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How to Increase Your Wealth by $75 Million Hiring Liam Neeson

He used to be the fourth most overpaid actor in Hollywood with a return of only 720% but we can almost double it to at least 1361%.

By Alejandro Guillú MendozaPublished 7 years ago 14 min read
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This is the second article in a series about the most overpaid actors and actresses in Hollywood.

You have to read the previously published article How to Increase Your Wealth by $300 Million Hiring Adam Sandler first if you haven't read it yet before you go any further.

If you want to make $75 million or more in Hollywood producing two or more movies starring Academy Award nominee Liam Neeson then you need to invest at least $6 million.

Therefore, if you want to generate a 1361% return on your $6 million investment then you must sell at the very least $163.32 million worldwide.

Liam Neeson did sell more than $321 million with the epic historical period drama film "Schindler's List" back in 1993 but you could make the argument that four-time Academy Award winner John Williams, Academy Award winners Steven Spielberg and Sir Ben Kingsley, Emmy Award winner Branko Lustig, and Academy Award nominee Steven Zaillian were responsible for at least five-sixths of the global ticket sales.

The book Schindler's List written by Australian Thomas Keneally was originally published in 1982 and won the very prestigious Man Booker Prize for Fiction that same year.

As you can see, if you want to be nominated for an Academy Award then all you have to do is hire an unemployed published author of a fictional book to read every winner of the very prestigious Man Booker Prize for Fiction since 1969 and build a list of the best ones suitable for the big screen.

Maybe you can find an option within your budget.

The world has evolved a lot since 1969 and back in 1992, a new literary award was created exclusively for Russian writers.

The Man Booker International Prize was created back in 2005 and now every writer in the entire world is eligible. A step in the right direction.

A similar literary award for Asian writers was sponsored from 2007 until 2012.

NOTE TO JACK MA: As the first entrepreneur born in China to appear on the cover of Forbes magazine you are the role model for billions of people all over the world and I think you should sponsor in association with other billionaires from China and other Asian countries a new version of the Man Asian Literary Prize. $13,000 each year means nothing to you but one day in the near future we could be watching a film nominated for an Academy Award in the category Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material Previously Produced or Published written by an Asian writer.

This is one of the 1001 movies you must see before you die according to Ian Haydn Smith and Steven Jay Schneider.

If you are still young and you love films and you are only going to buy one or two books in the next two years then I strongly suggest you buy this very interesting book. Your life will improve in a lot of positive ways.

You can also download it to your Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) Kindle and take it everywhere you go.

"Schindler's List" is currently one of the Top Rated Movies according to IMDB.

This film won seven Academy Awards including Best Picture; Best Director; Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material Previously Produced or Published; Best Cinematography; Best Art Direction-Set Decoration; Best Film Editing; and Best Music, Original Score.

This film was also nominated for twelve Academy Awards.

Only 16 films have been nominated for twelve Academy Awards and two of them were directed by three-time Academy Award winner Steven Spielberg.

Liam Neeson secured a nomination for his hard work in this film and eventually became the world's biggest movie star.

NOTE TO MICHAEL B. JORDAN, CHADWICK BOSEMAN, AND EDI GATHEGI: If Spike Lee or any other director with at least one Academy Award nomination calls you and wants to hire you to work on his next film then you should take that job. It does not matter if he is only offering you a small role or if he is paying you only $1 for your hard work.

Liam Neeson is now a global icon and you include his name on the film posters.

Liam Neeson did sell more than $106 million with drama film "Nell" back in 1994 but you could make the argument that two-time Academy Award winner Jodie Foster and Academy Award nominee William Nicholson were responsible for at least two-thirds of the global ticket sales.

Two-time Academy Award winner Jodie Foster secured a nomination for his hard work in this film and eventually directed two of the highest-rated television shows: House of Cards and Orange is the New Black.

NOTE TO REED HASTINGS: I think you should hire her as director for at least three episodes of "Stranger things", "Narcos", "Better call Saul", "The Crown" and/or "Black Mirror"

Liam Neeson did sell more than $193 million with epic period drama film "Gangs of New York" back in 2002 but you could make the argument that four-time Academy Award nominee Martin Scorsese and Academy Award nominee Leonardo Dicaprio were responsible for at least two-thirds of the global ticket sales.

Gangs of New York tells the story of William Cutting, a murderous thief played by three-time Academy Award winner Daniel Day-Lewis.

Liam Neeson did sell more than $246 million with Christmas-themed romantic comedy film "Love Actually" back in 2003 but you could make the argument that Academy Award nominee Richard Curtis was responsible for at least one-half of the global ticket sales.

This film was nominated for two Golden Globes including Best Picture - Comedy or Musical.

Liam Neeson did sell more than $211 million with epic historical drama film "Kingdom of Heaven" back in 2005 but you could make the argument that three-time Academy Award nominee Ridley Scott was responsible for at least one-half of the global ticket sales.

Liam Neeson did sell more than $226 million with action thriller film "Taken" back in 2008 but you could make the argument that Luc Besson, the producer, writer, and director of at least three of the greatest films ever made was responsible for at least one-half of the global ticket sales.

Liam Neeson did sell more than $136 million with psychological thriller action film "Unknown" back in 2011 but you could make the argument that two-time Golden Globe nominee January Jones was responsible for at least one-half of the global ticket sales.

Liam Neeson did sell more than $303 million with the military science fiction action film "Battleship" back in 2012 but you could make the argument that Rihanna was responsible for at least one-half of the global ticket sales.

Liam Neeson did sell more than $222 million with mystery action thriller film "Non-Stop" back in 2012 but you could make the argument that three-time Academy Award nominee Julianne Moore was responsible for at least one-half of the global ticket sales.

Animated films, sequels, and remakes are not included in this analysis nor are films with less than $100 million in global ticket sales.

Here are a few ideas for sequels, remakes, inbetweenquels, and prequels starring Liam Neeson.

If you like at least one of my ideas and you know a business executive currently working in Hollywood or New York then please share these articles with him or her.

Maybe I will get lucky like the writer and journalist Mark Jacobson, the author of the article The Return of Superfly originally published in New York magazine and they will display my name on the big screen in a credit like this:

based upon the article "How to increase your wealth by $75 million hiring Liam Neeson" by...

Maybe I will get luckier and Jeff Bezos will hire me to write a few pages of the screenplay like Michael Crichton, the author of the books "Jurassic Park" and "The Great Train Robbery"

Without any further delays, here it goes:

Krull 2/Ice Pirates 2

Krull was one of the most expensive films ever made back in 1983 with an extremely large budget of $47,000,000

This may not seem like too much money by modern day standards but it's the equivalent of more than $112,000,000 at this point in time.

We did not have Netflix (NASDAQ: NFLX), Hulu, Amazon or DVDs back then. Most sales were ticket sales.

We did have HBO, now a subsidiary of AT&T (NYSE: T) and Showtime, now a subsidiary of CBS back then; but they were just very small companies with a very small number of subscribers paying monthly fees.

We now have HBO in the Netherlands since 2012 and in the Middle-East and Africa since 2016.

Today, HBO has more than 131 million subscribers paying monthly fees and they invest a billion dollars annually buying films, television shows, concerts, comedy specials and boxing matches.

Eventually, Showtime, Starz, now a Lionsgate (NYSE: LGF) subsidiary, Epix, and other television channels will expand to Mexico and Canada.

Today, AT&T is the twelfth most important publicly-traded company in the entire world according to Forbes magazine with massive annual profits of $13.345 billion in 2015 and still growing each year apparently.

Twenty-three sets were built for the film and they could not recover their original investment.

However, we now have a lot more consumers interested in the science fantasy genre.

A Sequel starring Liam Neeson and other well-known actors and actresses with previous roles in the Star Wars films could be a financial success. Particularly if they invest less than $50 million in the production of both sequels.

The science fiction film Ice Pirates was also a critical and commercial failure back in 1984.

These small budget features cannot compete against Marvel and DC Comics with massive budgets as high as a billion dollars.

That's right! We are now making films with billion dollar budgets or so it seems.

I think both films should be shot back to back with the same cast and crew and sell a ticket to both films for the price of one.

In other words, if you buy the ticket to see Krull 2 online before the film is released then you may get a ticket in your inbox to see Ice Pirates 2 for free if the first film sells at least $100 million in global ticket sales.

Both films were written by Stanford Sherman.

The Delta Force 4

Liam Neeson actually appears in the first film of the series.

This franchise was active for five years and spawned two sequels.

Maybe we can reboot it with Liam Neeson playing Major Scott McCoy.

The Dead Pool 2 or Dirty Harry 6 or Punisher 4

Two-time Golden Globe winner Jim Carrey and Liam Neeson actually appear in the fifth film of the series.

The fifth film in the Dirty Harry series was produced with a budget of $31 million back in 1991 and it was a critical and commercial failure.

However, the original film from 1971 starring four-time Academy Award winner Clint Eastwood is still one of the greatest films ever made with a certified fresh rating of 95% on RT.

This is also one of the 1001 movies you must see before you die according to Ian Haydn Smith and Steven Jay Schneider.

We could reboot the franchise with Ryan Reynolds playing Harry Callahan and simply repackage and sell the entire saga as The Dead pool 2-6.

Alternatively, Liam Neeson could be hired to play Harry Callahan and Ryan Reynolds could simply be hired to play a supporting role in order to launch a borderline deceptive marketing campaign with both names in the film posters.

In fact, the tagline could be "This is not your typical Marvel superhero"

They cannot say you did not warn them that this is not a Marvel film.

Another commercial strategy could be to actually turn this ugly white duck into a very beautiful black swan.

In other words, we turn Harry Callahan into a Marvel superhero played by Liam Neeson and we lure the oldtimers interested in Harry Callahan, the adults interested in hardcore characters played over the years by Liam Neeson like Bryan Mills, Bill Marks and Jimmy Conlon and finally we lure the young punks interested in Frank Castle.

We simply modify the name Harry Callahan and we rename him Frank Castle and everything else remains the same.

We throw a couple of Marvel characters discreetly like director Tim Miller did with Colossus and Negasonic Teenage Warhead in the film Deadpool and we may or may not have yet another critically-acclaimed and financially successful Marvel franchise.

I realize The Walt Disney Company (NYSE: DIS) and AT&T, the current owners of the Dirty Harry character will be forced to work together to make this film a reality but 50% of a gazillion dollars is better than 100% of zero dollars.

The Dirty Harry franchise is dead and the Frank Castle franchise is still alive and kicking with the new television show coming next year to a phone, tablet, phablet, notebook, Amazon Kindle or television near you but a new film based on two critically acclaimed and financially successful franchises could launch the minor league character Frank Castle into the stratosphere.

Instead of Dirty Harry we call the first film in the series Dirty Frank.

Gerry Conway and John Romita, Sr. invented the Punisher in the year 1974 which probably means they went to see the film "Dirty Harry" a few years earlier and they loved the film and they decided to create their own new and improved version of Dirty Harry called Frank Castle.

If you are not familiar with the fictional character Frank Castle then you should watch the television series "Daredevil" on Netflix.

The Punisher makes an appearance on the second season.

"Daredevil" is currently one of the Top Rated TV Shows according to IMDB.

On the other hand, if you like Frank Castle then you are going to love Harry Callahan and you should watch the five Dirty Harry films.

None of the previously released Punisher films has been critically acclaimed or financially successful.

I think it's time to try something new.

Too bad I don't have $29 million in the bank to pay for the characters I need and write two $14.5 million checks to The Walt Disney Company and AT&T so I can write this crazy but potentially profitable idea.

This adventure does not have to be located in the shared Marvel Universe.

We could simply call this film "What if Dirty Harry was the Punisher?"

The possibilities are endless.

Leap of faith 2

Liam Neeson and five-time Golden Globe nominee Steve Martin reprise their respective roles.

This time, a global multinational corporation like Facebook or Twitter (NASDAQ: TWTR) is acquiring foreclosed houses, bankrupt small businesses and large pieces of land left and right.

At first, this seems like a very positive thing for the local economy because they are leasing law offices for the lawyers, tax offices for the accountants and they are hiring a lot of blue-collar workers to build massive solar and wind farms all over the region.

Unemployment goes down, crime goes down and wages go up. Everything is perfect and everybody seems to be happy about this.

First, they build the solar and wind farms to generate enough electricity for their facilities still under construction but they quickly realize they are generating way more energy than what they need so they begin to sell the surplus of electricity to every resident in town for less cash.

There are many theories about what they are going to manufacture in the massive facilities they are building. Some say they are building electric vehicles others say they are building virtual reality devices and most think they are building robots.

Eventually, the truth is revealed and they are simply entering the cannabis industry which is now legal in the State where our hero lives.

They are vertically integrated and they are going to plant their own weed and use it to manufacture all sorts of products. Anything from candies to cigarettes.

Our hero Sheriff Will Braverman played by Liam Neeson is not going to let this happen on his watch and he needs to bring a specialist from out of town.

This is where Jonas Nightengale played by Steve Martin comes in.

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About the Creator

Alejandro Guillú Mendoza

I have written for the largest and most popular websites in Australia, Japan, India and the United States of America including but not limited to TheStreet.com (NASDAQ: TST), Seeking Alpha, Motley Fool, Insider Monkey and Startup Mindset.

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