more from Berman on NEMESIS

[Kirok]

from trekweb

http://talk.trekweb.com/articles/200...046788553.html

Producer Rick Berman talks extensively about the box office performance of STAR TREK NEMESIS in his latest Update with the Star Trek Communicator for issue #143, hitting newsstands soon. NEMESIS made less than $50 million domestically, making it the lowest-grossing of all ten STAR TREK pictures. Berman, however, is weary of the culprit.
"It is really easy to be a Monday-morning quarterback. You can blame it on the competition, you can blame it on what month it was scheduled to be released in, you can blame it on the movie itself, you can blame it on the fan base deteriorating to some degree," Berman told Dan Madsen. "I think it is silly to make a guess as to what causes a film to do very well or not do very well."
Berman is open to the possibility that the STAR TREK franchise is simply over-saturated right now.
"Star Trek can be over-exposed; the audience can be saturated with Star Trek," he says. "It is definitely a possibility. But I think that if you look at the first night grosses of the movie,which are almost entirely fans, the fact that those first-night and second-night numbers were considerably down from previous movies tells me that the fans were just not coming out like they were before."
Berman says he and the studio were confident with the film's marketing campaign and didn't feel like MAID IN MANHATTAN constituted "major competition." He continues that less fans turned out than for previous movies.
"I think the fact that the first weekend boxoffice was down is definitely an indication that the fans were holding back a little bit. That is certainly a major comment, and whether that has to do with the over-saturation of Star Trek is a very valid question."
He also says that STAR TREK's audience has aged considerably since TNG, when asked by Madsen what he thinks STAR TREK's main audience is today.
"If you realize that The Next Generation has been off the air for eight years, the fans of that series have obviously gotten eight years older," he admits. "Indeed, the younger ones are no longer young, and the older ones are eight years older. I think that... that the audience has grown a bit older and the younger audiences are more familiar with Deep Space Nine and Voyager and Enterprise. I think the fact that our core audience has gotten a little bit older is something hard to ignore."
Although he says the studio has not begun discussing the fate of the STAR TREK movie franchise, Berman thinks taking advantage of the now five television series with a mixed-cast movie could be feasible.
"I have discussed it with a few people," Berman says. "It’s possible. Obviously, we did that with GENERATIONS. Now that we have The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, Voyager and Enterprise, I think the sky is the limit in terms of mixing and matching... If people knew what it would take to make box-office hits they would be very rich. Whether it means a change in cast or a partial change in cast, or whether it means a longer wait, or it means a drastic change in concept, I don’t know. We will obviously be discussing that over the next year, and everybody will take an educated guess."

[erhershman]

Sounds like he hit all the right points to me. Congrats to him.

[C5]

Hey, a movie with all the series in it... yeah, that could be quite fun. Assumed of course, they manage to do something better than GENERATIONS (the only things I liked in that movie were the crash of the Ent-D and the death of Kirk )...

Other than that, I tend to agree with Berman. The fact that there were less numbers on the first day tends to confirm the theory that the fans weren't motivated by the movie... before it was even out (something you can hardly blame the quality of the movie for).

Well, Nemesis is out next week in my country. I'll be able to finally have an opinion on the subject (I already have a -very low- one on the guys who did the French poster, where they wrote "Beware of your dark side". Now I don't know if this was the catchphrase in english too, but it seems to me those translators mixed Wars and Trek... again )

[Phantom]

Originally posted by Kirok
"It is really easy to be a Monday-morning quarterback. You can blame it on the competition, you can blame it on what month it was scheduled to be released in, you can blame it on the movie itself, you can blame it on the fan base deteriorating to some degree," Berman told Dan Madsen. "I think it is silly to make a guess as to what causes a film to do very well or not do very well."

I actually agree with him here. Now, if he can only admit that Nem was a bad movie...We can all move on.

[erhershman]

Originally posted by Phantom
I actually agree with him here. Now, if he can only admit that Nem was a bad movie...We can all move on.

Yes, but if he did that he would be contradicting his own statement about it being a "silly thing" to guess as to what made it fail.

So what you're saying is that you'd forgive him and be perfectly satisfied if he just admitted he made a bad movie?

[REG]

Yada Yada Yada...

Do me a favor, Berman. Either make the next Trek film more impressive than NEMESIS and INSURRECTION combined, and you would have redeemed yourself...

OR, find another line of work before the Paramount "suits" will have found that misplaced brain cell and consider removing you from the franchise's chief leadership position.

If you know what we want, then do it. Should have done it with NEMESIS in the first place but the past is past.

P.S. Remember this, Berman. Under you tenure as the head of Trek franchise (and successor to Gene Roddenberry and Harve Bennett), you've managed to allow writers to screw up two major villains. Now, I can never look at them in the same light as Doctor Moriarty is to Sherlock Holmes.

[Phantom]

Originally posted by erhershman
Yes, but if he did that he would be contradicting his own statement about it being a "silly thing" to guess as to what made it fail.

So what you're saying is that you'd forgive him and be perfectly satisfied if he just admitted he made a bad movie?

Not exactly. I m not asking for an analysis as to why it was, I just want to admit that it was. Since he isn't going to admit that it was indeed his fault...We can skip that step. If he can get just enough past his ego and say "Yeah, it sucked. We'll do better next time." We would be better off.

There is no point in discussing what made it bad...since it was a combination of everything above. Except release time.

[Kirok]

One of the things that really gets me is this comment:

"I think it is silly to make a guess as to what causes a film to do very well or not do very well."

What does this mean? That it's silly to GUESS the reasons? Yes, that wouold be silly. However, as Mr. Head Trek Honcho, shouldn't he be able to do more than guess on this subject? If he can't do more than guess, he definitely needs to go.

Did he mean "speculate"? If so, then no, it is NOT silly to speculate or to try to figure out why it did poorly. In fact, I would thing it would be his job to figure out or at least delegate that task to someone. I mean, Paramount gave him money to get the movie made, he should be answerable as to why it tanked.

Sez I.

[Balok]

NEMESIS made less than $50 million domestically, making it the lowest-grossing of all ten STAR TREK pictures.

Considerably less. The actual figure is closer to $43 million, and that's in 2002 dollars. Star Trek V, the previously acknowledged stinker, made about $55 million in 1989 dollars. Although a simple inflation adjustment isn't always the best measure, it's still worth noting that this is about $79 million in 2002 dollars (see http://minneapolisfed.org/research/data/us/calc/).

Berman, however, is weary of the culprit.
"It is really easy to be a Monday-morning quarterback. You can blame it on the competition, you can blame it on what month it was scheduled to be released in, you can blame it on the movie itself, you can blame it on the fan base deteriorating to some degree," Berman told Dan Madsen. "I think it is silly to make a guess as to what causes a film to do very well or not do very well."

Of course he's weary of being seen as the culprit. But is that because he thinks others share a portion of the blame -- a sentiment I agree with -- or because he seems himself as blameless -- something that's definitely not true. It may be difficult to guess what will make a film do well, or not do well, and it may be difficult to discover why a film didn't do well, but that's part of a studio's job, unless it wants to turn out poor performing losers until it fails.

Berman is open to the possibility that the STAR TREK franchise is simply over-saturated right now.
"Star Trek can be over-exposed; the audience can be saturated with Star Trek," he says. "It is definitely a possibility. But I think that if you look at the first night grosses of the movie,which are almost entirely fans, the fact that those first-night and second-night numbers were considerably down from previous movies tells me that the fans were just not coming out like they were before."

And why might that be? To what extent did pre-publicity (including the largely accurate script available all over the web) drive off fans by leading them to believe the movie would be bad. It almost kept me out of the theater, and I consider myself hardcore.

Berman says he and the studio were confident with the film's marketing campaign and didn't feel like MAID IN MANHATTAN constituted "major competition." He continues that less fans turned out than for previous movies.

"I think the fact that the first weekend boxoffice was down is definitely an indication that the fans were holding back a little bit. That is certainly a major comment, and whether that has to do with the over-saturation of Star Trek is a very valid question."

He also says that STAR TREK's audience has aged considerably since TNG, when asked by Madsen what he thinks STAR TREK's main audience is today.

"If you realize that The Next Generation has been off the air for eight years, the fans of that series have obviously gotten eight years older," he admits. "Indeed, the younger ones are no longer young, and the older ones are eight years older. I think that... that the audience has grown a bit older and the younger audiences are more familiar with Deep Space Nine and Voyager and Enterprise. I think the fact that our core audience has gotten a little bit older is something hard to ignore."

Here's the section that concerned me enough to write this reply. Nowhere does Berman even *allow* for the possibility that Nemesis was a bad film. Despite the fact that reviewers were not kind to it, and fans stayed away in droves. If he doesn't at least consider that possibility, then he's clearly blind to a major component in the film's failure -- that it just wasn't very good. And until he admits that it's possible for him to make a bad film, we'll never get a better one. At least, that's my fear.

"I have discussed it with a few people," Berman says. "It’s possible. Obviously, we did that with GENERATIONS. Now that we have The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, Voyager and Enterprise, I think the sky is the limit in terms of mixing and matching... If people knew what it would take to make box-office hits they would be very rich.

He's in that business. I'd hope he'd have at least *some* ideas. But this comment suggests that he thinks it's hit or miss. That is not the case.

Also, I wonder how an ensemble cast would fit with the fact that Berman is rumored to dislike many of the cast of Deep Space Nine. I'd heard that cited as a reason why there will never be a DS9 movie. I can't attribute that; it came to me friend of a friend, so take it with a grain of salt.

Whether it means a change in cast or a partial change in cast, or whether it means a longer wait, or it means a drastic change in concept, I don’t know. We will obviously be discussing that over the next year, and everybody will take an educated guess."

Here's my educated guess right now: try for quality writing next time. See where that gets you.

Not everything is going to succeed. But when you analyze failure, you can't do so with blinders on, or you're likely to repeat the mistake.

[Ineti]

Originally posted by REG
P.S. Remember this, Berman. Under you tenure as the head of Trek franchise (and successor to Gene Roddenberry and Harve Bennett), you've managed to allow writers to screw up two major villains. Now, I can never look at them in the same light as Doctor Moriarty is to Sherlock Holmes.

Just so I'm clear on your point of reference, you mean the Borg and the Romulans, right?

[Eric R.]

But the thing is is that NEM was not about the Romulans, contrary to the publicity it was about the Remans a totally unneeded addition to the frachise and that freaken Clone Idiot. In the end the Romulans ended up being what they have always been Stage Props!

Berman you failed the mission, you envy the fact that "your" inpsiration Deep Space Nine changed to meet Ron Moore's and Ira Behr concepts and eventually without your particpation became far more well liked by Fans and Critics then your own Sloppy Voyager.

[Cochrane]

Try to be a little more family friendly. A good G movie is possible. TNG was the most popular series, and the most family friendly. Focus on exploration. Maybe diplomacy.

[REG]

Originally posted by Ineti

Just so I'm clear on your point of reference, you mean the Borg and the Romulans, right?

Correct.

As for the Reman being spotlighted in NEMESIS and not the Romulans, it would have been a lot better if they didn't use the Romulans, the Romulan Government (Senate), Romulus, nor their space as elements of this movie. As I said, I find it hard to believe that Romulans would allow such second-class subject race with a useless clone to take over the central authority of the Romulan Empire, not without a civil war.

That is like having the KKK with a Bush double taking over Capitol Hill. Do you think as a US citizen, I'm going to accept the new authority? Hell, no.

[Phantom]

Originally posted by REG
Correct.

As for the Reman being spotlighted in NEMESIS and not the Romulans, it would have been a lot better if they didn't use the Romulans, the Romulan Government (Senate), Romulus, nor their space as elements of this movie. As I said, I find it hard to believe that Romulans would allow such second-class subject race with a useless clone to take over the central authority of the Romulan Empire, not without a civil war.

I agree with your above points, except for the exclusion of the Romulans. It is the whole Reman idea thta should have been spaced. The Romulans should have been the main adversary, at least a rogue Senator or something, not necessairly the whole gov't. And don't get me started on the whole stupid clone thing, amazing how this came out after Lucas's idea for Ep II?

[REG]

Actually the clone can work as a tool, by letting him infiltrate the starship to capture Captain Picard, and having him replaced. Of course, the glitch is that he suffers from rapid aging defect, which is why Tomalak and Sela have to work quickly.