By Anthony F. Hughes
Movies come and go on a regular basis. Some, originally targeted at cinema audiences, never see the inside of an auditorium simply because the finished productions don’t have what it takes – box office appeal.
It costs money to make a movie and then there are the expenditure add-ons – media promotions, distribution and so on. Rather than spend ‘good’ money after ‘bad’ some film makers, in a bid to cut their losses, offload their ‘dead ducks’ on television land – I’ve endured a share of them!
Down through the years a goodly amount of ‘dead ducks’ have been served up in the cinemas too of course. A fairly decent percentage of movies do make it however, prove popular with film goers, but a lot of them are forgotten about as soon as their cinema runs are over.
On the other hand a minority of films remain enduringly popular. I can think of a goodly number of cowboy offerings that are permanently etched in a lot of ‘Western’ fans’ memories. One such movie is the ‘The Magnificent Seven’ (128 mins). Directed by John Sturges the first ‘shoots’ were done on March 1st 1960 – the finished product was in the cinemas the following October! The production’s overall expenditure amounted to $2 million.
