! Which makes the situation with Take this Waltz even more insidious... "Oscar Nominated" branding should have kicked doors wide open for Polley's follow up film.

http://boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=awayfromher.htm

It also took an Oscar nod for English Canada to notice the Quebecois film Monsieur Lazhar this past year! And in Toronto, it only played at the TIFF lightbox, a really specialized art house venue. Subtitles aside, this was an extremely relatable and universal film about a teacher and his students.

http://boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=monsieurlazhar.htm

[Brazoo]

"Good" is such a relative term, particularly when it comes down to individual tastes. What I'm talking about is the even larger problem of the business end of things. Even if there was a Canadian movie you thought was good, or someone whom you considered to be a movie star... The likelihood of that film being seen by a large enough audience in the theatres, where films should be experienced IMHO, is slim and none because you don't have a proper distribution channel for even the audience to vote with their dollars. Without the distribution channel, you don't even have the marketing dollars to run any kind of real campaign. It just gets dumped straight to DVD and you rely purely on word of mouth.

Let's face it... The majority of Hollywood product that gets released to screens across Canada for the most part is mediocre at best. Yet why is it that every Dawg Awful Kevin James movie is guaranteed to be on hundreds of screens?

Many people can say Canadian Television sucks for the most part, or Canadian music, but I think you can pretty much say that about 90% of anything, no matter what country it comes from. The biggest difference is that we protected our homegrown tv and music industry with a Canadian content requirement, which for the most part (yeah, there are hiccups along the way... Brian Adams had a right to be ****ed) has been successful in keeping our talent employed and creating our own content. And thus success can spring up in this environment and find even larger audiences in the international marketplace. SCTV, kids in the hall, Barenaked Ladies, etc.

Paul Gross aside, the last time any purely Canadian film had any chance of modest success was about ten years ago... Men with Brooms, which got on a significant amount of screens with a significant anoint of advertising budget attached as a result.

http://boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=menwithbrooms.htm

It was around this time that our distribution was completely sold out. Note the producer of Men with Brooms is Robert Lantos, formerly a distributer (Alliance) who tried to protect and nurture homegrown product when possible.

Here is what could have happened in the old days with Defendor (again, not discussing the merits of the film, we're talking business) before block booking closed off the theatrical channels. Zombieland hits. Seeing an opportunity, the Canadian distributer could take advantage of that and strike more prints of Defendor and negotiate a wider release to the chains and indies, come up with the Marketing campaign to take advantage of this... "ZOMBIELAND'S WOODY HARRELSON... Not shooting zombies this time, he's an offbeat Superhero!". And remember, it doesn't matter if it's a different kind of movie... Hollywood trades on name brand star recognition all the time, whether it is the previous hit movie, or a bankable television star (how many Bad movies has Grey's Anatomy's Katherine Heigl done?). Superbad isn't Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist nor is it Juno, but marketing does take advantage of the fact that it's Superbad's Michael Cera... Or TV's Michael Cera from Arrested Development. But this scenario can't happen now. Why? Because Mall Cop or Zookeeper has been booked and guaranteed to open on however many hundred screens.

Sorry, "good" was a really dumb way for me to put it - I guess it makes sense to just sum up as 'you have to start with a product people want'. Look, I don't have the knowledge you do, but in my opinion as an outsider Canadian movies almost always feel like they're made for nobody. I've never watched the trailer for a Kevin James movie and thought "Who was THAT for?", and with Canadian movies I almost think that every single time.

To me, this is not a case where there's all these incredible movies people are missing out on because they can't get on screens. These are often movies who don't seem like they'd appeal to anyone getting bad critical and audience reviews and making no money - so to me, that's a real problem.

It seems like almost all lower budget American movies start with limited theatrical releases and the ones that stand out grow from there - so I don't see why things should be different for Canadian movies.

I don't think you're wrong. I think that devising a way to force Canadian movies onto more screens would probably generate more ticket sales, but unlike TV and radio broadcasters I don't think the government licenses movie distributers or theater owners - so I don't understand how that would work.

From what I know "Men With Brooms" was a hit because Alliance Atlantis put an unprecedented advertising budget behind it - so maybe the government should encourage bigger advertising budgets with different kinds of subsidies packages that focus on that?