'R' Rated Animation and It's Big Future

'Sausage Party' had a very difficult time getting distribution.  At a cost of $19 million, Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg, owners of Point Grey Pictures, finally got Sony Pictures to co-produce and distribute. With an opening weekend of $33.6 million and a total gross of $43.6 million after its first week, this film has good legs and should stay strong throughout August.

What the adult animated movie does is fill a void in the cinema market. As is often stated in CMG, audiences are yearning for a fresh cinema - movies that are creative and innovative.

'Sausage Party' is a rare film in that there have not been many adult animations.  'South Park:Bigger, Longer, & Uncut' (1999) was the most successful of this rare breed and grossed over $83 million! Unfortunately, the major studios (which produce virtually all of the animated films) use the genre as family-friendly.  With huge production budgets the studios go for 'G', 'PG', with a rare 'PG-13 rating'. For the most part, animation equates to Disney. The issue is that 'R' rated animation must be marketed heavily as adult entertainment so it's not mistaken as a kid's film.

This summer saw another adult animated film, 'Batman: The Killing Joke'. Green-lit by Warner Bros. as a direct to video product it did get a very limited theatrical release (two days) but grossed a whopping $3.8 million!. This box office success did not go unnoticed at WB and other projects are now in the works.

Point of fact, the movie studios are behind the curve when it comes to adult animation.  This form of entertainment is thriving with the internet streamers.  Netflix has been capitalizing with a very loyal audience following for its 'Bojack Horseman', or FX's 'Archer', or the Cartoon Network's 'Adult Swim' are all very successful shows.

The big plus for the producers is that every animator wants to work in 'adult', be it at Warners, Disney, Sony or any other studio.  For decades the animation community was told what they could or couldn't do - now they can have full creative freedom and they all want it.