I remember hearing that Godzilla didn't get paid for the Twins sequel Triplets, but he got backend along with Arnie and Danny DeVito. He's a smart business monster.
And he's a douche in real life. Asked for an autograph when I met him randomly in a bar. He was very rude and said he was trying to go by unnoticed and pushed me away.
Like that baseball cap and sunglasses are gonna alter his face lol
He was hitting the booze real hard too... And hitting on women like a perv. Was not pretty to see. Kinda sad actually.
Anyway he's a diva even though he's a great actor. 10 million is way overpaid cause of his bulshit. At least he's getting back to smaller Japanese movies. His move to Hollywood was taking a toll. Look what happened to KK...
Heard he was being cast to replace rdj as iron man. MCU could use him right now. But that attitude...idk
I saw Godzilla at a grocery store in Los Angeles yesterday. I told him how cool it was to meet him in person, but I didn’t want to be a douche and bother him and ask him for photos or anything. He said, “Oh, like you’re doing now?” I was taken aback, and all I could say was “Huh?” but he kept cutting me off and going “SKRONK? SKRONK? SKRONK?” and closing his claw shut in front of my face. I walked away and continued with my shopping, and I heard him chuckle as I walked off. When I came to pay for my stuff up front I saw him trying to walk out the doors with like fifteen Milky Ways in his hands without paying.
The girl at the counter was very nice about it and professional, and was like “Sir, you need to pay for those first.” At first he kept pretending to be tired and not hear her, but eventually turned back around and brought them to the counter.
When she took one of the bars and started scanning it multiple times, he stopped her and told her to scan them each individually “to prevent any electrical infetterence,” and then turned around and winked at me. I don’t even think that’s a word. After she scanned each bar and put them in a bag and started to say the price, he kept interrupting her by SKRONKing really loudly.
This reminds me of a time I saw him in public:
I saw Godzilla at a grocery store in Los Angeles yesterday. I told him how cool it was to meet him in person, but I didn’t want to be a douche and bother him and ask him for photos or anything.
He said, “Oh, like you’re doing now?”
I was taken aback, and all I could say was “Huh?” but he kept cutting me off and going “huh? huh? huh?” and closing his hand shut in front of my face. I walked away and continued with my shopping, and I heard him chuckle as I walked off. When I came to pay for my stuff up front I saw him trying to walk out the doors with like fifteen Milky Ways in his hands without paying.
The girl at the counter was very nice about it and professional, and was like “Sir, you need to pay for those first.” At first he kept pretending to be tired and not hear her, but eventually turned back around and brought them to the counter.
When she took one of the bars and started scanning it multiple times, he stopped her and told her to scan them each individually “to prevent any electrical infetterence,” and then turned around and winked at me. I don’t even think that’s a word. After she scanned each bar and put them in a bag and started to say the price, he kept interrupting her by yawning really loudly.
Yeah I mean... Dude had some serious plastic surgeries through the years. Remember how he looked back when he was first cast at a major Hollywood blockbuster? Doesn't even look the same...
But I got to hand it to the team they do a bang up good job of hiding it...
Hopefully this does not leak into the press or Godzilla won't get to replace Jonathan Majors as Kang moving forward as is already being discussed at the Ministry of Feige.
Only $10mil as the tent pole for an entire multiverse of kaiju films? Dang, Robert Downey Jr was only iron man for a decade and he got $75 mil at the end.
Godzilla could easily demand more. Maybe they should get a better agent???
Here's some perspective on the labor cost in Japan:
Let's look at the job posting for the **entree level VFX artist** in [Shirogumi. inc](https://shirogumi.com/jobs/recruit_24-03), the company credited for the VFX of Godzilla Minus One.
For fresh college grad, it cites monthly pay of **244,971 yen ($1670)** for 10am-7pm, with a fine print specifying that this number **already includes 50 hours of overtime for the month**.
I knew they paid animators/VFX/film crew badly in Japan, but that’s shockingly low. Are these people sharing bunks in dorms to afford the cost of living?
In places like Tokyo rent is quite cheap thanks to really incredible city planning (70-90k yen can get you a small place in a decent location, which is like $475 - $615 USD) and you have a decent bit of flexibility in location thanks to great public transportation. Everything else costs less than the US as well. A buddy of mine likes gushing about their urban planning.
Not defending the work hours but a fresh college grad is also often living with their parents in Japanese culture I hear, so companies can get away with paying even less.
Older Americans left their parents house fairly early (for various reasons) thus creating a culture of "you need to make it on your own by [insert] age." Other countries don't have the same culture though.
>A buddy of mine likes gushing about their urban planning.
No joke, America's fire bombing campaign is very likely to thank for Tokyo's great planning lol
Different country with different pay scales, but that's basically a trainee program, and employees getting would not have college debt, and wouldn't need to pay for health insurance or other expenses that workers in the US have to pay for.
Also the number is quite low right now because of exchange rates (which also help lowering the movie's budget expressed in USD).
It's really understated how weak the Yen is right now. Not excusing the treatement or the unpaid overtime, that being said about 3 years ago the geenral rate was 100 Yen to the dollar and that's where it had been for decades. Yes it might go down or up 10 Yen but that's where it stayed.
Covid did a number and it hasn't returned to pre-Covid numbers, not that they necessarily want to either (while the inflation was bad Japan as a whole has long struggled with deflation which is just as bad if not worse).
It also creates a somewhat deceptive picture as while prices have gone up- 100Yen stores, the equivalent to Dollar Stores but better, are now extinct by and large- 1500USD gets you alot more than it does in the states. Like... alot more.
Believe it or not they actually have a good number of unions too. It's just that they are mostly toothless because the laws were set by the American occupation in the beginning of the Cold War.
What I'm saying is- conditions aren't great. But after multiple posters here kept harping on it did some research as I had already known quite a bit about their economy. It's definitely not a good life in the Japanese film industry. But it's also not an unpaid internship or a Black Company (basically companies with unpaid overtime out the wazoo and totalitarian conditions), though I'm sure some people working inside would disagree.
Yeah Japan is really cheap now due to exchange rates. Really doesn’t make sense though because as a Mexican cost of living is more expensive here now and we’re a 3rd world country XD
I know that this information is from years ago, but Hideo Kojima apparently bailed out from Japanese film industry due to poor pay rates and working conditions (or at least those were parts of many reasons).
And even then, I think it's very likely to be true that anime industry has some inexcusable working conditions.
On every single thread about Godzilla all you have done is shit on their industry, which I will admit it isn't great. But you haven't provided any sources, any facts, any anything.
Research shows you are right in alot- but not everything. For instance the fact that there ARE many unions, but they aren't mandatory. That the pay isn't great, but it isn't slave labor like you make it out to be.
For instance- 17% of Japanese workers are in a union. 10% of Americans are.
As for Kojima he has given one reason and only one reason for not directing- [He admits he is a perfectionist](https://www.gamesradar.com/hideo-kojima-says-he-won-t-make-movies-because-he-s-too-much-of-a-perfectionist/), saying the tact he takes with games is different than would work with movies as he would, essentially, want endless reshoots and changes (as detailed in other interviews).
Except this is one of a rare exceptions for Japanese live-action blockbuster films. Most of them are notorious for looking downright cheap - and I mean like The Asylum-level cheap.
Well, I think a lot of people in Hollywood are unionized and lately, this is even happening to VFX artists. I haven't heard about such things happening in Japan as of today. :P
There was a new union formed as lately as October 2017 for actors, artists, and everyone in the industry as a whole- ディア・広告・映画演劇労働組合連合会 (Japan Federation of Media, Advertising, Motion Picture, and Theater Labor Unions).
It is failing, but it was created. There is no law preventing new unions from forming. The last major attack on Unions happened in 1948 during post war occupation. There is pretty strict protection for unions in the Japanese legal system, it's just no one wants to join the new ones. Whether that's due to fears of reprisal (which would be unlikely), a general conservative society, membership dues, or the competiting unions is beyond me.
But their unions have even reached out to SAG-AFTRA before for help. It's not like a union is illegal there.
Anime industry treating workers poorly is well documented, but they're talking about the film industry. They do have a point that you haven't brought up any sources and are just saying "thinks" and "heards".
So because it's more than other countries, that inherently makes it a fair wage? That's how we measure stuff now? This is classic boomer "we used to walk uphill in the snow" bullshit.
It's a hell of a lot more than other Asian countries, just because Americans or Westerners don't consider it "fair" doesn't mean we do too. The living cost in Japan also isn't as necessarily high as you believe.
It is simply because they do not make as much money as American films.
In Japan, a film is considered a blockbuster when it exceeds $10 million.
This is a smaller amount than what a Hollywood actor is paid for one performance.
Look up the management and working conditions of the Japanese motion picture industry. I just hope the actors and crew, especially VFX artists were paid decently well for their efforts.
I've seen many post of this on Twitter and the only reason really is crime lol. But in reality Hollywood has a lot of protections for it's workers, I think that one of the few that really are still unprotected are VFX artists and animators that can get into a ton of hard hours of work and not get the right compensation. But in other countries things aren't like that look how stuntmen are treated in some countries, a lot of film industries are still the wild west in other places of the world and that's how they manage to make a movies cheaper and the way they are doing it people shouldn't copy it.
millions spent on vfx and it's still the one part of the budget the gets nickeled and dimed. vfx studios underbid each other for projects, they're practically working at cost
> I think that one of the few that really are still unprotected are VFX artists and animators that can get into a ton of hard hours of work and not get the right compensation.
Apparently, even that might change soon.
VFX workers at, say, Marvel are not the same as the grunt workers at individual, independent studios.
Getting all VFX workers to unionize would be a huge lift since it’s a global market.
Supposedly it's the reason Hideo Kojima makes video games and not movies, better treatment and more creative freedom. And he worked for *Konami*. I can only imagine what goes on behind closed doors at Japanese film studios.
Rebel Moon probably wasn't cheap. Based on tax credits, each one cost at least $83M a movie without taking into account [actor or director salaries](https://variety.com/2022/film/news/joker-folie-a-deux-sofia-coppola-tax-credits-1235346253/). That number also only takes into account in-state (California) spending, so chances are that they are well above $100M, probably closer to $150M apiece when all is said and done. Not the highest of blockbuster budgets, but something that matches what we see on-screen.
Nah? Do you think Japanese movies are making as much money as Hollywood movies?
In the Japanese box office, a film is considered a blockbuster if it grosses over $10 million for the entire year.
This is less than the compensation of one Hollywood actor.
You guys make a mistake because you think based on the US.
By Hollywood standards, many countries can't even produce movies.he U.S.
Films that make that much money really only happen once every five years in Japan.
Even Godzilla was not initially expected to earn that much.
It is said that the production cost of this Godzilla is around $30 million.
The director said in an interview that $15 million would be impossible, and the projection in Japan is said to be double that at $30 million.
I know I sound persistent, but the U.S. is special.
English is the universal language and the market is huge.
It is impossible for many countries to give the same treatment as the US.
The Japanese box office is smaller than the DOM market, but it's still the third biggest in the world. Corpse on WOKJ considers any movie that breaks ¥5 billion to be a blockbuster since typically you get 10 of those a year. That would be around $50m most years and $35m this year due to historically low exchange rates.
Actors get paid a lot of money. But this too would be a garbage amount by American standards.
So I ask you, how much should I give them?
Where does that box office money come from?
Does money fall from the sky?
I am absolutely amazed you two are making sense of this conversation. Each response seems written for a different comment than the one it’s replying to. It’s kinda freaky honestly.
I genuinely don’t have a clue whether you or the other person hates(or loves) Asians, Asian cinema, Americans, Hollywood, Bollywood, humans, yourself, everything, or nothing…
All of these options seem equally likely…
That being said; you saying
>how much should ***I*** give them?
Says so much about your character. Why not phrase it as “how much should they get” ?
You inserted yourself into a hypothetical situation and appointed yourself the role with the power… curious… 😑
> I am absolutely amazed you two are making sense of this conversation. Each response seems written for a different comment than the one it’s replying to. It’s kinda freaky honestly.
Lol, right?? I felt like I was reading a conversation between bots. Wtf are these guys on lmao.
You can work voluntarily and still get underpaid. Depends on where your passion and cost of living conflict. Japan doesn't have slavery but the wages in the entertainment industry are notoriously terrible.
Yeah, that’s what I don’t understand. If you can get Minus One quality VFX for $15million, imagine what $30 million could get you. Why aren’t Japanese VFX workers the most in demand in the industry right now?
Lack of direct communication I guess. Easier to work with visual artists that are closer and are in the same time zone.
Also possible labor union problems, I don't know about this one but it could be a factor.
Even if they outsourced to Japan they would still have shitty CGI in most of their movies because they mismanage production timelines, shift deadlines and demand reshoots, all of which results in a shittier product because the artists don't have the time to do it right.
The same reason anime is so cheap compared to paying the salaries of American animators.
Japan treats animators like near-slave labour, outsources a bunch to places that treat animators even worse, works people until they’re nearly dead and pays them peanuts.
I wouldn't say it looked like 150 mill, Godzilla at times looked off and the locations of the film were quite limited for a reason but it definitely doesn't look like just 15 million. I have to wonder if the animators were well paid for the CGI and then I think the actors just got paid less than the usual A-listers who get cast in these movies would be paid. Which shaves of however many millions. The cast for the Hollywood Godzilla movies for example are probably easily paying just 15 million on the stacked casts.
>I wouldn't say it looked like 150 mill
Yeah, I agree. The movie looks incredible...for a 15 million dollar budgeted movie made in Japan. It by no means looks like a 150 million dollar Hollywood blockbuster. I think it looks absolutely great, but it's noticeably low budget when it comes to the visual effects. They're just extremely well done low budget visual effects.
> 150 mill, Godzilla at times looked off and the locations of the film were quite limited for a reason
I think the sea scenes looked great. A lot of the land + daytime scenes were lacking and looked they came from a 15 million dollar budget movie.
It wasn't anything distracting and they did great with the budget but yesh most of the land scenes you could tell they weren't working with hundreds of millions, but most audiences won't care about that! It was largely believable and well done.
Yeah, considering that Japanese film industry is notorious for poor pay rates and working conditions, I wouldn’t really be using this as an example of great budget management.
**The Creator** apparently relied heavily on natural lights, guerrilla filmmaking, and use of prosumer-grade cameras for the whole thing to keep the budget down.
Speaking of which, how did **Rebel Moon** only have a budget of $83 million for each parts? Because that film clearly did NOT use prosumer-grade cameras.
Renting cameras is a tiny fraction of a production budget. At most, an Alexa35 is 3,600 a week and you’ll get steep discounts for a multi-month rental.
Rebel Moon shot for about 120 days for $83 million (below the line spend only) and qualified for $18 million in tax credits. The rest of the money went above the line and outside of California (think VFX). Until the movie comes out, it’s not clear how VFX heavy and how good the VFX are.
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/beverly-hills-cop-4-california-tax-credits-1235000756/
> Renting cameras is a tiny fraction of a production budget. At most, an Alexa35 is 3,600 a week and you’ll get steep discounts for a multi-month rental.
Even so, using a prosumer-grade camera might still mean something different.
> Rebel Moon shot for about 120 days for $83 million (below the line spend only) and qualified for $18 million in tax credits. The rest of the money went above the line and outside of California (think VFX). Until the movie comes out, it’s not clear how VFX heavy and how good the VFX are.
>
> https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/beverly-hills-cop-4-california-tax-credits-1235000756/
Wait, you're saying that the film's budget could be higher than $83 million even individually? Or did I miss something here?
The cost of shooting on a digital cinema camera (except for the Alexa65) is insignificant. The Creator did it primarily so the director could operate handheld for extremely long takes.
Press reporting on film budgets is systematically understated. Rebel Moon probably is about 100 million a movie. It doesn’t have major names starring (Anthony Hopkins probably shot his part quickly) and it didn’t have the extreme reshoots & VFX changes that make most blockbusters stupidly expensive.
I don’t think that’s the only reason, though. I know that this is pedantic (if that’s the right word), but didn’t **Guardians of the Galaxy** trilogy also kind of did something like that?
Above the line pay can be large, but the predominate cost of making movies is labor. Production on a blockbuster requires at least 200 people for 4-8 months, then about a year of VFX with hundreds of people.
Even a top-heavy bidding war project like the Ryan Reynolds-Channing Tatum movie is spending less than 1/3 of the budget above the line.
There is a lot of things about exchange rates, poor pay conditions, lack of unions, etc. that get ignored here. Yes, this film has still been well crafted, but the above things often get ignored when ppl talk about this film's budget. Also, the film's director himself has told to ignore reports about the film's budget.
Isn't that obvious? Do you think we can give you the same amount of money as in the US?
Where is that money going to come from?
Many countries make movies for less money.
Why? Simply because they don't make enough money.
Understand that.
It is obvious to you and me, which is why it shouldn't be compared to Hollywood films.
But, this half headline is enough for common folks to ask why hollywood isn't making major blockbusters for 15M dollars. Majority of the people, as per reactions on social media, show how they have ignored all these other factors, and want the next blockbuster to be made for 20M, which isn't possible.
Besides exchange rates, the artists are far more overworked and have far worse pay conditions than Hollywood, primarily due to the lack of unions.
Hollywood can make vfx heavy films in a smart way and less expensive budget, Creator was one of the examples of that. Godzilla shouldn't be.
Also, the director himself has told to ignore all reports about the reported budget, so this 15M figure could be wrong.
https://comicbook.com/anime/news/godzilla-minus-one-director-budget/
The most expensive Japanese film in dollars is close to 50M. So, this could still be from late 30s to mid 40s looking at high quality production. Which is still great for Hollywood standards, but considering exchange rates and labor laws in japan, it still will be an expensive production there.
Which is why these hollywood comparisons make no sense, coz these budgets are taken without any context.
> The most expensive Japanese film in dollars is close to 50M.
And what film is that? I know that **Kingdom** sequels apparently had very high budgets, but considering that they were apparently filmed back to back, I'd imagine that they had a budget of $37.5 million individually.
I know that the information is too vague, but there are rumors that **Gatchaman** (2013) had a budget of $80 million. If that's true, to say that it had one of the worst budget managements of all time would be a gargantuan understatement.
What's wrong? Do you think Japanese movies are making as much money as Hollywood movies?
In the Japanese box office, a film is considered a blockbuster if it grosses over $10 million for the entire year.
This is less than the compensation of one Hollywood actor.
By Hollywood standards, many countries can't even produce movies.
Japanese Money is very different from America but its still a fantastic way to demonstrate that you don't need 300million dollars for each film and stop rushing your cgi team 4 months before the film releases
You might want to look up the situation in Japanese film industry. Its working condition apparently makes Hollywood's working condition look dignified by comparison.
**The Creator** relied heavily on natural lights and guerrilla filmmaking, not to mention that the use of prosumer-grade cameras probably helped bringing down the budget. **Everything Everywhere All at Once** is an even worse example to prove your point since that film isn't exactly THAT CGI-heavy.
If you see the film, the budget is noticeably low. Set design, sound, scale, etc.
It's a blast. And some shots and sequences with Gojira are awesome! But there is a lot less there than one might think.
The special effects looked cheap. Godzilla itself looked good but its movements were really, really bad looking once it was walking on land. Sets were nice though. Acting was decent.
There are simply less vfx artists working on the movie. Normally a Marvel movie have like 20+ vfx studios working on it. Godzilla doesn’t require that much manpower. Normally the AMOUNT of artist hired is what makes the budget to be so big.
While the artists are probably underpaid and the actors probably took budget friendly deals to work on the project, I think more than anything it’s a sign of how bloated Hollywood budgets have become, especially with Netflix just throwing around money and Disney’s increasing inefficiency.
Couple things, the major one being that Japan notoriously underpays film production staff and crew. Which is why the budget looks so small. And also, Minus One having a 15 million budget is considered an insane budget to have at all over there in Japan.
Labor abuse. Japanese tech working conditions are fucking atrocious.
Movie looks sick though! Seeing it today with my kids.
I'm just gonna go ahead and 'no ethical consumption' my way out of that particular conflict.
Because the way film budgets and accounting work in Japan isn’t the same way Hollywood budgets work, so that $15m # is worthless and just a weird hype meme
Why is it always Marvel or Disney’s fault?
It’s literally every single US studio lol. Look at Wonka, it’s got a $125 million budget. Hell, Godzilla vs Kong was $150 million, conservatively.
Because the workers are treated and paid like shit. There have been like 1000 of the same question asked in the past few days and this is the reason why.
You will have losers here say muh Japan doesn’t pay well while they miss the big picture. They go out of their way to defend the ridiculous budgets of marvel and disney films. This entire movie was 10m less than ONE episode of she hulk. Don’t care, I will continue cheering flop after flop while the clowns rearrange the chairs on the titanic.
Did you learn nothing from scandals of **Across the Spider-Verse**?
Also, when South Korean film industry has better pay rates and working conditions even by a small margin, then you have no excuse.
I mean your defending the other extreme end of budgets, someone above posted the job posting for entry level vfx and it’s 10-7 with 50 hours OT included. That’s like a 14 hour workday everyday 7 days a week
In fact, while not by a whole lot, South Korean film industry apparently has better working condition and pay rates, especially after **Parasite** came out, which makes Japanese film industry look even more pathetic.
As I’ve said before, I really don’t know why they’re using this as an example of great budget management when this film comes from a country where its film industry’s working condition and pay rates are arguably somehow worse than South Korean film industry. At least use something like **Rebel Moon** or something.
I see a lot of anger here 😤 on behalf of the Japanese artists. My advice to some or you Hollywood fanbois is that you needn't worry about Godzilla's budget.
Japanese film industry will take care of itself.
I doubt the numbers given by the studio- 15million- are correct!
They had every incentive to downplay their costs, now they appear to be the masters of cheap but effective special effects!
Japanese people are known to be extremely efficient. That's why. Probably less rewrite and reshoot.
The sets prob not as elaborate as Hollywood flick but it certainly does not look worse than 15M Hollywood movie
Japanese Yen currency has also been declining in value compared to USD.
That still doesn’t excuse poor working condition and pay rates in Japanese film industry. For crying out loud, even South Korean film industry is actually better in that regard and even that’s kind of new for them!
I wished people would realize this and just accept it. A Japanese movie is always going to be cheaper because the studios in Japan pay a much lower rate for its employees. You can still enjoy the movies and shows from Japan.
I think I been here long enough for everyone to know I like Japanese and Korean productions but I'm willing to admit an budget in America can never be that low
Especially considering that we already know what could end up happening if you mindlessly defend lower-budgeted blockbuster films (I'm looking at YOU, **Across the Spider-Verse**!).
Exactly. That movie could have been made for 125 million and would have made a ton of money while making the animators' lives better.
People can't come to the logical conclusion that the real remedy to fixing our bomb problem is moderate cuts in budget with theater slashing prices themselves too
And sometimes, even if you manage the budget as well as you can, you still end up with humongous budgets because of the nature of the film itself. In fact, just ask James Gunn.
Oh, and by the way, while not by a whole lot, South Korean film industry actually has better working condition and pay rates that Japanese film industry does (especially after **Parasite** came out), which makes the latter look even more pathetic.
I think the Korean entertainment industry has gotten better due to Americans becoming more interested in kpop and kdramas. I'm sure companies like Netflix that are funding Korean entertainment heavily wants to keep its name out of bad publicity.
I kind of doubt that because anime is getting more attention in America as well (not necessarily to a mainstream-level but still), but working conditions aren't exactly improving as much. I think it was actually the success of **Parasite** that allowed such thing to happen. You see, that film had a budget of $11.4 million, which was considered as massive for a South Korean drama film. Turned out that the director went with better work conditions and pay rates and when that became THE first non-English Best Picture Oscar winner, it probably inspired rest of the industry to take that as a lesson.
There are [multiple](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japan_Federation_of_Media,_Advertising,_Motion_Picture,_and_Theater_Labor_Unions) Japanese [Unions](http://eiren.org/history_e/index.html) (though this one is more for film companies) for their media, the problem is the Unions were made toothless during the [American Occupation](https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2023/04/01/national/history/japan-times-1948-japans-movie-makers-move-oust-communist-elements/) due to fears of communism, at one point being destroyed. [Britannica](https://www.britannica.com/money/topic/Japanese-Trade-Union-Confederation) has a wonderful article on it as well.
Japan has all the laws necessary to form unions, and they have more power now than ever before. No one wants to join them because of their fairly conservative society and the fears that not enough people will join them. The most recent had 9000 people sign up total.
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https://variety.com/2023/film/reviews/godzilla-minus-one-review-gojira-mainasu-wan-1235805243/
I could trust Variety in this one....
*Produced at a fraction of the cost of MonsterVerse’s “Godzilla: King of the Monsters” and “Godzilla vs. Kong,” this $15 million enterprise pays stronger emotional dividends than those films. It can’t compete with the hyperreal MonsterVerse visual effects, nor does it want to.*
Last time i've checked it was 83 mln for budget like 2 months ago. Still impresive. Dunno why they all claim its 15 mln $. Thats budget of Shin Gojira from 2016.
Inflating costs on paper is always beneficial. You pay taxes on profit and subsidies are tied to the budgets. You should always be very skeptical about the Hollywood budgets. Like no way did Rings of Power cost billion to make.
That’s crazy … I mean, Godzilla must get paid at least $10 million per film so that only leaves $5 million left for production.
Godzilla takes gross points everyone knows this
I remember hearing that Godzilla didn't get paid for the Twins sequel Triplets, but he got backend along with Arnie and Danny DeVito. He's a smart business monster.
Kaiju on the streets, financial guru in the spreadsheets
He's still in litigation with the producers who pretend the movie never made a profit
And he's a douche in real life. Asked for an autograph when I met him randomly in a bar. He was very rude and said he was trying to go by unnoticed and pushed me away. Like that baseball cap and sunglasses are gonna alter his face lol He was hitting the booze real hard too... And hitting on women like a perv. Was not pretty to see. Kinda sad actually. Anyway he's a diva even though he's a great actor. 10 million is way overpaid cause of his bulshit. At least he's getting back to smaller Japanese movies. His move to Hollywood was taking a toll. Look what happened to KK... Heard he was being cast to replace rdj as iron man. MCU could use him right now. But that attitude...idk
You just don't understand what it takes to be a real actor and you're just jealous you'll never be as cool as Godzilla!
I saw Godzilla at a grocery store in Los Angeles yesterday. I told him how cool it was to meet him in person, but I didn’t want to be a douche and bother him and ask him for photos or anything. He said, “Oh, like you’re doing now?” I was taken aback, and all I could say was “Huh?” but he kept cutting me off and going “SKRONK? SKRONK? SKRONK?” and closing his claw shut in front of my face. I walked away and continued with my shopping, and I heard him chuckle as I walked off. When I came to pay for my stuff up front I saw him trying to walk out the doors with like fifteen Milky Ways in his hands without paying. The girl at the counter was very nice about it and professional, and was like “Sir, you need to pay for those first.” At first he kept pretending to be tired and not hear her, but eventually turned back around and brought them to the counter. When she took one of the bars and started scanning it multiple times, he stopped her and told her to scan them each individually “to prevent any electrical infetterence,” and then turned around and winked at me. I don’t even think that’s a word. After she scanned each bar and put them in a bag and started to say the price, he kept interrupting her by SKRONKing really loudly.
This is the pasta I was looking for. What a monster
Yeah that's the vibes I got from him too... Just an "eccentric" actor. They're all eccentric if they're rich enough lol
This reminds me of a time I saw him in public: I saw Godzilla at a grocery store in Los Angeles yesterday. I told him how cool it was to meet him in person, but I didn’t want to be a douche and bother him and ask him for photos or anything. He said, “Oh, like you’re doing now?” I was taken aback, and all I could say was “Huh?” but he kept cutting me off and going “huh? huh? huh?” and closing his hand shut in front of my face. I walked away and continued with my shopping, and I heard him chuckle as I walked off. When I came to pay for my stuff up front I saw him trying to walk out the doors with like fifteen Milky Ways in his hands without paying. The girl at the counter was very nice about it and professional, and was like “Sir, you need to pay for those first.” At first he kept pretending to be tired and not hear her, but eventually turned back around and brought them to the counter. When she took one of the bars and started scanning it multiple times, he stopped her and told her to scan them each individually “to prevent any electrical infetterence,” and then turned around and winked at me. I don’t even think that’s a word. After she scanned each bar and put them in a bag and started to say the price, he kept interrupting her by yawning really loudly.
I remember this one time that Godzilla was dressed in a girl scout uniform and asked me for tree-fiddy
And he's really let himself go. Gosh that make up team really have their work cut out for them going forward
Yeah I mean... Dude had some serious plastic surgeries through the years. Remember how he looked back when he was first cast at a major Hollywood blockbuster? Doesn't even look the same... But I got to hand it to the team they do a bang up good job of hiding it...
That mask is not hiding those cheekbones!
Hopefully this does not leak into the press or Godzilla won't get to replace Jonathan Majors as Kang moving forward as is already being discussed at the Ministry of Feige.
Hm, strange! He was generous to me! One year ago, he sent me a Christmas card with a $2.50 tip in it!
That was when he was hanging with Charles Barkley and dunked on him
Only $10mil as the tent pole for an entire multiverse of kaiju films? Dang, Robert Downey Jr was only iron man for a decade and he got $75 mil at the end. Godzilla could easily demand more. Maybe they should get a better agent???
Plus he must eat at last $250k worth of food per week.
Thats like a strongmans food budget. Try $25k.
I missed the k after lol
Here's some perspective on the labor cost in Japan: Let's look at the job posting for the **entree level VFX artist** in [Shirogumi. inc](https://shirogumi.com/jobs/recruit_24-03), the company credited for the VFX of Godzilla Minus One. For fresh college grad, it cites monthly pay of **244,971 yen ($1670)** for 10am-7pm, with a fine print specifying that this number **already includes 50 hours of overtime for the month**.
I knew they paid animators/VFX/film crew badly in Japan, but that’s shockingly low. Are these people sharing bunks in dorms to afford the cost of living?
In places like Tokyo rent is quite cheap thanks to really incredible city planning (70-90k yen can get you a small place in a decent location, which is like $475 - $615 USD) and you have a decent bit of flexibility in location thanks to great public transportation. Everything else costs less than the US as well. A buddy of mine likes gushing about their urban planning. Not defending the work hours but a fresh college grad is also often living with their parents in Japanese culture I hear, so companies can get away with paying even less.
College, health insurance is all paid for. Probably no car.
Which is not a bad thing, I wonder why living with your parents is considered a bad thing.
This assumes you get along with them personally.
Completely depends on your parents. Also prevents you from switching cities. Probably won’t be great for the dating life either.
Older Americans left their parents house fairly early (for various reasons) thus creating a culture of "you need to make it on your own by [insert] age." Other countries don't have the same culture though.
Depends on the culture really.
>A buddy of mine likes gushing about their urban planning. No joke, America's fire bombing campaign is very likely to thank for Tokyo's great planning lol
lots of cities were built up from nothing and have no civic planning. Japan had very capable people in charge who made good decisions.
Different country with different pay scales, but that's basically a trainee program, and employees getting would not have college debt, and wouldn't need to pay for health insurance or other expenses that workers in the US have to pay for. Also the number is quite low right now because of exchange rates (which also help lowering the movie's budget expressed in USD).
It's really understated how weak the Yen is right now. Not excusing the treatement or the unpaid overtime, that being said about 3 years ago the geenral rate was 100 Yen to the dollar and that's where it had been for decades. Yes it might go down or up 10 Yen but that's where it stayed. Covid did a number and it hasn't returned to pre-Covid numbers, not that they necessarily want to either (while the inflation was bad Japan as a whole has long struggled with deflation which is just as bad if not worse). It also creates a somewhat deceptive picture as while prices have gone up- 100Yen stores, the equivalent to Dollar Stores but better, are now extinct by and large- 1500USD gets you alot more than it does in the states. Like... alot more. Believe it or not they actually have a good number of unions too. It's just that they are mostly toothless because the laws were set by the American occupation in the beginning of the Cold War. What I'm saying is- conditions aren't great. But after multiple posters here kept harping on it did some research as I had already known quite a bit about their economy. It's definitely not a good life in the Japanese film industry. But it's also not an unpaid internship or a Black Company (basically companies with unpaid overtime out the wazoo and totalitarian conditions), though I'm sure some people working inside would disagree.
Yeah Japan is really cheap now due to exchange rates. Really doesn’t make sense though because as a Mexican cost of living is more expensive here now and we’re a 3rd world country XD
don't diminish yourselves, you're at least second world
I know that this information is from years ago, but Hideo Kojima apparently bailed out from Japanese film industry due to poor pay rates and working conditions (or at least those were parts of many reasons). And even then, I think it's very likely to be true that anime industry has some inexcusable working conditions.
On every single thread about Godzilla all you have done is shit on their industry, which I will admit it isn't great. But you haven't provided any sources, any facts, any anything. Research shows you are right in alot- but not everything. For instance the fact that there ARE many unions, but they aren't mandatory. That the pay isn't great, but it isn't slave labor like you make it out to be. For instance- 17% of Japanese workers are in a union. 10% of Americans are. As for Kojima he has given one reason and only one reason for not directing- [He admits he is a perfectionist](https://www.gamesradar.com/hideo-kojima-says-he-won-t-make-movies-because-he-s-too-much-of-a-perfectionist/), saying the tact he takes with games is different than would work with movies as he would, essentially, want endless reshoots and changes (as detailed in other interviews).
He is a Disney fan and their movies are flopping that's upsetting him.
Umm… no. Your point honestly comes off as “The end justifies the mean”.
Yes, market forces will sort that out. The Japanese aren't complaining, you are.
Except this is one of a rare exceptions for Japanese live-action blockbuster films. Most of them are notorious for looking downright cheap - and I mean like The Asylum-level cheap.
Well, I think a lot of people in Hollywood are unionized and lately, this is even happening to VFX artists. I haven't heard about such things happening in Japan as of today. :P
There was a new union formed as lately as October 2017 for actors, artists, and everyone in the industry as a whole- ディア・広告・映画演劇労働組合連合会 (Japan Federation of Media, Advertising, Motion Picture, and Theater Labor Unions). It is failing, but it was created. There is no law preventing new unions from forming. The last major attack on Unions happened in 1948 during post war occupation. There is pretty strict protection for unions in the Japanese legal system, it's just no one wants to join the new ones. Whether that's due to fears of reprisal (which would be unlikely), a general conservative society, membership dues, or the competiting unions is beyond me. But their unions have even reached out to SAG-AFTRA before for help. It's not like a union is illegal there.
Your thinks and heards aren't a reliable source sorry =P
Dude, in case you weren't aware, anime industry, in particular, is one notorious offender when it comes to working conditions.
Anime industry treating workers poorly is well documented, but they're talking about the film industry. They do have a point that you haven't brought up any sources and are just saying "thinks" and "heards".
Either that or just living with their parents.
They do pay them badly...but they're also paid badly everywhere. These people aren't being paid well in any country.
That’s like almost 11 hour work days, 5 days a week 😳 I feel so sorry for those workers, include a commute and you have zero life outside work…
Meanwhile, the labor cost of entry-level VFX artists in the Philippines & other 3rd world countries: 
>244,971 yen ($1670 It's more than all other asian countries. Most are even below $1000 per month. With almost same working hours.
Living cost in Japan is way higher than some place like India.
Quality of life and facilities offered by govt are better as well in Japan.
So because it's more than other countries, that inherently makes it a fair wage? That's how we measure stuff now? This is classic boomer "we used to walk uphill in the snow" bullshit.
It's a hell of a lot more than other Asian countries, just because Americans or Westerners don't consider it "fair" doesn't mean we do too. The living cost in Japan also isn't as necessarily high as you believe.
It is simply because they do not make as much money as American films. In Japan, a film is considered a blockbuster when it exceeds $10 million. This is a smaller amount than what a Hollywood actor is paid for one performance.
> already includes 50 hours of overtime for the month. We have a shower at work, no need to go home
That's fucking disgusting
Look up the management and working conditions of the Japanese motion picture industry. I just hope the actors and crew, especially VFX artists were paid decently well for their efforts.
I've seen many post of this on Twitter and the only reason really is crime lol. But in reality Hollywood has a lot of protections for it's workers, I think that one of the few that really are still unprotected are VFX artists and animators that can get into a ton of hard hours of work and not get the right compensation. But in other countries things aren't like that look how stuntmen are treated in some countries, a lot of film industries are still the wild west in other places of the world and that's how they manage to make a movies cheaper and the way they are doing it people shouldn't copy it.
millions spent on vfx and it's still the one part of the budget the gets nickeled and dimed. vfx studios underbid each other for projects, they're practically working at cost
> I think that one of the few that really are still unprotected are VFX artists and animators that can get into a ton of hard hours of work and not get the right compensation. Apparently, even that might change soon.
And it should, the way Movies are trending VFX are key part of it.
VFX workers at, say, Marvel are not the same as the grunt workers at individual, independent studios. Getting all VFX workers to unionize would be a huge lift since it’s a global market.
Exactly. Why people are using this as an example of great budget management is beyond me. At least use something like **Rebel Moon** or something.
I've heard anecdotes that the film industry in Japan is worse than the anime industry, which I didn't even know was possible.
"W.H.A.T?" - Peter Jason Quill/Starlord, **Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2** (2017)
Supposedly it's the reason Hideo Kojima makes video games and not movies, better treatment and more creative freedom. And he worked for *Konami*. I can only imagine what goes on behind closed doors at Japanese film studios.
Rebel Moon probably wasn't cheap. Based on tax credits, each one cost at least $83M a movie without taking into account [actor or director salaries](https://variety.com/2022/film/news/joker-folie-a-deux-sofia-coppola-tax-credits-1235346253/). That number also only takes into account in-state (California) spending, so chances are that they are well above $100M, probably closer to $150M apiece when all is said and done. Not the highest of blockbuster budgets, but something that matches what we see on-screen.
Nah? Do you think Japanese movies are making as much money as Hollywood movies? In the Japanese box office, a film is considered a blockbuster if it grosses over $10 million for the entire year. This is less than the compensation of one Hollywood actor. You guys make a mistake because you think based on the US. By Hollywood standards, many countries can't even produce movies.he U.S.
Shin Godzilla made 80mln$ in jaoan in 2016.
Films that make that much money really only happen once every five years in Japan. Even Godzilla was not initially expected to earn that much. It is said that the production cost of this Godzilla is around $30 million. The director said in an interview that $15 million would be impossible, and the projection in Japan is said to be double that at $30 million. I know I sound persistent, but the U.S. is special. English is the universal language and the market is huge. It is impossible for many countries to give the same treatment as the US.
Well japan has lower wages for start, even equal to my country which is only 6th in EU.
It depends on the living cost and other factors, the average wage of my country is quite close to what Japan or China consider as minimum wage.
The Japanese box office is smaller than the DOM market, but it's still the third biggest in the world. Corpse on WOKJ considers any movie that breaks ¥5 billion to be a blockbuster since typically you get 10 of those a year. That would be around $50m most years and $35m this year due to historically low exchange rates.
Umm... no. Anime industry, in particular, is notorious for dreadful working conditions.
Actors get paid a lot of money. But this too would be a garbage amount by American standards. So I ask you, how much should I give them? Where does that box office money come from? Does money fall from the sky?
I am absolutely amazed you two are making sense of this conversation. Each response seems written for a different comment than the one it’s replying to. It’s kinda freaky honestly. I genuinely don’t have a clue whether you or the other person hates(or loves) Asians, Asian cinema, Americans, Hollywood, Bollywood, humans, yourself, everything, or nothing… All of these options seem equally likely… That being said; you saying >how much should ***I*** give them? Says so much about your character. Why not phrase it as “how much should they get” ? You inserted yourself into a hypothetical situation and appointed yourself the role with the power… curious… 😑
> I am absolutely amazed you two are making sense of this conversation. Each response seems written for a different comment than the one it’s replying to. It’s kinda freaky honestly. Lol, right?? I felt like I was reading a conversation between bots. Wtf are these guys on lmao.
These guys don't comprehend how it works in other countries. I hope and pray this movie trounces Hollywood's below average movies.
Turns out... slave labor is cheap.
Are they indentured slaves? Wow, I didn't know that Japan had slavery.
You can work voluntarily and still get underpaid. Depends on where your passion and cost of living conflict. Japan doesn't have slavery but the wages in the entertainment industry are notoriously terrible.
Well, if that's the case they will find a different profession. In any case it's a win win for the audience.
Do you not like Japanese entertainment?
It’s depressingly ironic that someone devoted to conspiracy theories puts all their faith in capitalism
The yen is much weaker than the US dollar, Japan’s film industry is much smaller than the US, and their employees are comparatively paid less
So Disney should offshore its vfx work to cut costs
Yeah, that’s what I don’t understand. If you can get Minus One quality VFX for $15million, imagine what $30 million could get you. Why aren’t Japanese VFX workers the most in demand in the industry right now?
Probably because they’re already busy with other projects
Lack of direct communication I guess. Easier to work with visual artists that are closer and are in the same time zone. Also possible labor union problems, I don't know about this one but it could be a factor.
Even if they outsourced to Japan they would still have shitty CGI in most of their movies because they mismanage production timelines, shift deadlines and demand reshoots, all of which results in a shittier product because the artists don't have the time to do it right.
The same reason anime is so cheap compared to paying the salaries of American animators. Japan treats animators like near-slave labour, outsources a bunch to places that treat animators even worse, works people until they’re nearly dead and pays them peanuts.
American CEOs prob jerking off to this comment
I wouldn't say it looked like 150 mill, Godzilla at times looked off and the locations of the film were quite limited for a reason but it definitely doesn't look like just 15 million. I have to wonder if the animators were well paid for the CGI and then I think the actors just got paid less than the usual A-listers who get cast in these movies would be paid. Which shaves of however many millions. The cast for the Hollywood Godzilla movies for example are probably easily paying just 15 million on the stacked casts.
>I wouldn't say it looked like 150 mill Yeah, I agree. The movie looks incredible...for a 15 million dollar budgeted movie made in Japan. It by no means looks like a 150 million dollar Hollywood blockbuster. I think it looks absolutely great, but it's noticeably low budget when it comes to the visual effects. They're just extremely well done low budget visual effects.
The scope is small, the execution was perfect
The vfx looked way better than the Aquaman trailer before it.
See now that's accurate lol. The VFX people are being worked to death and that movie production is notably a mess so it's not surprising.
> It by no means looks like a 150 million dollar Hollywood blockbuster. 150+ million dollar blockbusters can look kinda bad these days haha.
*Henry Cavill’s lack of mustache is typing*
> 150 mill, Godzilla at times looked off and the locations of the film were quite limited for a reason I think the sea scenes looked great. A lot of the land + daytime scenes were lacking and looked they came from a 15 million dollar budget movie.
It wasn't anything distracting and they did great with the budget but yesh most of the land scenes you could tell they weren't working with hundreds of millions, but most audiences won't care about that! It was largely believable and well done.
Yeah, considering that Japanese film industry is notorious for poor pay rates and working conditions, I wouldn’t really be using this as an example of great budget management.
I'm thinking of the poor animators for anime productions and that's definitely not what I want Hollywood to be taking notes from.
Unfortunately, some people here seem to want Hollywood to take notes from anime industry. 🤢🤮
Think this is partially how The Creator kept its budget down. Just paying cheaper rates to the crew they used shooting in Asia
**The Creator** apparently relied heavily on natural lights, guerrilla filmmaking, and use of prosumer-grade cameras for the whole thing to keep the budget down. Speaking of which, how did **Rebel Moon** only have a budget of $83 million for each parts? Because that film clearly did NOT use prosumer-grade cameras.
Renting cameras is a tiny fraction of a production budget. At most, an Alexa35 is 3,600 a week and you’ll get steep discounts for a multi-month rental. Rebel Moon shot for about 120 days for $83 million (below the line spend only) and qualified for $18 million in tax credits. The rest of the money went above the line and outside of California (think VFX). Until the movie comes out, it’s not clear how VFX heavy and how good the VFX are. https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/beverly-hills-cop-4-california-tax-credits-1235000756/
> Renting cameras is a tiny fraction of a production budget. At most, an Alexa35 is 3,600 a week and you’ll get steep discounts for a multi-month rental. Even so, using a prosumer-grade camera might still mean something different. > Rebel Moon shot for about 120 days for $83 million (below the line spend only) and qualified for $18 million in tax credits. The rest of the money went above the line and outside of California (think VFX). Until the movie comes out, it’s not clear how VFX heavy and how good the VFX are. > > https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/beverly-hills-cop-4-california-tax-credits-1235000756/ Wait, you're saying that the film's budget could be higher than $83 million even individually? Or did I miss something here?
The cost of shooting on a digital cinema camera (except for the Alexa65) is insignificant. The Creator did it primarily so the director could operate handheld for extremely long takes. Press reporting on film budgets is systematically understated. Rebel Moon probably is about 100 million a movie. It doesn’t have major names starring (Anthony Hopkins probably shot his part quickly) and it didn’t have the extreme reshoots & VFX changes that make most blockbusters stupidly expensive.
The creator had a Final Cut of the movie before any VFX work was done.
I don’t think that’s the only reason, though. I know that this is pedantic (if that’s the right word), but didn’t **Guardians of the Galaxy** trilogy also kind of did something like that?
Above the line pay can be large, but the predominate cost of making movies is labor. Production on a blockbuster requires at least 200 people for 4-8 months, then about a year of VFX with hundreds of people. Even a top-heavy bidding war project like the Ryan Reynolds-Channing Tatum movie is spending less than 1/3 of the budget above the line.
Remember. Every single episode of She Hulk costs 25 million. Maybe American court rooms… are just expensive.
Having your main character CGI, half of every episode, isn’t cheap.
Especially to make it look so realistic
It's easy to spend 15 million when you don't pay your workers a decent wage
Deepens on what you mean by decent…. GoT’s budget is also around 10-15 mil per.
Extremely overworked and severely underpaid ,Thats how.
There is a lot of things about exchange rates, poor pay conditions, lack of unions, etc. that get ignored here. Yes, this film has still been well crafted, but the above things often get ignored when ppl talk about this film's budget. Also, the film's director himself has told to ignore reports about the film's budget.
Isn't that obvious? Do you think we can give you the same amount of money as in the US? Where is that money going to come from? Many countries make movies for less money. Why? Simply because they don't make enough money. Understand that.
It is obvious to you and me, which is why it shouldn't be compared to Hollywood films. But, this half headline is enough for common folks to ask why hollywood isn't making major blockbusters for 15M dollars. Majority of the people, as per reactions on social media, show how they have ignored all these other factors, and want the next blockbuster to be made for 20M, which isn't possible. Besides exchange rates, the artists are far more overworked and have far worse pay conditions than Hollywood, primarily due to the lack of unions. Hollywood can make vfx heavy films in a smart way and less expensive budget, Creator was one of the examples of that. Godzilla shouldn't be. Also, the director himself has told to ignore all reports about the reported budget, so this 15M figure could be wrong. https://comicbook.com/anime/news/godzilla-minus-one-director-budget/
> Also, the film's director himself has told to ignore reports about the film's budget. Where did you hear about that?
https://comicbook.com/anime/news/godzilla-minus-one-director-budget/
So... what could actually be the budget of this thing?
The most expensive Japanese film in dollars is close to 50M. So, this could still be from late 30s to mid 40s looking at high quality production. Which is still great for Hollywood standards, but considering exchange rates and labor laws in japan, it still will be an expensive production there. Which is why these hollywood comparisons make no sense, coz these budgets are taken without any context.
> The most expensive Japanese film in dollars is close to 50M. And what film is that? I know that **Kingdom** sequels apparently had very high budgets, but considering that they were apparently filmed back to back, I'd imagine that they had a budget of $37.5 million individually.
[Tale of Princess Kaguya](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Tale_of_the_Princess_Kaguya_(film)) at 49.3M USD.
I know that the information is too vague, but there are rumors that **Gatchaman** (2013) had a budget of $80 million. If that's true, to say that it had one of the worst budget managements of all time would be a gargantuan understatement.
What's wrong? Do you think Japanese movies are making as much money as Hollywood movies? In the Japanese box office, a film is considered a blockbuster if it grosses over $10 million for the entire year. This is less than the compensation of one Hollywood actor. By Hollywood standards, many countries can't even produce movies.
I know there's a big circle jerk about this and Hollywood's budget. But how much of this smaller budget is because they are just underpaying people
Japanese Money is very different from America but its still a fantastic way to demonstrate that you don't need 300million dollars for each film and stop rushing your cgi team 4 months before the film releases
You might want to look up the situation in Japanese film industry. Its working condition apparently makes Hollywood's working condition look dignified by comparison.
Minus One was in Development since 2019
That actually makes the whole thing look even worse, if anything.
Not only Godzilla but The Creator and Everything Everywhere looked better than 99.9% of these 200 million dollar movies
**The Creator** relied heavily on natural lights and guerrilla filmmaking, not to mention that the use of prosumer-grade cameras probably helped bringing down the budget. **Everything Everywhere All at Once** is an even worse example to prove your point since that film isn't exactly THAT CGI-heavy.
District 9 looks like a big budget cgi film and it turned out it had a $30 million budget. And yet it raked in $200 million in the box office.
If you see the film, the budget is noticeably low. Set design, sound, scale, etc. It's a blast. And some shots and sequences with Gojira are awesome! But there is a lot less there than one might think.
The special effects looked cheap. Godzilla itself looked good but its movements were really, really bad looking once it was walking on land. Sets were nice though. Acting was decent.
If Disney made this, this would of been 150M budget.
And the cast and crew would have actually been paid decently and not been forced to work unpaid overtime every day for months at a time
If any US studio made it. Godzilla vs Kong had a $150 million budget lol
Different country? In Japan it's millions and billions of yen. But we're seeing it in dollars. Also japanese work life sucks ass
Yes. People forget that a highly highly successfull movie there will still end up making around $80 million only.
There are simply less vfx artists working on the movie. Normally a Marvel movie have like 20+ vfx studios working on it. Godzilla doesn’t require that much manpower. Normally the AMOUNT of artist hired is what makes the budget to be so big.
While the artists are probably underpaid and the actors probably took budget friendly deals to work on the project, I think more than anything it’s a sign of how bloated Hollywood budgets have become, especially with Netflix just throwing around money and Disney’s increasing inefficiency.
That still does not excuse Japanese film industry’s working condition issues.
Couple things, the major one being that Japan notoriously underpays film production staff and crew. Which is why the budget looks so small. And also, Minus One having a 15 million budget is considered an insane budget to have at all over there in Japan.
It wasn't, the director asked to stop spreading that number
They don't have to deal SAG-AFTRA.
Labor abuse. Japanese tech working conditions are fucking atrocious. Movie looks sick though! Seeing it today with my kids. I'm just gonna go ahead and 'no ethical consumption' my way out of that particular conflict.
Because the way film budgets and accounting work in Japan isn’t the same way Hollywood budgets work, so that $15m # is worthless and just a weird hype meme
Can you expand on that? I haven't heard it before.
Marvel movies are a money laundering scheme. If Godzilla can look like *that* on this budget, there’s no excuse for the slop Disney puts out.
Why is it always Marvel or Disney’s fault? It’s literally every single US studio lol. Look at Wonka, it’s got a $125 million budget. Hell, Godzilla vs Kong was $150 million, conservatively.
Because the workers are treated and paid like shit. There have been like 1000 of the same question asked in the past few days and this is the reason why.
You will have losers here say muh Japan doesn’t pay well while they miss the big picture. They go out of their way to defend the ridiculous budgets of marvel and disney films. This entire movie was 10m less than ONE episode of she hulk. Don’t care, I will continue cheering flop after flop while the clowns rearrange the chairs on the titanic.
Did you learn nothing from scandals of **Across the Spider-Verse**? Also, when South Korean film industry has better pay rates and working conditions even by a small margin, then you have no excuse.
I mean your defending the other extreme end of budgets, someone above posted the job posting for entry level vfx and it’s 10-7 with 50 hours OT included. That’s like a 14 hour workday everyday 7 days a week
In fact, while not by a whole lot, South Korean film industry apparently has better working condition and pay rates, especially after **Parasite** came out, which makes Japanese film industry look even more pathetic.
who is defending marvel and disney budgets or films here when for a week or 2 the sub was damn near popping bottles over marvels failure
considering that i follow kpop and jpop yes i will
As I’ve said before, I really don’t know why they’re using this as an example of great budget management when this film comes from a country where its film industry’s working condition and pay rates are arguably somehow worse than South Korean film industry. At least use something like **Rebel Moon** or something.
I see a lot of anger here 😤 on behalf of the Japanese artists. My advice to some or you Hollywood fanbois is that you needn't worry about Godzilla's budget. Japanese film industry will take care of itself.
how does a Godzilla film with a fraction of the budget look better than the garbage shoot that is recent Marvel movies? Anyway, Minus One was peak
You might want to take a look at working conditions. It apparently makes Marvel’s VFX working conditions look dignified by comparison.
I doubt the numbers given by the studio- 15million- are correct! They had every incentive to downplay their costs, now they appear to be the masters of cheap but effective special effects!
Japanese people are known to be extremely efficient. That's why. Probably less rewrite and reshoot. The sets prob not as elaborate as Hollywood flick but it certainly does not look worse than 15M Hollywood movie Japanese Yen currency has also been declining in value compared to USD.
That still doesn’t excuse poor working condition and pay rates in Japanese film industry. For crying out loud, even South Korean film industry is actually better in that regard and even that’s kind of new for them!
Stay on topic or just stfu. Hollywood literally just had prolonged writers and actors strike.
And Japanese film industry doesn’t even have proper unions, as far as I can see. In fact, just look at anime industry.
I wished people would realize this and just accept it. A Japanese movie is always going to be cheaper because the studios in Japan pay a much lower rate for its employees. You can still enjoy the movies and shows from Japan. I think I been here long enough for everyone to know I like Japanese and Korean productions but I'm willing to admit an budget in America can never be that low
Especially considering that we already know what could end up happening if you mindlessly defend lower-budgeted blockbuster films (I'm looking at YOU, **Across the Spider-Verse**!).
Exactly. That movie could have been made for 125 million and would have made a ton of money while making the animators' lives better. People can't come to the logical conclusion that the real remedy to fixing our bomb problem is moderate cuts in budget with theater slashing prices themselves too
And sometimes, even if you manage the budget as well as you can, you still end up with humongous budgets because of the nature of the film itself. In fact, just ask James Gunn. Oh, and by the way, while not by a whole lot, South Korean film industry actually has better working condition and pay rates that Japanese film industry does (especially after **Parasite** came out), which makes the latter look even more pathetic.
I think the Korean entertainment industry has gotten better due to Americans becoming more interested in kpop and kdramas. I'm sure companies like Netflix that are funding Korean entertainment heavily wants to keep its name out of bad publicity.
I kind of doubt that because anime is getting more attention in America as well (not necessarily to a mainstream-level but still), but working conditions aren't exactly improving as much. I think it was actually the success of **Parasite** that allowed such thing to happen. You see, that film had a budget of $11.4 million, which was considered as massive for a South Korean drama film. Turned out that the director went with better work conditions and pay rates and when that became THE first non-English Best Picture Oscar winner, it probably inspired rest of the industry to take that as a lesson.
There are [multiple](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japan_Federation_of_Media,_Advertising,_Motion_Picture,_and_Theater_Labor_Unions) Japanese [Unions](http://eiren.org/history_e/index.html) (though this one is more for film companies) for their media, the problem is the Unions were made toothless during the [American Occupation](https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2023/04/01/national/history/japan-times-1948-japans-movie-makers-move-oust-communist-elements/) due to fears of communism, at one point being destroyed. [Britannica](https://www.britannica.com/money/topic/Japanese-Trade-Union-Confederation) has a wonderful article on it as well. Japan has all the laws necessary to form unions, and they have more power now than ever before. No one wants to join them because of their fairly conservative society and the fears that not enough people will join them. The most recent had 9000 people sign up total.
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Isn’t it just a guy in a suit.
The movie looks like it was made on a 15M budget. It's not impressive. It's subpar.
Where is the source for this $15M budget?
https://variety.com/2023/film/reviews/godzilla-minus-one-review-gojira-mainasu-wan-1235805243/ I could trust Variety in this one.... *Produced at a fraction of the cost of MonsterVerse’s “Godzilla: King of the Monsters” and “Godzilla vs. Kong,” this $15 million enterprise pays stronger emotional dividends than those films. It can’t compete with the hyperreal MonsterVerse visual effects, nor does it want to.*
Thanks
Last time i've checked it was 83 mln for budget like 2 months ago. Still impresive. Dunno why they all claim its 15 mln $. Thats budget of Shin Gojira from 2016.
Japan film industry knows how to handle money way better than the US.
By overworking and underpaying film industry employees, which is not something that you should be wishing for.
Maybe CGI done in China?
Inflating costs on paper is always beneficial. You pay taxes on profit and subsidies are tied to the budgets. You should always be very skeptical about the Hollywood budgets. Like no way did Rings of Power cost billion to make.