MovieChat Forums > Prisoners of the Sun (2014) Discussion > $18 million dollar budget?

$18 million dollar budget?

posted 10 years ago by Thrill_KillZ
6 replies | jump to latest

An absolute insult to viewers intelligence. The entire production value was very cheap looking, the sound wasn't particularly good at all, the lighting was very dark in most scenes and the overall cinematography was below average in comparison to a Sy-Fy channel film. Oh and the effects, definitely not impressive.

I know the film had it's problems, but I cannot believe there was a chance in hell that $18 million in checks were written out for the making of this film. I've seen probably 10,000 films and I have a very keen ability to appraise the film's I watch, that figure was an outright lie.

From what I saw, the absolute most this could have cost is $1.8 million and that's if they overpaid immensely in all departments.

If that figure wasn't posted I wouldn't have a problem, but having that number in mind while watching this was just plain infuriating.

So in closing, this was a severe case of money laundering.

[–] zanity 10 years ago

But this happens all the time in Hollywood as well. Saw 'Elysium' recently. The film stank, but clearly cost less than half the stated budget to make. The phrase "with this film, the entire budget is on-screen" exists because it is so obvious that most films cost a fraction of their stated budget to shoot.

Some films don't get greenlit unless half the so-called production budget goes immediately into the pockets of the senior producers. The public are constantly told that it is the 'greedy' stars who get all the money, but far too many big studio pictures are only made if the usual suspects walk away with giant cheques regardless of the Box-office business.

The other side of this is so-called Hollywood Accounting, where many of the real creatives are denied any profit sharing from even the most successful blockbuster, because on paper the film shows a 'loss'.

Producers like Spielberg always take a giant slice of the GROSS, whereas everyone else gets a slice of the non-existent NET.

[–] TheCountDracula 10 years ago

It's the Scientologists that paid for most of this PoS flick, Killer!

Intro - Jellyman, Offspring, Offspring, Jellyman. Gimme some fin, noggin, dude!

[–] brooke_gaylene 10 years ago

I agree, it had the feel of a Sy-Fy or Asylum movie of around 1 million budget.
When I saw how cheap it looked and saw John Rhys-Davies was in it I checked to see if it was made by Asylum.

[–] Ithilfaen 10 years ago

lol Dude, there are music videos these days that cost more than that. You don't know much about movie making, do you? 18 millions is a very very very low budget, and they probably blew it all on the intro and 3 mn of special effects throughout the movie. Just for the camels, cars, location, extras and camera crew, they would have spent at least 8 millions. Nobody was overpaid on that piece of crap.

For every lie I unlearn I learn something new - Ani Difranco

[–] Thrill_KillZ 10 years ago

Good to hear about your extensive music video budget ballparking I stopped watching MTV in the early 90's, that aside, you clearly know nothing of what a film actually costs or apparently what life in general costs at that.

Just for the camels, cars, location, extras and camera crew, they would have spent at least 8 millions.Nobody was overpaid on that piece of crap.

So a few rental camels,rental cars, shooting in the open desert with a video camera and a water boy equals $8 "millions"? Try around 50K.

Somebody was overpaid, but the money clearly wasn't spent on the film. The Asylum cranks out flicks exactly like this every other week for 1-2 million, so does the Sy-Fy channel.

[–] VanBooter 10 years ago

Having just watched it I think somehow they got US dollars confused with Egyptian Pounds.
I would suggest no one pays to watch this piece of garbage, if being funded by Scientology wasn't a good enough reason.
The Church of Scientology charges fees to it's followers for spiritual rehabilitation, I suggest if they watch this turd fest they should bare in mind they will need to run the course again.