USCCB reviews Brokeback Mountain ["The universal themes of love and loss ring true. ..."]

United States Conference of Catholic Bishops ^ | Dec 12 2005 | usccb

[Antioch]

The USCCB has issued a non-retraction retraction. It's completely inadequate, in fact, it only communicates to the laity the how pathetic Catholic teaching becomes when it acquires pop-culture street cred. Apparently, they still need our e-mails and faxes to clarify Church teaching.

As Mr. Forbes is clearly enamored with these gay cowboy studs, he needs to be removed and replaced with a Catholic who understands the purpose of the Office of Film Review. Forbes glowing review throws in two mild caveats to appease those who would object to the film’s approval of homosexuality.

The first caveat "As the Catholic Church makes a distinction between homosexual orientation and activity, Ennis and Jack's continuing physical relationship is morally problematic."

This needs to be changed something along the lines of: "Since homosexual orientation itself is—in the words of the Catechism—"intrinsically disordered," Catholics watching this movie are advised not to yield to the director's attempt to give the impression that the homosexual orientation may not itself be a source of concern and that only homosexual activity is "problematic."

His second caveat: "While the actions taken by Ennis and Jack cannot be endorsed, the universal themes of love and loss ring true."....and...."It's the emotional honesty of the story overall, and the portrayal of an unresolved relationship -- which, by the way, ends in tragedy -- that seems paramount."

This needs to be changed to: "The movie seems intended to leave the viewer with the impression that the pain caused to the two gay characters’ wives and children are ultimately the result of a homophobic culture and if only people had been more accepting of homosexuality then Ennis and Jack wouldn’t have felt pressured into marrying women and having families. Since Catholics maintain that sin is the source of pain and injustice in the world, they should reject the film's implication that we all can learn a lesson from this that our society must come to embrace homosexuality as an equal, respectable alternative lifestyle."

USCCB rating "OA" --Offensive and Antithetical to Catholic teaching.

[wtc911]

The costs have already been recouped from foreign sales. The domestic gross will be pure profit.

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I want to dispell this inaccuracy. BBM cost $13 million to make. In order for it to recoup that amount in foreign sales (deals are made for a fixed amount by territory) under standard terms then the foreign sales deals would have to have totalled at least $26 million (and under the more likely 60% to the SA deal - $32 million). The Foreign Buyers are out swinging for this amount and need to more than double that number in their territory's box office for them to break even. That means that they would have had to believed that BBM was good for over $50 million at foreign BO in order for the deal to make sense.

The comment that domestic grosses would be pure profit is absurd. Fifty percent of gross BO stays with the exhibitor. The remaining fifty percent goes in totum to the Distributor until all of his costs (prints and advertising) are met plus an additional 15% (typically). Then the Distributor and the Production (there are five credited production companies on BBM) split their half of all subsequent dollars 50/50. And, all deferred payments and participation must be paid before the production can start to pay down the cost of making the film.

That is why break-even is usually calculated at 250% of the cost at a minimum.

BBN will lose big time.

[AmishDude]

Does this mean that King Kong has to make $500 million?

[wtc911]

Yep....now see the problem Hollywood has?