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If the Coen brothers follow this simple formula, they can make "A Serious Man II" a smash.
By Colin Covert
The elimination of all creativity from moviemaking takes a giant step forward.
The Guardian newspaper reports that a team of academics led by Prof. Thorsten Hennig-Thurau, a marketing and media researcher at London's Cass Business School, studied101 sequels released over the last decade.
Their analysis yielded a formula for creating hits.
"Now everyone can work out what a sequel right might be worth," said Hennig-Thurau.
The key factors: Keep your stars on board and don't wait too long between installments.
"Movies like the 'Twilight' sequel 'New Moon' are highly lucrative and relatively safe bets if key parameters, such as original cast, are maintained," he explained.
He maintains that "star continuity" is where "Basic Instinct 2" went wrong – no Michael Douglas.
"The time difference between the two films was very, very long and actor continuity was halved in that you only had Sharon Stone and it was a pretty aged Sharon Stone," he said.
Also, it reeked. But they haven't got a mathematical expression to represent that factor. Yet.
www.guardian.co.uk/film/2009/nov/08/movie-sequel-profit-formula
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