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You know sometimes I come on here with a less-than-confident understanding of why a movie did well at the box office. For example, I remain baffled as to why Minecraft made a billion dollars. Some people will tell you, “It’s a popular video game, Carson! That’s why.” Well, I can give you 20 movies that were made from popular video games that all bombed. So that’s not the most convincing argument.
With that said, I still have an approximation of why a movie like Minecraft did well. It was a big fun live-action family movie that used a proven formula and marketing angle (the same one that launched the Jumanji franchise) to appeal to the masses.
But when I heard that a movie I’m convinced didn’t exist until 4 days ago, Demon Slayer: Infinity Castle, made 70 million dollars this weekend, I couldn’t give you a fraction of an argument as to how it happened. I watched the trailer to the film and had absolutely no idea what was going on.
Yet somehow, it pulled in 900 times as much as Eddington. You guys could put together an AI_assisted 150 page dissertation on why this movie made money and if I read it 46 times, I would still not know why it made money. So, I’m not going to pretend like I have any idea. But don’t worry. I’m going to see it this week in Imax so I can properly review it and report back about the movie.
Pft, yeah right!
I’m more thrown by The Long Walk only making 11 million dollars. I thought the trailer for that film was the best trailer of the year. And its weak showing puts a dent in our little plan of producing the next great horror film, as it screws up all of the momentum the genre had.
But that leads me to today’s topic, which is something I talk about a lot: TAKING RISKS. Especially when it comes to your concepts. Because although The Long Walk is considered horror, it’s a very nontraditional horror concept. It doesn’t have ghosts. It doesn’t have demons. It doesn’t have monsters. The horror is completely human-generated. And that type of horror never does as well. Which is probably why The Long Walk, which was first written all the way back in 1979 (under Stephen King’s pseudonym, Richard Bachman) has taken so long to get made.
What’s going on here?
Don’t worry. I’m going to explain.
I want you to imagine a row of dartboards. In the center of each dartboard is a genre. Horror (think The Shining). Action (think John Wick). Thriller (think North by Northwest). Adventure (think Indiana Jones). Sci-Fi (think Terminator). These “smack dab in the middle” representations of genre are anti-risk. They are so part and parcel with that gooey genre center that audiences don’t have to think twice about them. Assuming the core idea is solid, they will go and see that movie.
Once you move out from that center, you get into sub-genres. For example, with Horror, you will have teen slasher (Scream), horror comedy (Shaun of the Dead), sci-fi horror (Alien), arthouse horror (The Witch). The further out from that center you get, the more risk you’re taking. You may look at these movies I just mentioned and point out that they’re all very successful and therefore not risky. But that’s only because I’m using examples you’ve heard of before. There are hundreds of films in these sub-genres that failed because the risk didn’t pay off.
Now let’s look at a movie like The Long Walk. What genre does it exist in? It’s not straight horror, so it’s not in the center. It doesn’t exist in any of the sub-genres I mentioned. That means it’s even further out from center. You might say it’s post-apocalyptic horror. Except it doesn’t exist in the future. It exists in some 1970s alternate universe. Alternate universe period piece horror? We’ve just gone even further away from the center.
None of this is to critique the movie itself, which is getting great reviews. We’re talking about getting people into theaters. Which is the directive by which everyone in Hollywood operates. Which is why, if you write a project like The Long Walk, you’re taking a big risk. Because studios – and audiences – aren’t going to be able to place it into a box that’s easy to market.
Don’t even get me started on Life of Chuck and Eddington. I’m not sure those movies are extending out from any genre. At least the earlier sug-genres I mentioned have a sun to orbit around. These films are out in space all by themselves. And that’s how potential audiences see them. They see them as weird blurry entries which don’t exist in any identifiable form. So why risk going to the movies to see them?
One of the more captivating examples of risk I’ve encountered was Nobody 2. This was a great time at the theater. All it cared about was entertaining you. The only problem was that I seemed to be the only one who wanted to be entertained. Cause nobody – pun-intended – was there.
That’s because Nobody 2 was a risk that didn’t pay off. Believe it or not, the original draft had the family vacationing in Italy. They were going to do something not unlike The Equalizer sequels. But, at the last second, they turned it into a National Lampoon’s Vacation type film. Where does that sub-genre exist on the dartboard? A hitman action family film with comedic elements. Does a dartboard even have a section for that?
This is where being so deep in movie analysis gets me in trouble. To me, Nobody 2 was a fresh take. But to the average moviegoer, it was a step too far. They couldn’t identify what the movie was compared to what they knew from before.
So what am I saying? Never take a risk?
Of course you should take risks. The great thing about risk is that when a risky script pays off, it pays off big. Weapons is the perfect example. Weapons isn’t traditional horror. It’s not a ghost story, or a demon story, or a monster. It’s a missing persons mystery in the horror universe. And it’s not told in a traditional way. It’s told out of sequence via different points of view. This risk is exactly what made Weapons feel fresh and exciting, and audiences showed up because of it.
But here’s the more important reason for why you need to take risks – As an unknown screenwriter, you have a WAY better chance of standing out if you write something risky. It’s less likely that you will break out with a perfectly executed safe movie idea. Even if you write the next Night at the Museum and sell it, nobody will be excited about you as a writer. Hollywood is way more into risky writers, the people who write Get Out and Promising Young Woman.
I just watched this small indie movie called Sorry, Baby, about a young teacher trying to move on from a traumatic experience. It fell into its indie trappings a little too much for my taste. But for a movie I normally would’ve turned off after 20 minutes, I kept watching because at least the execution was risky. She tells her story out of order and it adds a certain level of suspense that wouldn’t have been there otherwise.
But still look for balance. You can’t be so risky that people don’t even understand what the movie is about (Life of Chuck) just as you can’t be so safe that people feel like they’ve already seen your movie before (Love Hurts). But embrace risk (both in concept and execution) wherever you can. Risk is the main tool that will make your script stand out.
