Toxic Avenger Hollywood Remake!

[Newton Gimmick]

First he took over Tromaville, then Japan and now he takes over the WORLD! It seems that some big Hollywood movers and shakers have inked a deal with Troma to bring their most famous creation to the big screen in blockbuster style. Check out the full story: Toxie Goes Hollywood (http://www.infinitehollywood.com/2010/04/toxic-avenger-comes-to-hollywood.html)!

Normally I would object to this sort of thing, but a more PG-13 style Toxic Avenger with big budgets and special effects could be just what Troma needs to help the little company that could.

[Brodie]

Bigger budget mainstream Toxie? Sure, I'd get behind it. But pg-13? Meh. Not crazy about it. That'd mean they'd probably nix the graphic running down pedestrians stuff.

If it was weird and zany like the cartoon? I'd support it 100%

[Powder]

I was excited, now maybe not so much....

Part of the amazingness of toxie is the senseless, disgusting, never get through the barriers gore/sex/violence he's known for.

Maybe it'll turn out good. Idk.

Fun fact- Kevin Eastman has a cameo in Toxic Avenger 4.

[Krutch]

I could get behind an R rating but... PG-13 doesnt give me enough interest to keep up with it.

[Newton Gimmick]

There's really no point in them doing an R rated Toxic Avenger. There have been four R rated Toxic Avenger movies. Heck, they're working on a 5th. An R rated film almost always bombs at the box office. An R rated film typically can't be shown on television without major cuts.

This will definitely be a tame Toxie in comparison to Troma's efforts with the character, but that doesn't mean it can't be entertaining. Toxic Avenger has been done in PG-13 form before in other media and it's worked out well enough.

I understand when people get upset that TMNT can't get an R rating, because it's never had that. But the original Toxic Avenger was so violent it actually got an X rating. Toxic Avenger has gotten more than enough time in the R rated spotlight, going this route will open up the character to millions of more people.

[The Stryker]

Whatever. There's nowhere to go but up after the last 3 movies.

[Brodie]

Heck, they're working on a 5th. An R rated film almost always bombs at the box office.


I hope youre speaking of specifically Toxie films, because otherwise you're wrong.

[Newton Gimmick]

I hope youre speaking of specifically Toxie films, because otherwise you're wrong.

Well my choice of wording might have been slightly poor, "bombs" isn't technically correct. However I am absolutely right in my assertion. R rated films do signifigantly worse than PG-13 and lower rated films. Getting an R rating is almost considered the kiss of death in the film industry today. Outside of some raunchy comedies (Hangover, Wedding Crashers), most films shoot for a PG-13 rating because the box office for R rated films is way less.

That wasn't the case so much in the 1980's, but in the last fifteen years a movie with an R rating gets a much lower box office. The top grossing Rated R film of all time, only earned as much as the EIGHTH top grossing PG-13 film.

Even that is a bit of a misnomer, as the top grossing R rated film is actually The Passion of the Christ, which, surprisingly isn't what most consider a typical R rated film. Passion of the Christ did almost double of the second highest grossing R rated film. The next highest rated R film is the Matrix Reloaded, which total gross isn't even comparable to the 20th highest grossing PG-13 film.

There isn't a single R rated film in the top 50 highest grossing films in the US.

If you just take a look at the top grossing R rated films you can see that it's a dead genre. The Excorcist, Pretty Woman, Rain Main... All in the top grossing R rated films and those weren't even considered R genre films.

Releasing an R rated film is asking for your movie to do poor box office. That's why nobody really does R rated films anymore.

Saw, the highest grossing horror franchise of all time's biggest hit was Saw II. It did $80 million or so at the box office. By any other measuring stick, that's not a successful film. That's peanuts to what most PG-13 films bring in.

[Brodie]

R Rated is less at the box office, yes, but its not "asking for your film to do poor."

Are you also taking into account the cost of making a film vs its gross? Because I'd imagine that they wouldn't keep making Saw films if they didnt make back a decent amount of revenue.

And stating "that's why nobody really does R rated films anymore." ? I don't think that's the case. Again, if anything, it's just -less-.

[Newton Gimmick]

They continue to crank out Saw films because they cost peanuts to make. Which is why I said by any other standard, they aren't successful films. If you make a movie for $1 million dollars and it brings in $12 million, it was a huge success for your movie and studio... But it isn't really considered a successful film in the grand scheme of things. That's more or les what the Saw franchise does. Makes a movie for $10 million, then makes $60-80 Million box office.

Do some films still come out with an R rating? Absolutely. But it's not just less, it's a LOT less.

Nobody will invest major money (studios, etc) into an R rated film anymore. WB made it a policy to ensure that no more superhero movies got an R rating after Watchmen failed to live up to expectations. It's well documented that the majority of the major studios don't want R rated films.

Movies that are made on the cheap can sometimes get an R. A movie that's a proven draw can get an R. Most other films do anything they can to avoid an R rating.

I'd say it's a bit of an unspoken rule that most movie studios don't want to release films with an R rating, but it's not really unspoken, it's pretty commonly talked about.

For what it's worth, a PG-13 rated movie today would more often than not be an R rated film in the 1980's. Of course the 1980's did release genuine R rated films, but Pretty Woman would be considered PG-13 today, not R.

I just can't imagine any movie studio buying the rights to do a character and then pigeonholing it into an R rating where even if it becomes an absolute blockbuster, it'll still do worse than it would have done with a PG-13.

That's the mentality of most movie studios today. Release a movie with an R rating, make $50 million dollars or release the same movie with a PG-13 rating and make $125 million. Guess which one they're going for?

As an addition to that, DVD has further helped kill the R rating. Many directors who want to make a gory R rated film, DON'T. Instead they make a PG-13 film because it'll do better at the box office, then shoot additional scenes for their "unrated DVD version" without the repercussions of the R rating.

Anywho I think you (Brodie) and I may just have a disagreement on semantics and not necessarily anything else.

I do think a lot of people get caught up in the idea that a movie can't be good unless it's got an R rating. Or that it can't be "adult" unless it has one. Part of the charm of the Toxic Avenger movies is the over the top violence, sex and gross out humor... But it doesn't necessarily mean that if you toned those things down and scaled back on them to the point that you got a PG-13 rating, you couldn't then hammer out a good story and have a much better film because of it.