Turning $20 million into a little over 3 million and losing your dignity in the process. Normally you have to start a glibertarian magazine to accomplish that so effortlessly, but it appears the strategy also has crossover appeal in cinema. I think a couple more lectures in market forces from these clowns is just what we all need.
BrklynLibrul
Sometimes that invisible hand works!
Chris
Ayn Rand’s movie skewered by Ayn Rand’s ethic. As fitting an epitath as there could be. Mourn not.
BR
I’m sure it’s a lefty conspiracy of advertisers who decided not to promote a movie that celebrates the best of the American entrepreneurial spirit that caused it to do poorly at the box office. I’m sure there will be analyses shortly at glibertarian websites about how they didn’t promote the movie comparably to Avatar or something.
Steve M.
Don’t forget to read Box Office Mojo’s essay on why even the not-horrible first-weekend grosses were an embarrassment.
mds
Oh, now, this is too harsh. Most of them never had any dignity.
Tom Levenson
I love the smell of schadenfreude in the morning.
williamc
Totally should have had as an accompanying graphic the little dog sitting in a bucket “goin’ galt”.
dmsilev
There was a hilarious story in the Chicago Trib a few days ago. Seems that the producers of Atlas Shrugs have been blasting out emails to anyone and everyone saying that people should see the film to Stick It To The Man, where The Man are the liberal movie critics who savaged the thing. The paper’s movie critic then reprinted some of the hate mail he got, and patiently explained that it’s in his job description to give a subjective assessment of a movie’s quality…
Story link
Edit: Best bit of hate mail reprinted in the article:
Bob
DVD sales and foreign markets will no doubt prove it’s salvation.
“Not intended as a factual statement.”
Chris
@BR:
You mean, they used their God- and market- given freedom to decide what to advertise for and what not to advertise for.
CT Voter
I’m still flummoxed that enough people have seen it for it to haul in 3 mil.
But then again, ticket prices are pretty steep these days, aren’t they?
wvng
Their problem is they can’t inflate the box office the same way they inflate winger book sales by buying them by the truckload.
Hans Solo
I like Scalzi’s take on Atlas Shrugged:
http://whatever.scalzi.com/2010/10/01/what-i-think-about-atlas-shrugged/#comments
That said, it’s a totally ridiculous book which can be summed up as Sociopathic idealized nerds collapse society because they don’t get enough hugs. (This is, incidentally, where you can start your popcorn munching.) Indeed, the enduring popularity of Atlas Shrugged lies in the fact that it is nerd revenge porn — if you’re an nerd of an engineering-ish stripe who remembers all too well being slammed into your locker by a bunch of football dickheads, then the idea that people like you could make all those dickheads suffer by “going Galt” has a direct line to the pleasure centers of your brain. I’ll show you! the nerds imagine themselves crying. I’ll show you all! And then they disappear into a crevasse that Google Maps will not show because the Google people are our kind of people, and a year later they come out and everyone who was ever mean to them will have starved. Then these nerds can begin again, presumably with the help of robots, because any child in the post-Atlas Shrugged world who can’t figure out how to run a smelter within ten minutes of being pushed through the birth canal will be left out for the coyotes. Which if nothing else solves the problem of day care.
All of this is fine, if one recognizes that the idealized world Ayn Rand has created to facilitate her wishful theorizing has no more logical connection to our real one than a world in which an author has imagined humanity ruled by intelligent cups of yogurt. This is most obviously revealed by the fact that in Ayn Rand’s world, a man who self-righteously instigates the collapse of society, thereby inevitably killing millions if not billions of people, is portrayed as a messiah figure rather than as a genocidal prick, which is what he’d be anywhere else. Yes, he’s a genocidal prick with excellent engineering skills. Good for him. He’s still a genocidal prick. Indeed, if John Galt were portrayed as an intelligent cup of yogurt rather than poured into human form, this would be obvious. Oh my god, that cup of yogurt wants to kill most of humanity to make a philosophical point! Somebody eat him quick! And that would be that.
Rommie
{teabot3000} But it’ll do great in DVD and Blue-Ray and streaming, because the people who really want to watch it, but don’t want the embarrassment of being seen in the theater, can partake of the legend in the privacy of their own home. {teabot3000}
It should make the L-Ron fans happy that they aren’t on the bottom of the barrel anymore. Progress!
Dennis SGMM
It’s obvious: the American people have become so dependent on the soshulist welfare state that they’re unable to comprehend the lofty truths of “Atlas Shrugged: Part I”. Just for that, Atlas Shrugged – Parts II and III will not be made: you aren’t worthy.
New Yorker
Isn’t it time for the Koch Brothers to begin buying up tickets until this turkey beats out “Avatar” to become the highest grosser of all time?
That’s kinda what I’m expecting here.
At least Mel Gibson’s fascist passion play chainsaw massacre was something people (though not me) apparently wanted to see.
Citizen Alan
Eh. It will make profit on DVD sales. Every billionaire douchebag in America will buy thousands of copies for their employees in lieu of a Christmas bonus.
Chris
@dmsilev:
Hmm. Not sure if this is objectivist or anti-objectivist.
On the one hand, once again, objectivism is about selfishness as the highest ethic. If you’re wasting your money to support a cause (even the objectivist cause) or for some higher principle, you’ve completely missed the point of Ayn Rand Thought.
On the other hand, Ayn Rand was one of the most petty and vindictive human beings who ever lived. So wasting money simply for the purpose of screwing over hated people would be very much in keeping with her ethic.
Well, if I didn’t have better things to do, I’d ponder the answer to this riddle. But that paint on the wall isn’t going to watch itself dry.
Silver Owl
I find it seriously scary that today’s republicans are utterly mired in fiction for their ideology, image, idols and policy. It’s just so insane.
Comrade Javamanphil
@Chris: As if Ayn Rand fans were capable of noticing this bit of logic. Instead, they’ll just use this failure as further justification for the story they tell themselves about how they are the oppressed minority and nobody recognizes their genius.
Dennis SGMM
@Citizen Alan:
First Prize: An “Atlas Shrugged – Part I” DVD.
Second Prize: Two “Atlas Shrugged – Part I” DVDs.
jibeaux
@dmsilev:
I kind of liked the guy who accused him of having tainted his credibility as an objective critic.
An objective movie critic, for Pete’s sakes.
Chris
@Dennis SGMM:
You have no idea how happy it would make me if instead of blathering on and on about how unworthy we all are and waggling their finger about how if we don’t play nice they’re going to go away and deprive us of their genius, those guys actually got a move on and did it.
Sadly, AS 2 and 3 probably will be made. After all, what’s the point of being superior if you don’t monologue to your audience about your superiority?
cleek
why watch 6 hours of boring conference room chatter when you can get the same moral impact by watching this 60 second clip ? it even has Charlie Sheen!
aimai
It occurs to me that the entire economic model of the book–which is that the great herd of unwashed, unruly, sheeple will freely buy your product even as they hate you enough to try over and over again to destroy you–is not a really good model for dealing with your movie audience and critics.
I mean, isn’t the centerpiece of Rand’s philosophy that the few do things that the masses can’t appreciate? When it comes to a market for, say, Air, or perhaps even Transportation its true that demand may be quite high even while detestation and fear remain high. Hell, that’s precisely what monopolies and cartels are organized to overcome–they overcome the fact that in a free market the consumer has more than one choice in acquiring something and can band together to set a good price or get a good deal.
The movie industry and creativity itself (art, books, poetry, hallmark greeting cards) doesn’t successfully operate as either a monopoloy or a cartel because it is not necessary for the viewer to choose to view a product, there are many other sources for product, and what the viewer acquires when he/she purchases the product is personal pleasure.
So the “fuck you/I’ve got mine” philosophy of Galt’s Gulch and the model that punishes the indifferent or contemptuous consumer with “withdrawal of productivity” is almost definitionally not really going to work well as a marketing plan.
aimai
jinxtigr
One of the hatemail letters that reviewer got said he obviously hated patriotic, tea partying, [b]neighbor loving[/b] real murkins.
What does neighbor loving have to do with Rand??
Maybe he meant bound, spreadeagled, greased neighbor ‘loving’? That would more or less be the callous selfish use of a neighbor that Rand would be down with. Killing them afterwards like William Hickman would be sort of bonus points.
Real ‘neighbor-loving’. Words fail.
Maybe these poor confused bastards need to run with what they mean by neighbor-loving, just embrace it, and get heavy into socia1ism? That’s not a joke, either. Doesn’t it kind of make more sense? Just run with it, for Pete’s sake.
John PM
So was this a better or worse take then those two other right-wing movie behemoths – An American Carol and Left Behind?
The crappiness of Republican artistic endeavors makes me think that their main reason for cutting arts funding is that they are jealous of their more talented liberal peers.
Chris
@aimai:
And now you know what no matter how much they might bitch that “if you’re not good I’m going to go Galt!” the mighty Captains of Industry will never actually do it.
Mudge
I wonder who bankrolled the $20M? Marty Peretz? The Kochs? George Soros in some sort of insidious plot to further discredit those who are already discredited?
Xantar
@dmsilev: the tea bags are the gift that keep on giving.
Villago Delenda Est
The linked article is very workmanlike and steeped in analysis.
The author is a professional; he’s applying standard tools to the movie, without regard to the content.
The Randroids, of course, see EVERYTHING through the lens of their fucked up ideology, and can’t stand a dispassionate take down of their precious.
Fuck them. The market has spoken.
Dennis SGMM
@Chris:
They won’t even go so far as to ask anyone whether or not they’d give a fuck if the Captains of Industry all went Galt. That’s because they know that the answer would be, “Don’t let the door hit you in the butt.”
lacp
@jinxtigr: …and what color do you suppose their neighbors that they love so much are?
jibeaux
I can’t say as I’ve read or followed the “plot” of the book or the movie too much, but my husband says it’s about people trying to build a free-market capitalist rail line. In Colorado. I am beginning to think maybe these guys don’t actually understand capitalism too good.
gnomedad
Atlas Tanked.
kindness
Too bad we can’t link Pam Geller to the project. I know it’s bad for my karma but seeing her get thrown under the bus (any bus) would be a good day.
Xenocrates
In all fairness, the producers of this epic have simply illustrated the long-held secret to making a small fortune; begin with a fairly large one….
salacious crumb
the invisible hand has to work….Rand’s butt boy Greenspan needs to buy all existing copies to show that his erection is so hard at thought of the hand that that itself will create demand for this trash.
Dave
Hmmm…I don’t know if DVD sales can salvage the movie. Remember that those ticket sales are split between the studio and the theaters. And DVD sales relative to theater take has been down since 2009. So there is a whole lot of ground to make up before this piece of crap breaks even.
Ash Can
@Steve M.: From your link:
I like how he equates “logistics” with “whether we can find any operators who don’t laugh in our faces and then hang up on us.”
The Moar You Know
@John PM: Can’t speak to the movies but I read most of one of the “Left Behind” books while stuck in a laundromat during an epic laundry session. “Left Behind” is fucking Shakespeare compared to the literary and moral abomination that is “Atlas Shrugged”, a book that is so awful I get truly angry when thinking that someone wasted trees committing its foulness to paper. Ayn Rand is not only a horrible human being, but is the worst writer I have ever read. And yes, I’ve read “Battlefield Earth” as well. Lesson: bring your own books to the laundromat.
nickgb
[shamelessselfpromotion]We ran a post on this over the weekend, mostly to bitch about a Wash. Times fluff piece. It’s got some other numbers for perspective, if anyone is into it.[/shamelessselfpromotion]
Bill Section 147
As parasites how could we choose not to feed on the healthy blood of such superior entertainment?
How could businesses overlook their long-term benefit for short-term gain?
How can this movie not make HUGE profit?
Ayn, you died too soon, we need your invisible hand.
Citizen_X
@Chris:
But that’s the amazing thing: the whole Objectivist movement is run as…a charity! (Aynrand Gagged!) The Ayn Rand Institute gives out free classroom sets of Rand’s books to high schools and universities. This has to add up to thousands of free books they’re giving out. (Looks like they got to the Regenery publishing model first.) So they’re not very clear on the whole capitalism thing. The obsessive religious cult thing, on the other hand, they’ve got that covered.
Villago Delenda Est
@Xenocrates:
That’s pretty much the life story of The Donald.
Villago Delenda Est
@Xenocrates:
That’s pretty much the life story of The Donald.
redoubt
@aimai: These are people devoted to a book–and philosophy–in which railroads and radio are the apex of technology.
(Everybody probably knows this already, but to reiterate: Sputnik was launched a week before this book was published.)
Dave
@The Moar You Know: The only thing better than “Left Behind” for right-wing/Christian-esque pablum are the Chick cartoon tracts. I read my first one at a campground back in the 80s. Even then I knew it was equal parts insane and awesome.
Julia Grey
I’ve often wondered, why do we say that?
I WANT the door to hit them in the butt.
Dave
@John PM: An American Carol made 3,656,000 it’s opening weekend. Left Behind did 2,158,780. So it’s in the same crappy ballpark.
Gravenstone
@gnomedad: /applause
cleek
@Dave:
DVD sales will give wingnut sugardaddies a chance to buy DVDs in bulk to use as giveaways for magazine/website subscriptions – the same thing they do with books.
expect to see A.S. on top of the DVD sales charts, once it goes on sale.
Chris
@The Moar You Know:
I’ve never read the Left Behind books, chiefly because I don’t think I could get past the “Secretary General of the UN is the Antichrist!” thing.
Because the Secretary General of the UN is absolutely the rank you’d want to attain if you wanted to take over the world, amirite? For fuck’s sake, the Governor General of the Falklands has a bigger impact on the human race.
Dave
@cleek: Good point. I forgot about the Regenery model…I suppose you could apply that to DVD sales as well. Sigh…
Chris
@Citizen_X:
This should be where I’d point out that Ayn Rand hated religion every bit as much as she hated charity and soshulism, but Ayn Rand did set herself up as a cult figure herself, so…
Omnes Omnibus
@Chris:Isn’t the UN Sec Gen also the chair of the Bilderberg Group? That’s where the power resides. The UN thing is window dressing.
Mandramas
Also, a lot of movies that tanks domestically at least can save something with overseas market. Fortunately, Ayn Rand is overwhelming unknown on the rest of the world, with notable rare exceptions of lectured people that hate and despise her.
evinfuilt
I don’t understand why they released the movie when Bioware already released the sequel, Bioshock.
Mark S.
@Ash Can:
Yeah, I’m sure all those theater owners will waste a couple screens on Atlas instead of Pirates of the Caribbean IV, X-Men Whatever, etc. May’s the start of the summer season.
fasteddie9318
@Bill Section 147:
Is that the same invisible hand she used to sign her Social Security checks?
aimai
@Ash Can:
Yes, I love “logistics” there–is there some technological or geographic problem, hitherto unknown in the movie peddling business, that prevents theaters from trying to get butts into seats by showing them things they want to see? Was the film shot on some novel metallic form, or use a perpetual motion static electricity that doesn’t take a plug and can’t be shown on the regular screen? Is that what they mean by logistical? Or is it that the capitalist railroad that shuttles the films to the theater broke down?
aimai
fasteddie9318
@Chris:
Really? It’s the UN Sec General? I always thought their boogeyman was the head of the EU or whatever.
Chris
@Omnes Omnibus:
Never read the book, but if so, I’m relieved. That’s somewhat better conspiracy stuff. “UN Black Helicopter” shit is really laughable.
@fasteddie9318:
Fast Eddie FTW.
Villago Delenda Est
You know, about that $20 production cost…
You can see it all up there on the screen.
Omnes Omnibus
@Chris: I was making it up. Never read the books either.
Montysano
With notably rare exceptions, forays into conservative/glibertarian film, comedy, and music have been smashing successes.
Dennis SGMM
@Montysano:
“Springtime for Atlas and liberty!”
russell
It’s “Battlefield Earth” for libertarians and Randroids.
Martin
This is what happens when you don’t release action figures. I’m thinking a full-sized inflatable Tagny Daggart action figure would have taken care of that invisible hand problem.
Villago Delenda Est
OT, but hilarious nevertheless:
Haley Barbour’s decision not to run for President “narrows the field” for the GOP nomination…
Brian R.
Atlas Sharted.
The invisible hand gave their idol an extended middle finger.
And yeah, it’s only a matter of time before the Kochs blow $50 million in pocket money to buy tickets to be distributed free to all Clownhall.com readers.
ciotog
OMG, did you see the ad in the NY Times this morning that suggested that we can’t tax our way out of debt, because even if we “confiscate” all the yearly income of the top 2% it only (!) amounts to 58% of the 2011 budget and besides they’ll go Galt? Seriously!
beergoggles
I’m guessing being fisted by the invisible hand isn’t quite the same when ur on the receiving end.
Martin
@Villago Delenda Est: True. Out of 160 million eligible citizens who may run, there’s now one less.
Dennis SGMM
@Martin:
Only in true Libertarian fashion Inflatable Dagny wouldn’t have any, um, “openings”.
Jay in Oregon
@Hans Solo:
Scalzi than goes to write this, a harrowing prophecy of the time to come. Will we be smart enough to recognize the warning signs?
http://whatever.scalzi.com/2010/10/02/when-the-yogurt-took-over-a-short-story/
Hungry Joe
“Atlas Plotzed.” There’s a joke in there somewhere, but damned if I can find it.
Phoenician in a time of Romans
@Bob:
DVD sales and foreign markets will no doubt prove it’s salvation.
We used to have (here in NZ) a parody show which featured a satire of arts programs, featuring an absolutely deadpan presenter extolling the artistic features of some obscure Czech or Polish film which was about to show, in a way that made it clear that she expected her audience consisted of about two video machines and a very puzzled goldfish.
Yeah, about like that.
Mark S.
@aimai:
I think the logistical problem stems from their studio being a tad on the obscure side. I find it interesting that this studio’s other movies were all religious. Ayn Rand was a hardcore atheist who hated religion, but gooperism makes for strange bedfellows.
Chris
@Hans Solo:
AWESOME.
I love Scalzi, and that was well put – will go off and read the rest of it now.
Chyron HR
Well, I know we always told you
Selfishness is great
But please donate your paychecks
To our box office take
Bob L
We liberal blood sucking parasites should offer to watch Atlas Shrugs if an Obejectivits buys us tickets.
Anyway, isn’t a summery of AS message “My selfishness is good, yours is evil”
Tsulagi
Oh yeah, believing box office numbers from Lieberal Hollywood. No doubt connected with the same nonreal Americans who peg Tea Party protest crowd sizes in DC at less than eight figures.
You can’t fool teabaggers. They know how to count nuts.
NonyNony
@Mark S.:
Much like L. Ron Hubbard she hated religion so much she created her own.
Objectivism – the youngest of America’s home-grown religions. It shares many characteristics with its slightly older sibling – Scientology – in that both, when followed rigorously, produce sociopaths and both were started by frustrated writers of science fiction who created cults of personality around themselves.
When compared to Scientology, Objectivism appears to lack in the myth-building department. Scientology’s foundational myths include ancient space tyrants committing genocide with atomic weapons after all, and so the competition would seem to be fierce. But Rand’s stories about producers vs. parasites are no less mythical than Hubbard’s Body Thetans, it’s just that Hubbard’s literary influences were the pulps and Rand’s appear to be ponderous Russian fiction.
Keithly
@jibeaux: I think the thought process here is that the only kind of critic who should review an objectivist movie is an objectivist critic.
Alex Gurney Halleck-S.
Well, that confirms that die-hard libertarians are really just a very, very small fraction of the electorate. This movie might end up making $5 million in the end if the movement conservatives won’t boost it. Not even DVD sales will help there, and surely not the international market. And I wonder, the book is well-known and is being read often, at least more often than the movie has been watched. So, maybe the book just doesn’t want to make you watch the movie or in other words, it’s just not a good book?
The box-office result is especially bad when you consider that Paulites were able to give up to $6 million a day to Ron Paul’s campaign. I can see how someone would finance this project with $20 million because it’s not THAT much and there was a realistic chance to get that money back. But the results so far are really just bad.
Villago Delenda Est
@Tsulagi:
One…
Two…
THREE?
WTF?
Chris
@Keithly:
And yet those critics weren’t happy either. Remember the reviewer saying “the greatest shame about this movie is it ruined Ayn Rand’s novel just to make a quick buck.”
fasteddie9318
@Chris: Yeah, but that dude clearly wasn’t a real Objectivist. No true
ScotsmanObjectivist would give this film a bad review.Cam
@Dennis SGMM: Funny you bring this up. The producer is thinking of making Part III a musical! I kid you not: http://dailycaller.com/2011/03/03/thedc-exclusive-producer-of-atlas-shrugged-movie-says-part-three-of-trilogy-could-be-a-musical/
Sloegin
#1 DVD sales followed by a plastics spike at the landfill.
You would think since NYT moved HP off the bestsellers list because of some nonsensical reason other than “hey, kids book screwing up our ‘respectable’ listings” that they’d do the same thing to random conservative-bulk purchased spoutings by Bobo, Friedman, Will… er…
The Moar You Know
@Dave: They’re all here. I loves me some Chick when I need a good laugh.
Ash Can
@Cam: Mel Brooks must be in awe of these guys.
les
There’s a humorous discussion of the Atlas phenom over at Edroso’s place also. Too.
The evil liberals poking fun at the infirm amuses me greatly. Play on.
Norwonk
True randroids will see this as confirmation of her ideas. After all, she did say that she and her followers belonged to an exclusive elite of great minds, right? Obviously, the movie-going public, i.e. the parasites and looters, don’t understand her greatness. Q.E.D.
Ash Can
@The Moar You Know: I tried to read some of the stuff on that site, but I quickly felt my brain struggling to escape through my ear canals. Not a comfortable feeling. I need to go listen to some nice soothing classical music now.
SweetNostrils, fka Scuffletuffle
@Villago Delenda Est: Should say “thins the field.”
Tom Levenson
@aimai: Could be a real logistics problem in this sense: prints cost money. Quite a bit (say 2 thousand per, IIRC). They may well not have enough prints to expand (why make more than you open with, plus a margin, before seeing how things go). With sales on this scale, they may not have cash on hand or borrowing capacity to cover the cost of, say 500 prints at $2,000 each, which adds up to a cool million. Even the $200K cost of a mere 100 prints is real money when you’ve already blown through eight figures.
Plus, from the looks of it, they’ll have some to spare soon…
Fred
No worries, the Koch brothers will make up the difference out of their petty cash account.
Of course they have to do it the same way they do everything else. Perhaps give out free tickets to church groups or just hand them out to random people so the reported box office take goes up. I would not be surprised if they are not already doing that.
Brachiator
Yawn.
Sometimes terrible movies (Atlas Shrugged) tank at the box office.
Sometimes great movies tank at the box office.
Apart from this, I am enjoying the mockery here of all things Galtian.
Mouse Tolliver
The last three movies that won Best Picture Oscars were all made for less money than Atlas Shrugged. The King’s Speech, Hurt Locker, and Slumdog Millionaire only cost $15 million apiece.
Ooh, and here’s one that’s really going to sting. Precious — a movie about a pregnant, black teenager who gets help from an altruistic lesbian teacher — made over $1.8 million on its opening weekend (more than AS) even though it got a limited 18 theater release. And it only cost $10 million.
Dennis SGMM
@Cam:
Sweet Jeebus in the hills on a tricycle, these people cannot be parodied.
Mark S.
@Mouse Tolliver:
It’s not fair to compare AS with good movies.
tkogrumpy
@Hans Solo: I sit in awe of first class prose.
Mouse Tolliver
With numbers this bad there won’t even be any decent porn parodies. I was looking forward to Atlas Juggs starring Sera Paylin.
quaint irene
Jersey’s paper, ‘The Star Ledger’ never ran a review. And there was never any listings in the movie section. Was it in, as they say, ‘limited release?’
I suppose they can always blame the crappy numbers on that.
darkmatter
@evinfuilt:
Not Bioware, Irrational Games made Bioshock.
amk for obama
Don’t worry. Conservative groups will buy the dvd version by the tons and turn that 3 million into 300 million. Just watch. What do you take us randians for ? Fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool me — you can’t get fooled again.
amk
Don’t worry. Conservative groups will buy the dvd version by the tons and turn that 3 million into 300 million. Just watch. What do you take us randians for ? Fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool me — you can’t get fooled again.
Anoniminous
A moronic, unimaginative, inartistic, POS novel is turned into a moronic, unimaginative, inartistic, POS film … which promptly dies at the box office.
What a surprise.
Mouse Tolliver
@quaint irene: They’re not admitting failure yet. So far the media strategy is to lie about how successful it is. My favorite headline comes from the Washington Times:
Atlas Shrugged box office success stuns liberal Hollywood
Shoemaker-Levy 9
Judging from what I’ve read over the past couple of weeks all $3 million came from liberal bloggers.
Anoniminous
@quaint irene:
For a first time indie production company, a pissant distribution company, and no Big Names in the cast Shrugged got a massive number of theaters. A combination of perceived market attraction/draw of the book and ideology by theater owners?
Despite Red Herrings the No-Brain crowd is weeping about, the film failed because it was fer-shit.
amk
@Brachiator: Being ignored, hurts and it fucking hurts like hell, ain’t it ?
tkogrumpy
@ciotog: Sounds like a plan to me. The rest of us will gladly kick in the other 42%.
Peter
@cleek: Wow, THAT was a weird thing to hear spoken in the voice of Captain John Sheridan.
Peter
@Peter: No, wait, different guy. Sure sounds a hell of a lot like him, though.
Captain C
@Chris:
In other words, like a good oligarch she just didn’t want competition.
Cris (without an H)
@dmsilev: Speaking of Chicago film critics, Roger Ebert’s review is hilariously nonplussed. He can’t really even work up the energy to mock it. Best line of the review, regarding the tame love scene: “This may be disappointing for libertarians, who I believe enjoy rumpy-pumpy as much as anyone.”
Brachiator
@amk:
Huh?
Mr. Wonderful
This just in: the producer of the film is ‘reconsidering’ doing Parts II and III. He blames “the critics,” you will be the-opposite-of-shocked to learn. And maybe he’ll–say it with me now–“go on strike.”
http://tinyurl.com/6e6sgkg
Mr. Wonderful
@Mouse Tolliver:
Will you take a prose parody? Behold:
http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/54707
M. Bouffant
From the New York Post, yet:
Jeremiah Meyer-O'Day
@Chris: that just serves to reinforce a psychological truism: the folks who are the most shrill and irrational in their tirade against a thing are probably reacting to some hated and (to them) shameful facet of their own personality (for instance, J. Edgar Hoover, noted anti-porn crusader, had one of the largest collections of pornography known to exist, among other weirdnesses). Ayn Rand also seems to have really loved taking advantage of government-provided infrastructure and subsidies, which means that she approved of socia1ism for the rich, at the least.