Hollywood Producers Rise Again with ‘Terminator 3’
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Everyone knew that HE — “Terminator” Arnold Schwarzenegger — would be back. But Wednesday’s debut of “Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines” also marks the return of two producers who were once among the hottest teams in Hollywood before splitting in the 1990s. ‚Ć
Movies made by Andrew Vajna and Mario Kassar have raked in $3 billion at box offices. Their former company, Carolco Pictures, backed the “Rambo” movies starring Sylvester Stallone and big-budget action adventures like “Total Recall” and “Terminator 2: Judgment Day” with Schwarzenegger.
The pair went their separate ways in the mid-1990s over differences over Carolco’s future, but neither enjoyed the kind of hits they made at the former company.
Vajna started a new company that mounted films like 1996’s “Evita,” and Kassar took the reins of Carolco before one flop too many sent it into bankruptcy in 1995.
“We had a very good run at being able to pick the right projects during our heyday at Carolco, and we felt the team was better than either one of us alone,” Vajna said. “To simplify, two heads are better than one.”
Under their new film label, C2, the pair returned to the formula that made them a hit — a non-stop action flick with an emotionless leading man who doesn’t really say much but wreaks havoc and destruction everywhere he goes.
In short, they went to “Terminator,” whose star Schwarzenegger uttered the now classic line, “I’ll be back.”
“Everytime you say, ‘I’ll be back,’ you think of ‘Terminator,”‘ said Kassar.
He added that Carolco’s collapse was a huge disappointment personally, but it has led him to look at the movie business in a more mature way and put priorities in order.
TERMINATOR REBIRTH
Winning the rights to make “Terminator 3” proved no easy task, however. The pair bought 50 percent of the rights from their old company in a bankruptcy auction and the other 50 percent from “Terminator 2” executive producer Gale Anne Hurd.
C2 partnered with film producer Intermedia, an affiliate of German company IM Internationalmedia AG, and they auctioned distribution rights to major studios such as Warner Bros., a unit of AOL Time Warner Inc and Columbia Pictures, part of Sony Corp.’s Sony Pictures Entertainment.
Schwarzenegger had to be signed to a contract, and a new director found to replace original writer/director James Cameron, who declined a chance to return. C2 hired “U-571” director Jonathan Mostow.
Published reports of the amounts paid Schwarzenegger run as high as $30 million. The movie’s overall cost has been estimated between $150 million and $175 million.
The producers, however, declined to talk about the money involved because of one thing they think is a sure thing. “Terminator” movies make a lot more cash than they cost.
“Terminator” in 1984 and “Terminator 2” in 1991 raked in over $550 million at global box offices.
Moreover, the fans who have helped “Terminator” achieve cult status around the world were much younger than the producers thought, said Intermedia chief Moritz Borman.
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“We did a Google search on ‘T3,’ and got 17,000 pages,” Borman said, “before we even decided to go with the movie.”
What will those young fans get from a pair of producers steeped in 1980s and 1990s action movies? “Terminator 3” has the same combination of big explosions, blasting guns, sci fi special effects and Schwarzenegger utterances that made the first two films huge hits. “I don’t think the audiences’ tastes have changed that much,” said Vajna.
If that is the case, expect the 55-year-old action star to keep making big-budget Hollywood films, if he doesn’t jump into politics. But one thing is for sure: behind the cameras will be a couple of producers named Vajna and Kassar.
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