By Michael Mann’s “Ferrari” hit cinemas in December, with the response being a whimper. Despite good reviews, the film only managed to gross $43 million worldwide ($18M domestic) from a budget of $95 million.
In a recent interview with THR, Neon CEO Tom Quinn revealed that the film was initially planned to go direct to a streaming service. It only went theatrical after his company snatched up the film for $15 million and spent over $17 million on P&A to promote it:
“We were the only company that stepped up to make sense of an awkward situation that stopped this movie from going straight to Paramount+ and Showtime. And to me, I don’t care what anybody says, that’s the success for me.”
This matches with reports last year that STX, which funded the majority of the film, had planned to put it direct to streaming through its deal with Showtime. Ultimately though they licensed it out to Neon.
One they weren’t so lucky on was Richard Linklater’s “Hit Man” starring Glen Powell. A smash hit at the Toronto Film Festival last year, the film was made for $5-7 million and NEON offered $10 million for the U.S. rights only, but Netflix snatched it up for over $20 million for several territories. Quinn says they would’ve done better:
“We absolutely thought Richard Linklater would be an Oscar contender for screenplay and director… We believed the film would have grossed in excess of $25 million domestically, with a chance of doing maybe as much as $40 million…. no discredit to Netflix, but they paid in excess of $20 million for that film with a few other multiple territories.
To me, that’s a disappointment for exhibition and certainly a disappointment for us. The idea of something that can really build excitement around multiple kinds of audiences in both the flyover states and the coastal states sets up the chance for so many other successes.”
NEON had big success this Spring with “Immaculate” and Summer with “Longlegs” which beat all expectations, less lucky was “Cuckoo” which debuted in August. Up next is Palme d’Or winner “Anora” next month followed by “Presence,” Stephen King adaptation “The Monkey,” “2073” and the reboot of “Emmanuelle”.
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