Not Good News: 'Pacific Rim' Is Tracking Poorly

Pacific Rim movie from Guillermo del Toro

Pacific Rim, from the mind of Guillermo del Toro, is probably going to be the ultimate modern-day giant robot versus giant monster movie to date.

The last time around that we had some serious movie making focused on giant monsters was... well, Godzilla.  There was also Gareth Edwards self-made movie Monsters. (Great movie by the way. AND he's helming the Godzilla 2014 movie!)

There's Power Rangers, but that's not so much for the the grown up kid.  Pacific Rim is the present day nod to the giant monster fantasy science fiction genre.  And some big bucks and time are being dropped on it.

(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5guMumPFBag)

The clips look great...  in del Toro I trust...  but there's some bad news on this movie project.

Early marketing tracking suggests that Pacific Rim is going to lose out to Grown Ups 2, and there's concerns that Legendary Pictures and Warner Bros. is going to lose a ton of money on the movie.

Sadly, folks seem actually be comparing Pacific Rim to the Power Rangers franchise, according to some sources.  Or even worse... folks think it's a new Godzilla movie.  This is neither one of those folks!

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Side Note:  I was sitting in a theater waiting for Man of Steel to start and after the trailer for Pacific Rim played out, folks around me were questioning if that was indeed an upcoming Godzilla movie.  Head smack! And yes, I corrected them!
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What the marketing concern is at the moment is that Warner Bros. has spent their marketing dime (so far) on getting core fans, those of us who like this kind of movie, excited for the movie.

I do believe they have already done that!

Case in Point:  When John Carter came to the screen, it flopped.  But that was because of a huge lack of marketing from Disney.  Rumors of studio in-fighting caused this flop.  I wasn't going to go see it until I saw a fan-mashup of all the trailers that made it look incredible.  And after it did flop on the big screen, the movie held it's own on DVD/Blu-ray sales for a lot longer than most movies last in the top-10 charts.

Right now, Pacific Rim comes to theaters on July 12th.

That's hardly a ton of time to fix this marketing snafu.  Or is it?

I would hope so!  Personally, I'd like to see this movie have enough umph to warrant sequels.  But if the market tracking is as poor as they say it is, and it's taking a back seat to another Adam Sandler film... (film is a strong word with Sandler flicks), then I guess fans will have to be happy with this one-off monster movie and grab the DVD or Blu-ray when it comes to town.

Sigh.

Pacific Rim
Guillermo del Toro - Director / Writer (screenplay)
Rated PG-13
Production Co:     Legendary Pictures
Distributor:     Warner Bros.
Cast:
Charlie Hunnam
Idris Elba
Ron Perlman
Charlie Day
Clifton Collins Jr.
Burn Gorman
Robert Maillet


-Bruce 

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