Elaboration on my previous comment -
I don't think time crunches are adequate to explain a lot of what's going on, though. It's a partial factor at most.
Indy#5 was a work-in-progress for like 3 years and they were spitballing on it for another few years before that. They had plenty of time. But they proceeded to make the wrong movie. Then they changed their minds once the test screening results started coming in. There are shades of that happening on a lot of movies.
With the SW 'Solo' movie they decided they had the wrong directors. But they made that decision when the movie was 80% done. It was big movie and they picked a top-grade new director to redo it. Compare that to 'Back to the Future' and the Eric Stolz/MJF replacement. BTTF was a notorious case of "doing the movie over" by 20th-century standards . . . and that was a relatively low-budget show, and they were only 5-6 weeks into shooting when they made the call. With modern Lucasfilm it's more like they would film for 12 weeks, get the whole thing done, do some test screenings, and then decide the movie is a wreck and needs 8 weeks of reshoots.
Look at the 'Snow White' remake. Disney filmed most of that movie. Then some pics hit the net and the public started mocking the 7 dirty hippies. Now they are scrambling to redo it. They could have test-screened the dirty hippies concept a year earlier and saved $100m.
There was a time when movies that were 80% finished would get released, period. The money was already spent and they were gonna recoup whatever they could out of it. Not today. These days a big franchise movie isn't only the production budget. It's also the franchise entry. It's the release date. The marketing expenses. Etc.
Today the $300 million bucks they spend on the movie is only part of the investment in it. And the actual footage is only a portion of the $300m tab. You can re-shoot a movie for much less if you catch it before all the VFX are done and all the assets (actors, crew, sets, costumes, props, etc) are disbanded.
Bottom line: These production disasters are liable to continue until the studios get serious about test-screening their shows at earlier stages of development. That's the only fix I see. They don't seem willing to hire good creatives and stand back & let them work. So IMO they need to start butting in at earlier stages if they are going to inevitably butt in.
I don't think time crunches are adequate to explain a lot of what's going on, though. It's a partial factor at most.
Indy#5 was a work-in-progress for like 3 years and they were spitballing on it for another few years before that. They had plenty of time. But they proceeded to make the wrong movie. Then they changed their minds once the test screening results started coming in. There are shades of that happening on a lot of movies.
With the SW 'Solo' movie they decided they had the wrong directors. But they made that decision when the movie was 80% done. It was big movie and they picked a top-grade new director to redo it. Compare that to 'Back to the Future' and the Eric Stolz/MJF replacement. BTTF was a notorious case of "doing the movie over" by 20th-century standards . . . and that was a relatively low-budget show, and they were only 5-6 weeks into shooting when they made the call. With modern Lucasfilm it's more like they would film for 12 weeks, get the whole thing done, do some test screenings, and then decide the movie is a wreck and needs 8 weeks of reshoots.
Look at the 'Snow White' remake. Disney filmed most of that movie. Then some pics hit the net and the public started mocking the 7 dirty hippies. Now they are scrambling to redo it. They could have test-screened the dirty hippies concept a year earlier and saved $100m.
There was a time when movies that were 80% finished would get released, period. The money was already spent and they were gonna recoup whatever they could out of it. Not today. These days a big franchise movie isn't only the production budget. It's also the franchise entry. It's the release date. The marketing expenses. Etc.
Today the $300 million bucks they spend on the movie is only part of the investment in it. And the actual footage is only a portion of the $300m tab. You can re-shoot a movie for much less if you catch it before all the VFX are done and all the assets (actors, crew, sets, costumes, props, etc) are disbanded.
Bottom line: These production disasters are liable to continue until the studios get serious about test-screening their shows at earlier stages of development. That's the only fix I see. They don't seem willing to hire good creatives and stand back & let them work. So IMO they need to start butting in at earlier stages if they are going to inevitably butt in.
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