After Poor Opening, 'The Alamo' Looks Like a Loser for Disney
For Walt Disney Co., the jokes about forgetting "The Alamo" are about to begin.
Disney's $100 million production of "The Alamo" tanked over the weekend, taking in an estimated $9.2 million domestically. Disney wrestled for years to keep the film's cost down, and delayed its scheduled holiday season release to improve the finished product. Now the company appears certain to take a sizable loss on "Alamo."
The failure is noteworthy and ill-timed because Disney and its chief executive officer, Michael Eisner, are under heavy pressure to meet or exceed the company's financial targets in the wake of a shareholder revolt. At Disney's recent annual meeting, 43% of the shares voted opposed Mr. Eisner's re-election to the board. The board stripped Mr. Eisner of his chairman title as a result, and his ability to hang on as CEO is now tied closely to Disney's performance in coming months.
With that as a backdrop, Disney's film studio, which had a banner year in 2003, has been trying to make it through a shaky stretch of its winter/spring release schedule without a major bomb. Until now, it has been skating on the brink without suffering a disaster, though just barely. Its $90 million film "Hidalgo" has taken in $62.9 so far and is probably on track for just a modest loss. The animated "Home on the Range" cost about $100 million and has taken in $27.5 million since its April 2 release. That is also tepid, but Disney's animated offerings tend to perform strongly overseas and on DVD.
"The Alamo," however, is a clear loser that may struggle to take in even $25 million or $30 million in U.S. theaters at this pace. Its prospects overseas are thought to be dim, because the historical event it is based on is of little interest outside the U.S.
Disney's distribution chief, Chuck Viane, said the studio was obviously disappointed in the debut, and noted that theaters are currently packed with too many films vying for attention. On top of that, Mel Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ" returned to the top of the box office again for the Easter weekend, and has now taken in nearly $355 million domestically.
Now the question is what impact the nose dive of "The Alamo" will have on Disney's ability to achieve the 30% earnings growth Disney has promised in 2004. Disney's film projections for this period were conservative and didn't bank on any of the films in question becoming a major hit. The company signaled as much to Wall Street earlier this year, prompting some analysts to lower their projections for the performance of the studio. Disney's fiscal year began Oct. 1, and so far the studio's performance has been propelled by strong DVD releases of films like "Finding Nemo" and "Pirates of the Caribbean." The company has just begun its fiscal third quarter, and is hoping that the improving fortunes of its theme parks will propel it during this period.
The failure of a single film typically doesn't affect the stock price of a sprawling media company like Disney. The Burbank, Calif., entertainment giant must now hope that this case is no different, as keeping its share price up is critical to its ability to continue fending off Comcast Corp., which in February made an unsolicited all-stock offer for the company that was rejected by Disney's board.
The saga of Disney's "The Alamo" goes back to 2002, when the company initially planned to make the movie with two Academy Award winners, director Ron Howard and actor Russell Crowe. But Mr. Howard wanted to make the film a more violent R-rated epic, and Disney balked at giving Mr. Howard his usual profit-participation deal for such a risky film. So instead, the studio turned to a young director named John Lee Hancock, whose film "The Rookie" had just been a surprise hit. The initial hope was to spend only around $65 million, but costs inevitably ballooned. Disney originally planned to open the film late last year, to qualify it for major awards, but pulled back because it thought "Alamo" needed more work.
迪斯尼《边城英烈》遭遇票房惨败
对于沃尔特-迪斯尼公司(Walt Disney Co.)而言，别指望《边城英烈》(The Alamo)赚钱了。
迪斯尼投资1亿美元的巨片《边城英烈》上周末遭遇冰海沉船，在美国国内的票房收入约为920万美元。迪斯尼此前为压缩这部影片的成本曾花费了数年时间的努力，并为影片的后期制作而推迟了假期上映的计划。而现在迪斯尼却似乎铁定要在这部影片上蒙受巨额亏损。
迪斯尼在《边城英烈》上的惨败极为引人注目，而且时间亦颇为尴尬。在股东们揭竿而起之后，迪斯尼及其首席执行长迈克尔?埃斯纳(Michael Eisner)目前正为达到或超过公司的财务目标而承受沉重的压力。在近期召开的股东年会上，43%的迪斯尼股东投票反对埃斯纳再次入选公司董事会。结果，董事会撤销了埃斯纳的董事长职务，而埃斯纳能否留任迪斯尼首席执行长一职目前则与迪斯尼今后数月的表现密切相关。
在这样的背景之下，刚刚在2003年大获全胜的迪斯尼电影制片厂一直试图使公司在避免票房惨败的前提下安然度过冬/春影片发行期。到目前为止，迪斯尼一直如履薄冰，虽然几度濒临这一危险的边缘。
迪斯尼投入9,000万美元制作的电影《狂沙神驹》(Hidalgo)目前的票房收入已达6,290万美元，这部影片可能仅会微幅亏损；动画片《牧场是我家》(Home on the Range)制作成本大约为1亿美元，自4月2日公映以来票房已达2,750万美元。这种表现只能算是平平，但迪斯尼的动画片在海外和DVD市场上一向风头颇劲。
不过，《边城英烈》无疑将会成为一个大输家，以目前的票房收入推算的话，这部影片的票房充其量可能也不过区区2,500万-3,000万美元而已。外界认为，由于《边城英烈》所取材的历史事件在海外市场难以引起共鸣，因而这部影片的海外前景亦很黯淡。
迪斯尼发行部负责人长查克?维恩(Chuck Viane)说，很显然，《边城英烈》的首映情况令人失望，电影院目前为吸引观众推出了太多的影片。此外，梅尔?吉步森(Mel Gibson)主演的影片《耶稣受难记》(The Passion of the Christ)上周末再度登上票房榜首，目前美国国内的票房收入已接近3.55亿美元。
目前的问题就在于，《边城英烈》的票房惨败将会对迪斯尼实现其所允诺的2004年度利润增长30%的目标带来何种影响。迪斯尼对这一期间的影片预测相当保守，并未留出任何影片在票房上遭遇重挫的余地。今年早些时候迪斯尼向华尔街发出了如此之多的信号，以致于一些分析师下调了他们对其业绩的预期。迪斯尼的财政年度始于10月1日，迄今为止，《寻找尼莫》(Finding Nemo)和《加勒比海盗》(Pirates of the Caribbean)等影片DVD的强劲发行势头均提振了迪斯尼的业绩。该公司刚刚开始其第三财政季度，目前寄希望于其主题公园项目能够交好运，从而提振公司同期的业绩。
一般而言，单单一部影片的失败并不能影响到像迪斯尼这样的媒体企业的股价。这家加州娱乐业巨头目前肯定希望这一次也没有例外，因保持公司股价上涨对于迪斯尼能否继续抵制康卡斯特(Comcast Corp.)的敌意收购要约至关重要。康卡斯特2月份时主动提出，全部以换股方式收购迪斯尼。但这一收购要约遭到了迪斯尼董事会的拒绝。
欲言《边城英烈》的传奇，还要从2002年说起。当时迪斯尼最初计划在影片中启用两位奥斯卡金像奖得主--导演朗?霍华德(Ron Howard)和演员罗素?克劳(Russell Crowe)。但霍华德希望将影片拍摄成R级影片，对于这样一项极具冒险性的投资，迪斯尼拒绝了霍华德通常提出的利润分成的要求，而将影片交给一位年轻导演、刚刚大获成功影片《心灵投手》(The Rookie)的导演约翰?李?汉科克(John Lee Hancock)来执导。迪斯尼最初希望影片的成本能够控制在6,500万美元左右，但成本却不可避免地大幅膨胀。迪斯尼最初计划在去年末公映这部影片，以便使其赶上主要奖项的档期，但由于认为影片还需进行更多的后期制作而推迟了公映日期。
