What Can Save Universal Studios?

The first glimpse at this weekend's box office receipts reveals the same sad song for Universal Studios. Repo Men, touted as the young male action film alternative to opening chick flicks like The Bounty Hunter, opened Friday with only $2 million, and a projected $5.5 million for the weekend. On a budget of $32 million, those totals spell disaster for the futuristic Jude Law film. This is the latest in a startling string of failures and middling, marginal successes for the ancient studio. Once the Hollywood maternity ward for pop culture landmarks like E.T. The Extraterrestrial and Jurassic Park, the studio has limped through the last few years with barely anything to show for its efforts except a series of low-grossing, culturally-dead films that the public has ignored completely. The studio last broke the $200 million barrier way back in August of 2007, when The Bourne Ultimatum concluded that popular trilogy. Since then, Universal has floundered with a track record of disastrous, overproduced comedies and dinky action films. This period of creative decay coincides with the change in management that occurred in Universal in late 2006, when Stacey Snider left the company for Dreamworks, and was replaced by Marc Shmuger and David Linde. Under their control, the studio released a group of films startling only for their wrong-headedness. In 2008, their biggest film was the widely-panned Mamma Mia, followed closely by The Incredible Hulk, which earned around $150 million a piece. Neither film was a critical darling, but each touched off enough interest to make some money, particularly the surprising Mamma Mia, which only had a budget of $27 million. Wanted was also a fair hit, earning $135 million on a $75 million dollar budget. But the studio lost money on several films that had unreasonably high budgets. A third Mummy film, unwanted by the public, was given a budget of $150 million dollars, which it failed to recoup. Other bad greenlights included a sequel to a Hellboy film already four years old, and was given $85 million dollars that the film did not return, as well as other over-produced films like The Tale Of Despereaux, Death Race, Changeling, and Leatherheads. But the downward slide would continue and worsen in 2009. Universal gave $100 million to produce a gangster film called Public Enemies, which ended up a critical and commercial disappointment. The biggest film from the studio that year was Fast And Furious, which made $155 million on a budget of $85 million while trading on the goodwill of the fans of the first film. Mostly, though, the year was filled with financial disasters like Land of the Lost, a misguided stoner comedy given a budget of $100 million, only to see it return less than half of that amount. Films like Repo Men and Green Zone, and The Wolfman are the last trickle of output from the tenure of Schmuger and Linde, and it continues their flat, embarrassing track record. But is hope on the horizon? What can be done to return Universal to its glory days? Hope might be arriving for the Universal lineup in the form of a couple of upcoming releases gathering a fair amount of buzz. Assisted by a couple of tantalizingly-epic trailers, Ridley Scott's Robin Hood looks like just the right mix of gritty realism and Braveheart-styled, freedom-blasting fare to entice huge audiences. MacGruber, which debuts the week after Robin Hood, has some potential as a money-maker thanks to a budget rumored to be only $10 million dollars. However, films based on Saturday Night Live skits have had a terrible track record in general, and the MacGruber skit upon which it's based is particularly thin. Universal's other potential golden goose for 2010 is the highly-anticipated geek favorite Scott Pilgrim Versus The World, which should manage to recoup its $50 million dollar budget thanks to incredible buzz. On the animation front, the Steve Carrell-voiced Despicable Me should find its comfy summer slot suitable to rake in money from the parents of kids everywhere. Near the end of the year, Universal will be releasing Little Fockers, which should make somewhere close to $200 million despite the film straying from the formula of the first two successful films. Universal's future lineup looks bleak, however. They have already announced two films based on a board game (Battleship) and a forgotten toy line (Stretch Armstrong). The latter looks to be a disaster of Richie Rich proportions despite the inclusion of red-hot star Taylor Lautner, who will see his fame fade much like Macauley Culkin did back in 1994 after starring in that misguided Rich film. Universal has also slated a film called My Soul To Take, a horror film from Wes Craven about a serial killer who returns 15 years after his death to kill the children born on that date - which sounds like a limp retread of Craven's own Nightmare on Elm Street premise. So what can Universal do to turn the tides of their recent misfortunes? A quick look at the top grossing films of every studio reveals two glaring consistencies: 1. The top grossing films of every studio contain original works by populist directors. Twentieth Century Fox has Avatar, Star Wars, Independence Day, and Home Alone among its top top ten. Sony/Columbia has Spiderman, Men In Black, Ghostbusters, Hancock, and DaVinci Code. A look at Universal's top ten reveals E.T., Jurassic Park, Jaws, Bruce Almighty, and Back To The Future. Investing in populist directors and giving them the money and the freedom to create what their hearts desire generally leads to enormous profits. It's a mistake to reign in the creativity and flexibility of populist directors with sequels and prefabricated crap. Universal's gamble on Edgar Wright and Scott Pilgrim could be a step in this direction. The studio needs more of this, but at a lower price point. 2. The top grossing films of every studio contain viable franchises that appeal to teenagers and kids as well as adults. Fox has the Star Wars franchise, Sony has the Spiderman franchise, and Warners has both the Batman and Harry Potter franchises. This is not simple to replicate, and studios have lost a lot of money in recent years chasing the Next Big Thing in children's literature (anyone remember The Golden Compass??). But Avatar showed conclusively that the audience still exists to produce a monster hit, even in a sluggish economy and piracy/home theater threatening theatrical releases. At this point, Universal has no film like this on the horizon. Ultimately, Universal will make enough money to keep the doors open and the cameras rolling. The last few years have seen a sharp decline in both the quality of the films and the subsequent grosses, but enough money is being made worldwide to keep the ship aright. The more important puzzle to be solved is the direction going forward, as Universal cannot continue to produce sloppy, poorly-marketed films that appeal to limited sectors of the audience. Now is the time to invest in a couple of young, promising directors with a populist entertainment eye (think Spike Jonze, for instance), and give them the money and support to produce gargantuan hits. And now is the time to search for franchise-friendly, kid-friendly fare that can have broad-based appeal. Nobody loves formula filmmaking. But the formula for studio success is relatively simple, and necessary to continue producing films - and profits - everyone can love.