The Best Movie Actor In Hollywood!

Chapter 291

Universal Pictures was ambitiously determined to capitalize on the success of The Mummy franchise, launching a top-tier production with a massive investment. Their goal was to reignite public fascination with the studio's once-dazzling roster of classic monsters and, much like The Mummy, generate significant profits and revenue for the company.

Matthew had even learned from Sean Daniel that the top brass at Universal were discussing the possibility of bringing even more monsters back to the screen if The Mummy and Van Helsing proved successful. The idea was to pack more creatures into their films, creating a connected cinematic universe.

However, Universal approached this internal proposal with great caution, as the fiasco of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen was still fresh in their memory.

But within Universal's official plans, these discussions had, for the time being, come to a halt.

Unlike Dawn of the Dead, the reviews for Van Helsing were embargoed on Rotten Tomatoes until its official release date. By the very next day, the film was certified rotten, with a freshness rating of just twenty-four percent and an average score of 4.3—a figure so abysmal it was sickening.

It wasn't unheard of for films with atrocious Rotten Tomatoes scores to perform well at the box office, as a distinct gap often exists between the tastes of summer audiences and professional critics. After all, the freshness rating is based entirely on a compilation of reviews from the latter.

But beyond the critics' freshness rating was the audience score, and most box office hits boasted ratings of 85%, or even 95% and higher.

Van Helsing's was a mere 57 percent.

Meanwhile, audience scores began to appear on IMDB, and its average rating of 6.1 was mediocre at best.

"Van Helsing's biggest failure is that it resurrects classic monster archetypes but fails to make them scary. The film's visual effects are stunning, but the plot is weak, and the backstory bringing the three monsters together is poorly explained."The feedback from audiences and critics was incredibly varied.

Of course, for a big-budget, high-profile, and heavily promoted blockbuster, feedback from audiences and critics has a greater impact on the film's long-term box office performance than its opening weekend numbers.

This was especially true now that advance ticket sales were available in North America, both online and offline. Interested viewers could book their tickets through the internet or by phone, sometimes as early as half a month in advance.

These advance bookings were often driven by publicity, the scale of the investment, media hype, and the appeal of the stars.

Looking at the opening weekend alone, Van Helsing fell short of Universal's projected $60 million, but its $51.7 million take was still a respectable, middle-of-the-road performance.

However, subsequent data released by various box office forecasters indicated a clear trend: Van Helsing was projected to open strong and then plummet.

CinemaScore, the leading forecaster for the North American film market, was especially harsh on Van Helsing, assigning it a 'B-' grade based on polling moviegoers, indicating poor audience reception.

Furthermore, CinemaScore projected that Van Helsing would likely gross between $120 million and $130 million in its total North American run.

Across all of North America, CinemaScore had the highest accuracy rate for box office predictions, with a success rate of over eighty-five percent for mid-sized films and larger productions.

While studios often employed their own external research firms to conduct market analysis, generate forecasts, and adjust marketing strategies, CinemaScore, being a relatively neutral third party, was considered more accurate.

CinemaScore's business model relied heavily on selling its forecasts to the public, and if their predictions were wrong too often, the company would quickly find itself out of business.

If Van Helsing's North American box office haul truly topped out at around $120 million, as CinemaScore predicted, Universal would be left weeping.

And by the end of its first week, Van Helsing's box office receipts began to plummet: on Monday, the daily gross dropped a staggering 70 percent compared to the previous Sunday!

Even a niche zombie film like Dawn of the Dead, which appealed to a smaller audience, hadn't experienced such a steep drop-off during its theatrical run. Furthermore, Dawn of the Dead was rated R, while Van Helsing had the much broader PG-13 rating.

Over the following days, Van Helsing's daily box office take continued to fall by an average of fifteen percent each day.

This trend was largely consistent with CinemaScore's dire forecast.

...

Standing before her office window, Helen gazed out at the bustling streets of Burbank. She had removed her black-framed glasses, setting them on the windowsill, her expression lost in thought.

A part of her was actually grateful that she and Matthew hadn't landed a role in Van Helsing. Otherwise...

Looking at it from every angle, the combined North American and overseas box office for Van Helsing would not be enough to recoup its high production costs, let alone the additional $70 million spent on marketing and distribution.

Unsurprisingly, the film's stars, Orlando Bloom and Kate Beckinsale, were facing a significant career downturn. Fortunately for Orlando, he had already signed on for Ridley Scott's new film, Kingdom of Heaven, and with the success of The Lord of the Rings trilogy at his back, his chances of bouncing back were higher.

As for Kate Beckinsale, however, her prospects were much bleaker. She had starred in Pearl Harbor, a film that underperformed and earned poor reviews, and now Van Helsing was proving to be another disaster. She would be lucky to maintain her status as a B-list star, let alone have a shot at the A-list.

Director Stephen Sommers would also likely disappear from the scene for years, and it was uncertain when, or if, he would return to directing major commercial productions.

What if Matthew had starred in that movie? Helen didn't have to think hard to know it would have been a devastating blow to his career. When they had auditioned for the role, casting for Pirates of the Caribbean hadn't started yet, and the two projects eventually had a scheduling conflict. If Matthew had landed Van Helsing, he would have almost certainly lost the chance to be in Pirates of the Caribbean...

In that scenario, Matthew's career would have been over, and all the resources and energy she had poured into him for years would have gone to waste.

Thankfully, he hadn't fallen into the Van Helsing pitfall; otherwise, he might never have climbed out.

Helen bit her lip, deep in thought. It seemed she and Matthew had been incredibly lucky, and she knew that for a Hollywood star, luck was absolutely essential.

Every year in Hollywood, a top-tier production that looked like a launchpad to stardom turned into a career-ending pitfall. And though Helen was confident in her own abilities, she knew it was incredibly difficult to predict the success of a major production in advance. Beyond vision, skill, market analysis, and sharp instincts, you still needed a healthy dose of luck.

Take Van Helsing, for example. It had a production budget of $160 million, with over $70 million more for promotion. It was directed and produced by Stephen Sommers, the man behind the two enormously successful Mummy films.

The Lord of the Rings and even The Scorpion King had proven in recent years that the market was highly receptive to this type of fantasy-adventure genre.

It was, by all accounts, a solid project, which was why she had fought so hard for it at the time.

Then again, in Hollywood, even the most reliable-looking projects could fall short of expectations. There was a fifty-fifty chance, or even greater, that they would become the Waterloo for the careers of many involved.

Helen gave a slight shake of her head, dispelling the gloomy mood. One thing, however, she knew for certain: both she and Matthew would need continued good fortune if they were to achieve even greater success.

And she would do everything in her power to minimize the impact of misfortune.

In some ways, the project from Summit Entertainment, Mr. & Mrs. Smith, was similar to Van Helsing in terms of investment and the creative team involved. It, too, was a very solid project.

It was likely because of Van Helsing's poor box office performance that Helen had been thinking about it so much.

But she quickly composed herself. Hollywood history had taught her one unmistakable lesson: projects that looked solid on paper had a far greater chance of success than those that didn't.

Knock, knock, knock!

A knock came from the office door, followed by the sound of it opening.

Helen didn't need to turn around to know it was Matthew. She picked up her old-fashioned, black-framed glasses and slid them back onto her face.

"Hey, Helen," Matthew said, noticing her standing by the window. "Thinking about something?"

"No." Helen turned to face Matthew, giving him a thoughtful look. "I was just thinking how lucky you are."

Matthew replied instantly, "I've always been lucky. You know that."

He poured himself a glass of water and then sat down on the only sofa in the office.

Helen came over and sat beside him. "It wasn't just luck, was it?" she asked. "From the very beginning, you weren't all that keen on pursuing Van Helsing."

Having long anticipated this line of questioning, Matthew had his answer ready. "Stephen Sommers is a very capable and imaginative director," he said seriously. "He always has great ideas, but sometimes they're just too absurd. If he doesn't have a sensible producer by his side to keep him grounded, he'll run with those ideas and make the film worse."

He didn't need much to be convincing in these kinds of conversations. All it took was a plausible enough reason, and Helen would have nothing to argue against.

Besides, wasn't it a good thing that they had avoided such a major pitfall?

Helen had only been asking casually, and after hearing Matthew's response, she didn't press the matter. Changing the subject, she said, "Universal Pictures just sent me a memo. Dawn of the Dead finished its theatrical run and was pulled from all theaters nationwide as of midnight last night."