Professor Elam

Sept 3, 2016 Labor Day Weekend

Peter Fonda spent $400,000 producing Easy Rider in 1969.

The movie grossed $60 million. Fonda was never able to  repeat the success and apparently spent much of the gain trying to do so.

Watch the original trailer here.

There of course are always low budget films around but few make that kind of splash.

We study break even and target profit in managerial accounting. And that is what efficient movie makers understand.

In our second month of this blog back in 2006, we noted that one of the under appreciated reasons for Clint Eastwood's success has been his understanding of this concept. See our post hte Good Bad and Ugly of Film budgets.

We visited the topic again in 2009.

Consider that Gran Torino cost $33 M and grossed $148 M.

Notably Eastwood was the only recognizable actor in the film. The rest were locals recruited in a few days of screen tests. Clearly Clint knows how to get the best from his actors.

I have read that the most frequent word heard on his sets is Next!  He shot Honky Tonk Man in a mere three weeks.  this keeps Clint popular with both his studio and the theaters that show the films.