The Rhythm Section (EON Productions)

…American football fans is who TRS was mostly aiming to attract? Very specifically to make all its money on a Sunday afternoon?

You have to understand that with the SB, it’s not American football fans that watch it, it’s everybody. My 72 year old mother couldn’t name a single football team, but she had a SB party last year. This isn’t on the same level as anything else.

A big budget spy flick with Blake Lively? Of course people will still go and see it, but there’s no question it would have drawn much more sales if they kept it in its original date opposite a G rated Disney film.

For some perspective, the top movie last SB weekend earned only $8 million, and the only new movie released was something called “Miss Bala.”

Not sure I agree it would’ve made more money as, Marvel-less though it is, November and December have other big budget movies which would suffocate any media attention TRS would need, not just for opening, but for a slow burn. As much of a hit they’d take from having one afternoon as a write off in the second biggest market, it’s not going to be as much as 2 huge Disney films, with their marketing budgets that kill other films, opening in ALL MARKETS would be, regardless of target market.

If the debate boils down to when would a big budget action movie with Blake Lively make more money - November 22 or Super Bowl weekend - then I stand absolutely confident…

‘Course there’s every chance it’ll move again, and this’ll be a moot point.

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Yeah, direct to iTunes :wink:

It occurred to me that I still haven’t read this book - need to order it today.

It’d be to Netflix, then they could say it was intentional :crazy_face:

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I have the book here on my shelf - it’s possible I get to read it some time, but probably not soon. Thematically it’s a woman-is-drawn-into-espionage-intrigues thriller, and these are by now a sub genre of their own, with countless Nikita clones in Salt and Red Sparrow and Ghost in the Shell and possibly soon The Black Widow. Diane Kruger is currently in an iteration on the theme of Little Drummer Girl, and that’s of course a telly series as is Killing Eve.

In short, there is no lack of this stuff and whether The Rhythm Section ever actually makes it to theatres won’t be noticed by many people…

Well, the Super Bowl Weekend (I didn’t know that it was that weekend!) is a dumping ground for movies. Sure, they can say: it´s counterprogramming. But they obviously do not expect it to catch on, so they are already counting their losses. Maybe they move it even further down the road - but they won’t have it conflict with postproduction for Bond and all the PR activities which will keep BB busy in February and March.

Maybe they can put it into summer then. Lively actually had a great opening with that shark movie (“The Shallows”?) and that was a summer release. It would make sense to carve out that niche for her by releasing “The Rhythm Section” in the same window.

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I went to order the book and the only copies you can order (save getting a used one) are the movie tie-in, which they don’t have scheduled to be released until the end of October, and obviously now that will be pushed back :unamused:

I ordered the first two used, they cost hardly more than the postage and shipping. I think I even flicked through the first but I definitely didn’t read it yet. For all I know it might be an absolutely fabulous thriller, I just haven’t discovered it. The fact it turned into a series points at least to sufficiently good sales to keep the thing floating. But the author probably now wishes it had been picked up by a streamer like Killing Eve.

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Share the hell out of this everywhere you can. Eon deserve support and praise for giving an actual spy series for a female lead, not just the tokenism scummy journalism is pushing for.

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And a female director too.

It’s understandable yet still unfortunate how people perceive retrofitting existing cultural icons like Bond as these springboards as more important than starting new original/new-to-film properties like TRS or Jessica Chastain’s 355. Great on Barbara for putting the money where her mouth is (she spoke about this very issue at the April B25 launch) and actually doing this.

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Very interesting. I pray it’s good; this certainly looks intriguing and as serious as I’d hoped for.

I´m positively surprised. That looks interesting and intense. Hopefully the whole film will keep the promise of this trailer.

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It seems that the reason feminists want to gender-swap successful characters is that they want short-cuts. They don’t want to go the long way round and create, develop and promote an original character, and then hope that she’s a success. But that’s what every character has to go through - Dirty Harry, Indiana Jones, James Bond, Rambo, John McClane etc. Four of those examples sprang from literature, so it’s a good place to start looking. In urban fantasy and Golden-Age style detective stories, the overwhelming majority of protagonists are women. This may be because more women seem to read such genres than men, or perhaps because sleuths, say, are not particularly physical and so are considered more brain than brawn. I really don’t know.

As for on-screen representation, perhaps there’s a disparity because the action genre has mostly featured men - these films are, at least in part, masculine fantasies - but I don’t think anyone would have a problem with seeing a woman in such a role. Gender is no barrier to empathy, after all, and that’s what draws an audience in. I doubt any of us watch a film and feel that we relate to a character less because she’s a woman. We’re too wrapped up in her predicament and wondering how she’s going to solve it.

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Wow, screaming through sexism there buddy

Side note; these are the respective directors of Ghostbusters (2016) and Oceans 8

I wonder if Paul and Gary have something in common…

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It doesn’t seem so. And they actually do want to go that way - but strangely when the man in power does not give you the job it is quite difficult to be successful at it.

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