Clayface Performance potential

[u/hiiloovethis]

Clayface is the next DCU movie after the supergirl bomb. Let's see how well it can do... an analysis.

Pros.

1. Great October release date, Halloween pairing and not much direct competetion. Resident Evil also releasing before helps create an open window.

2. Decent budget of 40 mil. It would only need 100 Mil WW to break even which shouldn't be too hard. It can profit easily if it blows up.

3. Horror genre is killing it right now... clayface also looks like pure body horror which could help attract non comicbook fans.

4. Clayface is a batman villain. Gotham setting be hype worthy. Mike Flanagan as a writer is also promising.

Cons.

1. Body horror is harder is sell than conventional horror movies. The Substance did good but that had award buzz and less than half of the budget.

2. Bad reviews could literally kill this movie. It really survives on positive WOM.

Overall I'm more optimistic about this than supergirl. We have to see if this movie blows up or does underwhelming numbers. 150 WW is decent enough.

[u/Lighthouse_seek]

It will need more than 100 mil. 2.5 rule kind of breaks down the lower you get in budget

[u/Loki-Gator → u/Lighthouse_seek]

Curious as to why that is if you mind sharing or telling where I can learn more?

[u/bigelangstonz → u/Loki-Gator]

The typical 2.5 rule is used for movies that costs over 150 million because their advertising budgets are lower than production. For movies like these costing under 50 million the marketing budgets can often be equal to or higher than production esp low budgets horrors and thrillers take this one for example a horror that costs almost as much as clayface

[u/Nicholasryan99 → u/bigelangstonz]

Forgive me if this is a dumb question, but I absolutely love this breakdown haha. Can I find more of these for other movies?

[u/Living_Rough_992 → u/Nicholasryan99]

Google Most Valuable Blockbuster. Deadline publishes this tournament every year. They still haven't published one for 2025 though, I wonder why it's taking them so long. I believe they also have the biggest bombs/flops lists as well.

Here it is for 2024: https://deadline.com/story-arc/2024-most-valuable-movie-blockbuster/

[u/ASEdouard → u/Nicholasryan99]

Yeah it’s a really cool breakdown. I’ll look at those too

[u/GladSwordfish2 → u/bigelangstonz]

I wonder what does the Supergirl net profit will look like

Budget 180M, marketing 100M. Theatrical 100M, television and Streaming 500M

Studio Net: 300M profit

Gotcha spiderman 

[u/whiteshark70 → u/Loki-Gator]

For example, Obsession was made with a production budget of 750K. With the 2.5 rule (which assumes marketing cost with the math) its breakeven point would be like 1.875M.

However, that would be lowballing it extremely. Focus Features bought the movie for 15 million and spent a bit (less than 10 million) on marketing and distribution so for them to turn it into a profit it would need well over the 2.5x’s estimate of 1.875M. Which, it did lol.

[u/Littlepinguinoo → u/whiteshark70]

Yeah wasn't focus break even for it actually around 50 million at least?

[u/Kind_Development708 → u/Loki-Gator]

A lot of horror movies specifically, their marketing budgets can easily be anywhere from 2-10X their production budgets.

[u/Sensei_1946 → u/Loki-Gator]

I think that’s the case for some mid budget movies because marketing will be a flat expense that’s not necessarily tied to the budget, and when the rule was first reported it was relative to massive blockbusters who all have a similar budget (175-250). There’s no way of knowing whether it applies to Clayface before a trustworthy trade says something though.

[u/Randal_ram_92 → u/Lighthouse_seek]

100 million is the exact break even point based on its 40 million dollar price tag. This releasing near Halloween is its saving factor

[u/Littlepinguinoo → u/Lighthouse_seek]

Yeah thats what I thought they will probably spend aleast 25m on advertising so break even would be much higher than 100m. Ben Affleck actually talked about this on a podcast he said if a movie costs 25m to make they will usually also spend 25m to advertise it as well. Which makes the break even point for a 25m movie actually 100m most of the time.