INKHEART

Inkheart

New Line Cinema co-financed the $60 million Inkheart after tax breaks, in hopes of spawning a franchise and sold off foreign rights to pay for most of the production. The Royal Bank of Scotland also provided some capital after they set up a $350 million fund in January 2007 to invest in New Line’s slate of films. Inkheart began filming back in 2006 and New Line originally scheduled the pic for March 18, 2008 but claimed that they pushed the release to January 2009 because they couldn’t market the film properly in time. Shortly after New Line delayed the movie, parent company Warner Bros took over all distribution responsibilities for all of New Line’s films. Inkheart was tracking poorly and opened in the US with little hype or buzz to $7,601,379 — placing #7 for the weekend led by the idiotic family film Paul Blart: Mall Cop and also competing for family auds was the holdover Hotel For Dogs placing #4. Inkheart declined 51% in its second weekend to $3,721,492 and a steep 66.9% in its third weekend to $1,231,458 and closed its run with only $17,303,424. Warner Bros would see back about $9.5 million after theaters take their percentage of the gross, which would not cover the P&A costs. Even though Warner Bros/New Line did not have much financial exposure after the foreign sales, the weak numbers would kill off the would-be franchise. Overseas the film saw mixed results, with Warner Bros releasing in Germany which posted the strongest gross at $10.1 million and Inkheart played soft for the numerous distributors who overpaid for the film during pre-sales, with a $45.1 million total. Domestic video sales amounted to a soft $9 million (less after resellers take their cut and manufacturing costs).