索尼影業如何彌補經濟損失

Seth Rogen, James Franco, and The Interview will not be coming to a theater near you. Not anytime soon, anyway.

由於受到黑客的嚴重威脅，塞斯o羅根、詹姆斯o弗蘭科主演的芯片《刺殺金正恩》（The Interview，又名《採訪》）將無法如期在電影院內與觀衆見面，至少近期上映無望。

Sony Pictures Entertainment’s decision on Wednesday to cancel the comedy film’s planned opening represents just the latest in a series of dramatic events that started a few weeks ago when hackers breached the studio’s computer system. It was soon followed by those apparently responsible releasing Sony’s internal e-mails and the nation’s largest movie theater owners deciding against showing the movie.

本週三，索尼影業（Sony Pictures Entertainment）宣佈取消《刺殺金正恩》原定的首映式。這是繼數週前該公司被黑客入侵電腦系統後，發生的又一起戲劇性事件。不久前，該公司內部電子郵件遭到故意泄露，之後幾家全美最大的影院遭到威脅，決定撤出放映計劃。

On Tuesday, a note purportedly written by Guardians of Peace, the hackers who claimed to be behind last month’s cyber attack, suggested a possible series of violent attacks at any cinema screening The Interview — a Sony comedy that portrays an assassination plot against a fictional version of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. (U.S. government officials said Wednesday that North Korea was likely behind the cyber attack, although the country has denied any involvement.)

聲稱對上個月攻擊索尼影業負責的“和平衛士”（Guardians of Peace）黑客組織週二再次發出威脅，揚言將對所有放映《刺殺金正恩》的影院採取一系列暴力襲擊。索尼投拍的喜劇電影《刺殺金正恩》講述了一個刺殺朝鮮領導人金正恩的虛構故事。（週三，美國政府官員表示，懷疑此次網絡攻擊的幕後黑手可能是朝鮮黑客，但朝鮮方面已予以否認。）

Regal Entertainment, AMC Entertainment, Carmike Cinemas and Cineplex Entertainment all confirmed on Wednesday that they were postponing the release of the film due to the threat, while Cinemark reportedly made a similar decision. Those companies are the country’s five largest movie theater operators and they control more than 20,000 screens across the U.S. and Canada.

週三，帝王娛樂（Regal Entertainment）、AMC娛樂（AMC Entertainment）、卡麥克院線（Carmike Cinemas）和加拿大Cineplex Entertainment以恐怖威脅爲由，一致決定推遲放映這部電影。據報道，喜滿客影城（Cinemark）也作出了類似的決定。這些是美國五個最大的院線公司，在美國和加拿大共擁有兩萬多塊大屏幕。

Faced with the likelihood that The Interview would find itself locked out of a large chunk of the country’s theaters when it made its Christmas debut next week, Sony opted to scrap the theatrical release altogether. “We are deeply saddened by this brazen effort to suppress the distribution of a movie, and in the process do damage to our company, our employees and the American public,” Sony said in a statement. “We stand by our filmmakers and their right to free expression and are extremely disappointed by this outcome.”

該片原定於下週聖誕節首映，由於擔心屆時可能會被美國大多數電影院拒之門外，索尼影業不得不放棄原定的上映計劃。該公司在一份聲明中表示，“我們對某些人如此厚顏無恥地打壓一部電影的上映感到非常難過，在這一過程中，他們肆意傷害索尼影業、我們的員工以及美國民衆的利益。我們力挺我們的電影工作者，支持他們自由表達的權力，同時對電影無法上映這一結果表示極度失望。”

So, where does that leave Sony?

那麼，索尼影業究竟會受到什麼樣的影響？

The Interview reportedly cost the company more than $40 million to make, including $8.4 million to Rogen, who co-wrote and stars in the film, and another $6.5 million for Franco, the film’s other leading star. (Their salaries were among the reams of data leaked in the wake of the hack.) Of course, that figure doesn’t even include tens of millions of dollars the company would have earmarked for promoting the film — some of which it will likely save now.

據報道，《刺殺金正恩》的製作成本超過4,000萬美元，其中支付給影片聯合編劇兼主演羅根840萬美元，支付給另外一名主演弗蘭科650萬美元。（兩位主演的薪酬數據來自於黑客事件後泄露的衆多數據之一。）當然，該數字還不包括公司原本爲影片推廣準備的數千萬美元——現在這部分估計可以省了。

If Sony opts to cancel the release of The Interview altogether — rather than postpone it — then the company will obviously have a difficult time recouping its expenses. Variety reported today that Sony is considering circumventing theaters altogether and giving the film a premium video-on-demand release, which would give Sony a chance to experiment with a new release method without fear of angering the movie theater operators that have already passed on The Interview.

如果索尼選擇完全取消《刺殺金正恩》的上映，而不是推遲，那麼公司將很難收回成本。綜藝雜誌《Variety》12月17日的報道稱，索尼影業正考慮完全繞過電影院，通過付費視頻點播的方式發行該影片，此舉可使索尼嘗試一種新的發行方式，而不用擔心激怒已經通過上映《刺殺金正恩》的影院。

It is difficult to say how much money Sony could make by selling The Interview on demand directly to viewers’ homes, even with the added (though not necessarily welcome) buzz around the movie as a result of the hack and threats. Some recent films have been made available on-demand – garnering some success – while they are still in theaters. Earlier this year, the critically-acclaimed dystopian action flick Snowpiercer made more through on-demand in its first two months than it did in a limited theater-run. But the film still only pulled in $6.5 million on-demand in that time and another $4.5 million in theaters, according to Deadline.

即使考慮到由於黑客和威脅造成帶來的宣傳效果（雖然他們寧願不要），索尼影業能夠通過觀衆的家庭直接點播《刺殺金正恩》獲得多少銷售收入依然很難說。最近一些電影已經開始提供點播並獲得一些成功，但這些電影依然是在電影院上映。今年早些時候，反烏托邦動作大片《雪國列車》（Snowpiercer）頗受好評，前兩個月通過點播獲得的收入喜人，甚至超過了在局部地區影院上映時的票房收入。但根據Deadline網站的數據，該影片當時通過點播獲得的收入仍然只有650萬美元，另外450萬美元來自票房收入。

The Interview was expected to bring in far more than $11 million, though. Box Office Mojo predicted gross ticket sales of around $90 million for the movie. That’s compared with past Rogen-Franco comedies like 2013’s This is the End, which pulled in $100 million, and 2008’s Pineapple Express, which made about $87 million.

不過，業內此前預測《刺殺金正恩》的收入本可遠遠超過1,100萬美元。跟蹤票房收入的網站Box Office Mojo預測，該片的總票房收入大約將爲9,000萬美元。這是與之前的羅根-弗蘭科喜劇片比較得出的預測結果，比如2013年的《世界末日》（This is the End）票房收入爲1億美元，以及2008年的《菠蘿快車》（Pineapple Express）票房收入約爲8,700萬美元。

A Sony Pictures spokesman issued this additional statement to Fortune: “Sony Pictures has no further release plans for the film.”

索尼影業的一名發言人向《財富》（Fortune）補充說明：“索尼影業對該片沒有進一步的發行計劃。”

Now, Sony Pictures is left with just one major release to bolster its holiday movie season: the remake of the musical Annie, which hits theaters this week. So far, Sony Pictures’ films have pulled in $129 million during the holiday season — a period that generally accounts for more than 20% of Hollywood’s annual ticket sales — compared to $322 million during last year’s holidays. The Interview’s expected ticket sales certainly would have helped Sony make up some of that ground.

現在，索尼影業可以支持假日電影季的主要上映影片只剩下一部：重拍的音樂劇《安妮o紐約奇緣》（Annie），該片將在本週上映。到目前爲止，索尼影業出品的電影在假日季已獲得1.29億美元的收入（假日季收入一般會超過好萊塢年度票房收入的20%），而去年假日季的收入爲3.22億美元。《刺殺金正恩》的預期票房收入原本可以幫助索尼縮小與往年的收入差距。

For the full year, Sony Pictures’ gross sales are up about 11.5%, which actually makes it one of the few major studios to post a year-to-year gain in 2014. The movie industry in general has seen sales to this point decline 5.5% from 2013 and Hollywood is counting on a successful holiday movie season to reach at least $10 billion in total gross for the year — a mark the industry has met every year since 2008. Box Office Mojo’s latest numbers show the industry more than $300 million away from that goal with just a few weeks left before January, which means The Interview‘s lost ticket sales could be a blow to more than just Sony.

從全年來看，索尼影業的總銷售收入增長約11.5%，這使其成爲在2014年實現年度增長的爲數不多的主流電影公司之一。整個電影業的銷售收入與2013年相比減少了5.5%，好萊塢正寄望於成功的假日電影季，以便其年內總收入至少能突破100億美元——這是自2008年以來，每年電影業都達到的標誌線。Box Office Mojo的最新數據顯示，整個行業距離該目標還差3億美元，而現在離1月份僅剩寥寥數週，這意味着遭受《刺殺金正恩》票房損失衝擊的，將不僅僅是索尼影業。（財富中文網）