ROTTEN TOMATOES: Studios Planning for Fewer Sequels in 2008 Comments

Studios Planning for Fewer Sequels in 2008

by Jeff Giles | January 03, 2008

Summary

If you're the type of moviegoer who greets the annual wave of sequels with groans and eyerolls, USA Today has some good news for you: In 2008, you can expect to see far fewer of them at a theater near you. Back to Article

(1-54 of 54 posts) | Reply

BrianInSD writes:
on Jan 03 2008 08:53 AM

Practically every franchise out there released an installment in 2007 so it's hardly surprising that there aren't as many to release in 2008.

What Harvey Weinstein doesn't seem to realize is that it's not the overly violent nature of his studio's films people object to but rather to the fact that the majority of the Weinstein Company's releases have sucked. The violence was the LEAST objectionable aspect of Hannibal Rising.

(Reply to this)

crystalwhiteeyes writes:
on Jan 03 2008 08:59 AM

Starting the year off in a good direction! Less sequels, less blood! I'm sure when the writers come back, we'll get more nonsense. Here's to hoping they get a real job!

(Reply to this)

opTIMus Nerd writes:
on Jan 03 2008 09:08 AM

Don't worry folks! It looks as if the new Rambo will have sequel and blood enough for all!

(Reply to this)

Shatter24 writes:
on Jan 03 2008 09:17 AM

Sequels and blood! Sequels and blood! What are we men or mice?

(Reply to this)

dahluzz writes:
on Jan 03 2008 09:29 AM

it wasn't the gore that turned people away from Grindhouse, the Weinstein studio's biggest blunder of the year, it was the terrible advertising (not helped by the accurate word-of-mouth that 'death proof' sucked). sorry 'hoodwinked' is one of your studio's top grossers, harv.

(Reply to this)

fullmetalnek writes:
on Jan 03 2008 09:58 AM

Damn! I need some gore!

(Reply to this)

BlueMobius writes:
on Jan 03 2008 10:00 AM

"...helping propel 2007 to about $9.6 billion at the box office, a record -- though attendance remained flat from last year..."

Um, has the irony in that statement hit anyone else? How could the box office break records when attendance was down from the previous year? Could it be that they're charging more per movie? I'm sorry, I'm not impressed by the dollar amount as much as I am concerned that people aren't seeing movies anymore. One used to have to get to the theaters at least a half hour early to guarantee a seat and it was likely that any new release would be sold out on a Friday night and packed three-quarters to full during its first weekend. Now? Most movies I see are only half full, new releases aren't sold out, and you can show up five minutes before show time and most likely get a good seat. The only movies that seem to follow the "sold out" trend anymore ARE the sequels and "franchise wannabes."

Just something I noticed.

(Reply to this)

Derbeste writes:
on Jan 03 2008 10:03 AM

I actually do think there is something to the "too much blood" philosophy. I think torture porn and gross out movies are designed to shock rather than entertain. It's a fine difference. You simply cannot hold a broad audience's attention for very long on shock. Furthermore, if nothing is left to the imagination, the mind ends up bored rather than engaged. It's gotten to the point where shock has been used to distract from the fact that movies have little to no story - rather than compliment it.

So winstein is actually right....if only by coincidence.

(Reply to this)

Gimy writes:
on Jan 03 2008 10:37 AM

Grindhouse failed because of the advertising? dude, try TIME! thats the biggest reason it failed. everybody i know who saw it LOVED it. problem is, not everybody has 3 hours to watch a flick thats NOT on dvd...

an arguement about "too much blood" only applies when there's NOT ENOUGH everything else. THAT is the main problem in these newer horror flicks, they spend more time on makeup and special effects rather than material(comedy, scare tactics, STORY, acting, characters) and it just comes out stupid. alot of them(saw, halloween, urgh...hostel 2) appear to be so amateurishly done...that watching it makes you think they're first time movie makers. you can gore the h3ll out of a movie IF you have strong support(hostel 1) around it. if the rest sucks, the entire movie sucks...regardless of gore.

i'm pretty sure this isn't OVERALL sequels though(only releasing in theaters). keep in mind, ALOOOOOT of sequels go straight to dvd(bring it on, american pie, sandlot...etc). so i hardly think this report is accurate. its basically saying the big budget(thought out bullsh3t) is cutting back? to me, that means nothing as long as they keep releasing stupid sequels on dvd...

(Reply to this)

EDmanwalking writes:
on Jan 03 2008 10:47 AM

On the violence debate, movies like Saw and Hostel are doing no good with their "torture-porn", but what of moviemakers like Scorsese, who depicts violence with consequences, or the Coens, who meditate on the violence within our world rather than just imitate it for cheap thrills?

(Reply to this)

BuckyUnderbelly writes:
on Jan 03 2008 10:49 AM

I think the number of sequels is likely to dip even more in 2009 if the WGA strike goes on much longer. Here's why ...

It's not because studios WANT to make fewer sequels ... but they just can't hire the writers right now to keep pumping them out. Because films take a year or two (or more) to make, the impact of the strike on the movie biz really won't be noticeable to us until late '08 or early '09. (Unlike TV which got hit harder up front.) I'm sure the studios would LOVE to have lots more of profitable, cookie-cutter sequels in the development pipeline right now, but they can't roll forward without any writers.

So the strike may be forcing some originality out of Hollywood. Which could be very exciting.

The other intriguing issue that may arise from the strike is the fact that there will be tons and tons of spec scripts on the market once the writers come back to work.

(A spec script, for those that don't know, is a script that a writer writes "on spec" ... meaning ... they write the whole thing and then hope to sell it later on. This isn't the most common way to sell a script, incidentally. Most often writers are either hired for an open writing assignment -- say, for a sequel that the studio is going to make no matter who writes it -- or they go in and pitch an original idea to studio executives who then agree to pay them to write it.)

Anyhow, with all the writers currently barred from working on studio projects ... you can bet that most of them are taking advantage of the hiatus to write their bliss. They're no doubt dusting off all those old ideas that they've always loved but that everybody said weren't marketable enough. So, when the strike is over, there are going to be lots of passion projects flooding the market.

So, ironically, the writers going on strike and interrupting the flow of the Hollywood product/profit pipeline MIGHT actually mean that we eventually get lots of new and original movies over the next couple of years.

(Reply to this)

FlapJack writes:
on Jan 03 2008 10:50 AM

Yay! I think they are going to try a new route. Say...prequels?

(Reply to this)

Bigbrother writes:
on Jan 03 2008 11:07 AM

In reply to this comment (#1423754)
That's true, but just because a film is bloody doesn't make it inherently a bad movie. Sometime when the film maker knows what he's doing lifelike violence enhances the film. Look at Braveheart at one point during the film blood actually splatters the camera, by accident or on purpose I know not, but it made me and my friends leen in closer to the screen and whisper "Awesome" which should be the ultimate goal of any bloody violence and then they went back to awesome story telling, top notch character acting and fun dialog. Blood and gore can't hold up a crappy movie, but it can make a good movie better.

(Reply to this)

kdbarrett writes:
on Jan 03 2008 11:13 AM

As for box office numbers, I've always been suspicious of using strict cash numbers as a measure of a movie's success because of inflation, more theaters (there are more and more where I live, anyway), less matinee pricing, etc. I think there should be more indices and ratios, such as the number of theaters, number of seats, and how many of those available seats did it fill? If one movie is released in 3,000 theaters but only sells about 2,000 theaters worth of tickets but another one is released in 1,500 theaters and fills them all, that, to me, is a more successful movie, even if it made less cash. The box office reports do occasionally address limited release movies and receipts per theater in those cases, but I just think there should be more of that.

(Reply to this)

Mackey23 writes:
on Jan 03 2008 11:19 AM

The Dark Knight and Indy 4...enough said.

(Reply to this)

BuckyUnderbelly writes:
on Jan 03 2008 12:20 PM

Yeah, I've personally always found the whole practice of using the movie's grosses as a benchmark for their success (instead of number of physical tickets sold) to be a little dishonest. Especially when the high grosses these days seem to be more a function of the rising ticket prices than of a movie's actual popularity.

But studios will never let go of the practice, because they love to crow about how they're setting records. It's a very useful statistic ... especially when you're crafting a TV ad campaign. It's always impressive to trumpet that your movie has broken this record or that one.

But if they went strictly by NUMBER of tickets sold ... well, they'd never get to trumpet about breaking any records. Because nobody would EVER beat Gone With The Wind ... which hauled in around $400,000,000 in worldwide grosses (NOT counting inflation) ... BACK IN 1939! Back when a movie ticket could be had for a few coins and a bit of pocket lint!

So when it comes to how many tickets were actually sold ... modern movies just can't even dream of approaching those numbers. The world, the business, and the marketplace ... have simply changed too much.

(Reply to this)

horrorfan666 writes:
on Jan 03 2008 01:29 PM

I would really like to see a sequel to HALLOWEEN. I thought the cast thats left over is terriffic; scout taylor compton, Malcom McDowel, Danielle Harris, Tyler Mane.... it could be really good if they found a good director to take over.

(Reply to this)

rt_hire_me writes:
on Jan 03 2008 02:04 PM

Didn't Brad Bird unlock the mystery to good movie making in an RT interview a couple months ago? 1. Story 2. Story 3. Story. Less blood? Sequel? Who cares.

I did appreciate the fact that I Am Legend could have been an R-rated hell-fest but wasn't so that I was able to watch it with my son. So yeah, you can put less blood at #4.

(Reply to this)

PlanBFromOuterSpace writes:
on Jan 03 2008 02:06 PM

A quick search, courtesy of infoplease.com, turns up:

"The big-screen adaptation of Gone with the Wind premieres, and will go on to gross $192 million, making it one of the most profitable films of all time. It's also one of the longest films, clocking in at 231 minutes."

That's going all the way back to 1939, including re-releases, etc., not figuring in inflation. Clearly, you are out of your mind. There weren't even $400,000,000 worth of moviegoers back then. That would be 1.6 billion people, assuming that everyone that saw it had seen it once.

The "Gone With the Wind" argument has always bothered me, as no one ever seems to figure in other factors. Today, you obviously have way more entertainment options and outlets. Sporting events and concerts certainly make more of an impact than they did back then. To say that the Internet, or rather the illegal pirating and distribution of movies online, takes a chunk out sort of goes without saying. Video games didn't exist. Most importantly, there was no TV really. There was no "Oh, I'll rent it when it comes out on video". The studios, of course, were aware of this, and if you think the advertising and marketing of a film are shameless NOW, you should take a look at what they used to do. There was a possibility that you would never again have a chance to see a film after it left theaters (or more importantly, no additional way for the movie to make money), and they made sure to exploit that.

You have to put things in perspective when looking at this argument. There's no fair way to say that (minus inflation) "Gone With The Wind" would be the highest-grossing movie ever if you pitted it against all the other contenders at the same time, in the same environment. Unless someone is going to go back in time and hand MGM a check for 1.4 Billion dollars (its approximate adjjusted gross), it's really not an argument.

Speaking of which, I wonder what it's adjusted COST would have been. At the time, I believe it was the most expensive film ever produced. No one ever talks about that. Would it be a legit blockbuster, or would it be considered a "disappointment" like so many of this last couple of years' $200,000,000 grossers?

To get somewhat back on topic though, money is all that matters to the studios that make these movies. 9.6 billion dollars is a lot of money, no matter how you slice it. Whether people paid the 1939 price of 23 cents to see a movie or if it was just 10 people chipping in a billion apiece, the money's the same in the end.

(Reply to this)

Uradik Smoke writes:
on Jan 03 2008 02:59 PM

I am predicting the 2 biggest movies of 2008 will in fact be a Sequels...

The Dark Knight and Indy 4 will account for close to a billion dollars in domestic box office ...

Long live the sequel for movies we actually want to see ...

And to be fair i would say 2007 was the year of the Threequel ...

(Reply to this)

Eat.Before.We.Eat.You writes:
on Jan 03 2008 05:03 PM

In reply to this comment (#1423746)
I didn't read the comments after Blue Mobius's, so I don't know if his comment was addressed already, but I will anyway:

You took the following quote from the article: "...helping propel 2007 to about $9.6 billion at the box office, a record -- though attendance remained flat from last year...". You then wondered how the box office broke records when attendance was down from last year. First of all, the article didn't say attendance was down. It said that "attendance remained flat from last year". You still ask a fair question, though; my guess is that the record was set because attendance remained the same, but cost per ticket went up. I know that prices at the theater by my house for a regular adult ticket went from 9 to 11 dollard recently, while the matinee price went from 7 to 9 dollars. That might have something to do with the record-setting box office gross.

(Reply to this)

rgallitan writes:
on Jan 03 2008 05:12 PM

In reply to this comment (#1426163)
"The Dark Knight and Indy 4 will account for close to a billion dollars in domestic box office ... "

Uh... that's deeply wishful thinking. Batman Begins barely cleared $200 mil. That's a respectable amount of money, but not a runaway success considering the high budget. It came in eighth place for 2005. It would have been tenth in 2007. Plus, while I know a lot of serious fans are looking forward to the new mega-creepy, maniacal Joker, he's only going to make the sequel an even tougher sell to the general public. Look for a similar gross to the first one - maybe up to $250m if it comes out particularly entertaining, but probably trending down to around $175m.

But yeah, Indy 4 will mop up.

(Reply to this)

Skadalilama writes:
on Jan 03 2008 05:17 PM

Has anyone heard anything about Silent Hill 2????!!! Last time I heard, it's shooting for a release date this summer but I haven't heard ANYthing about it since then (that was a couple of months ago).

(Reply to this)

MMacKK writes:
on Jan 03 2008 06:01 PM

Yeah, Sequels are only good when they are a follow up to a decent movie, or the story requires it.

I mean, now, we will see Alvin 2, and quite frankly, who but the morons who spent the GDP of Ghana to see it would want that?

(Reply to this)

MMacKK writes:
on Jan 03 2008 06:01 PM

And I have no faith in the Weinsteins. They try, but they always **** things up.

(Reply to this)

Hamboner writes:
on Jan 03 2008 06:25 PM

How about less blood and more sex? Lots of sex, gratuitous sex! In every movie, thrown into every scene where a remote excuse can be devised to insert it ( and even in a lot of scenes where there is no logical excuse ). I want to leave a movie theatre starring Megan Fox with a ****-eating grin on my face because I just saw some hot sexy action.

Where has all the sex gone? Damnit!

(Reply to this)

Parkcow writes:
on Jan 03 2008 06:52 PM

I'm all for continuing GOOD movie franchises. It's the Fantastic Four IIs of the world that I could do with less of. But that is just a matter of my taste. I'm sure someone out there thinks the FF movies are good. They are wrong, but they are entitled to their bad taste just as much as I'm entitled to my good taste.

(Reply to this)

XxCypherxX writes:
on Jan 03 2008 06:54 PM

Um, has the irony in that statement hit anyone else? How could the box office break records when attendance was down from the previous year? Could it be that they're charging more per movie? I'm sorry, I'm not impressed by the dollar amount as much as I am concerned that people aren't seeing movies anymore. One used to have to get to the theaters at least a half hour early to guarantee a seat and it was likely that any new release would be sold out on a Friday night and packed three-quarters to full during its first weekend. Now? Most movies I see are only half full, new releases aren't sold out, and you can show up five minutes before show time and most likely get a good seat. The only movies that seem to follow the "sold out" trend anymore ARE the sequels and "franchise wannabes."

Gotta agree with you there mate. And the thing that really annoys me nowadays is getting to the cinema, sitting down and watching 20 frigging minutes of advertising before the TRAILERS FOR NEW MOVIES even start!!! Then that takes another 25 minutes ( I timed it the other week when I went and saw AVP2 for the second time.... Sue me)I think cinemas should advertise what time the DOORS open, then advertise what time the FEATURE starts so I can avoid the damn candy bar, car, laptop, New Zealand ads, and catch at least one trailer I might want to see before actually getting to see the movie I've paid for.

In short....

Higher ticket prices, more and more advertising every time you go to the cinema ( by the way, the first time I saw AVP2 I was 30 minutes late to the cinema.... And the CLOVERFIELD trailer had only just come on, then there was another 5 or 10 minutes of ads after that :-/)

You just don't get what YOU want or expect anymore.

Sigh.

(Reply to this)

XxCypherxX writes:
on Jan 03 2008 06:57 PM

Bugger. Sorry. There was meant to be a "Someone else wrote" thingie in there somewhere.....

I'm new to this. Sue me. :-D

(Reply to this)

Uradik Smoke writes:
on Jan 03 2008 07:06 PM

rgallitan - Maybe a billion is a bit high , maybe more like 800-850 millionwould be a closer bet

I agree the Batman Begins didnt "Mop up" in the domestic box office and it did make 205 million . But Begins was sort of an unknown in 2005 , knowone was sure if this was a sequel or a new movie and what the premise was or what Bale and Nolan could deliever .I dont know the figures but I am willing to bet Begins did very well on DVD.

As far as The Dark Knight goes it is a publicity juggernaut. I have never seen a movie have this much hype around it this far away from its opening. All everyone is talking about is Ledgers Joker and how amazing he has pulled it off from what has been seen . I disagree and think his performance will bring more people in this go around . People now know what Nolan and Bale are bringing to the Batman franchise and what this movie is all about . I would bet on a solid 350-400 million ...

Indy is going to kill the box office and compete with TDK for the crown of box office champ 2008 ...

(Reply to this)

Reel Nerds writes:
on Jan 03 2008 08:02 PM

The article may be correct in its assertion that fewer sequels are getting made, but I would expect to see more prequels or spin-offs taking their place. That way, movies keep the brand name, or a brand-named character, and they can just use whatever script happens to be lying around, See e.g. Ocean's Twelve.

(Reply to this)

moviecrazy1 writes:
on Jan 03 2008 08:04 PM

what ever happened to sin city 2?

(Reply to this)

killermonkey8822 writes:
on Jan 03 2008 09:12 PM

rambo 4 are whatever it's called is probably gonna bomb, but you never know...... iron man could be good, though i never was all that interested in iron man in the first place..... (by the way, i'm looking down at the blade runner ad, how many versions of that movie do they have to make! :P)... back to what i was saying.... indy 4 could be good, i'll go see it, but i'm still debating if it will be good or not, i still can't believe that Harrison Ford is actually going back for that, sure the man hasan't done a good box office movie in a while, but isn't he a bit old? :P, it should still be good either way......... by the way i saw natinol treasure 2 last night, and it was actually not a bad movie, i was suprised.

(Reply to this)

DiscoDan writes:
on Jan 03 2008 09:25 PM

this is great news! but after all the needless gore movies and stupid sequels of 2007 it would be a miracle if they could produce just as many. From what I hear this is going to be a big year for remakes though, so get ready.

It's kinda sad that the biggest movies of this year are for sure going to be sequels though.. indiana jones, batman, and isn't another harry potter due this year as well? *sigh*

(Reply to this)

rgallitan writes:
on Jan 03 2008 11:15 PM

In reply to this comment (#1426888)
"I would bet on a solid 350-400 million"

Not a chance. But we have a friendly bet. See you on the wrap-up thread in July!

(Reply to this)

kdbarrett writes:
on Jan 04 2008 04:54 AM

Yes, to the STUDIOS, the money is all that counts. And yes, they do love to trumpet those "record breaking" numbers. But I'd like to see something a little more impartial to truly measure movie's successes and failures. We could compare a movie like "Gone with the Wind" to "Titanic" a little better if we used numbers like tickets sold, percentage of available tickets sold, things like that. Granted those movies were released in entirely different environments, which is different today and will constantly evolve, but there are better ways to measure this than sales, even when you adjust for inflation. And you might even be able to use entertainment market share or something like that to account for the changing landscape.

The idea is that it would be an objective measurement, so it would never come from the studios...

(Reply to this)

The Paki Don writes:
on Jan 04 2008 05:25 AM

rgallitan...

The Dark Knight is majorly hyped and has all the great cast members of the previous installment and more great cast members. It made 200 million dollars on its first installment. I'll stand with Uradik Smoke and say that double that amount on a domestic scale seems likely. Oh, and it will also soar beyond 80 million dollars on opening weekend.

The Paki Don has spoken.

(Reply to this)

Gimy writes:
on Jan 04 2008 05:46 AM

horrorfan666...you're more psycho than Myers himself, that movie was horsesh3t

(Reply to this)

Limit3Productions writes:
on Jan 04 2008 07:19 AM

IMO

This year will easily go to either Indy 4 or The Dark Knight. Like so many others I have never seen so much media coverage about one movie like TDK has received. Some say "sadly" the 2 biggest will be sequels, but honestly I don't mind sequels when they are made well and I definately will be going to see TDK. Bale has established himself as Bruce Wayne and Batman, Caine is a great Alfred, Freeman, Oldman, all were great in Begins, but now we have Heath Ledger who appears (from the Prologue I saw at the IMAX for I Am Legend and from the Theatrical Trailer) to be giving one of the most outstanding comicbook-villian performances anyone has seen since the last Joker (Jack N.)

I'm going with Uradik Smoke: 350-400M Domestic and at least 700M worldwide.

As far as other sequels, Hollywood needs to work on stories more than SFX or gore. Without a good story the movie ends up tanking.

(Reply to this)

Uradik Smoke writes:
on Jan 04 2008 09:06 AM

Well now that i have gotten support i sure hope I am right , I think I am for all of the above reasons .

But just in case I will start saving my money in case i have to go see this movie like 200 times to make it perform close to my prediction ...

(Reply to this)

rgallitan writes:
on Jan 04 2008 09:31 AM

MWU-HA-HA!! Use your money to buy yourself something nice instead - like a new house. For you and all your friends and extended family. In Malibu. :)

(Reply to this)

nathanpoitras writes:
on Jan 04 2008 10:02 AM

Of course there'll be fewer sequels in 2008, they used em all up in 2007! But apparently 2010 release slate is nothing but sequels, I look forward to such films as: A-Two-nement, Even Fewer Countries for Old Men and United 94.

(Reply to this)

sickofitall writes:
on Jan 04 2008 11:31 AM

In reply to this comment (#1423721)
Death Proof did not suck troll

(Reply to this)

tomwaitsjr writes:
on Jan 04 2008 01:20 PM

Yah, but will studios stop ripping each other off and offering the same subject movie with 2-3 different titles? A la Next/Deja Vu, etc etc etc

Nope.

The only cure is. . .

more Uwe Boll!

(Reply to this)

rgallitan writes:
on Jan 04 2008 01:58 PM

In reply to this comment (#1429287)
Nah. Even Uwe Boll is just a remake of Ed Wood. And a hamhanded one at that.

(Reply to this)

tabascoman77 writes:
on Jan 04 2008 03:00 PM

Death Proof didn't suck. I agree. Grindhouse was great. While DP was very talky, all the talking had a point. The girls fleshed out plotlines, backstories and the rest of it was the big payoff.

The thing that doomed Grindhouse was length, unfortunately. That's hardly the fault of the distributors.

The movie was adverted to teens and, unfortunately, most teens have a short attention span. They are willing to sit through a no-brainer like Planet Terror (which I ALSO thought was great) but don't want to sit through something different like Death Proof.

You also have to understand that Grindhouse, if it had a different-style movie like Machete in its place, it most likely would have ended up with a much lower critics rating and would probably have been dismissed *** too violent or silly.

You want to have two movies with two distinct styles, not two movies that feel the same.

Grindhouse was not for everyone and I KNOW Death Proof rubbed people the wrong way but I think if they looked past their own attention spans and looked at the movie as a retro 70's kitsch suspense film (murdering bastard stalks the young girls thing) with good dialogue, DP delivers just fine.

(Reply to this)

~*Admiral Snowstorm*~ writes:
on Jan 04 2008 04:30 PM

I think 350-400 million is too ambitious for The Dark Knight. Most people around here don't even know there's going to be a sequel in the first place. And to be honest, Batman Begins wasn't anything great either. It was quite good, better than we had any right to expect, but it's nothing more than good (and let's not mention the huge plothole of "Why doesn't a water vaporizer vaporize human beings, who are 75% water and therefore easy pickings?" The thing pierces concrete and steel but it can't go through a thin layer of flesh? Suspension of disbelief doesn't cover this.). I imagine it will rake in a reasonable amount of money, just as its predecessor did, but 250 million is, in my opinion, far likelier than 350-400.

And I don't care about blood in movies or sequels as long as they're good. I hate any category of movie if it's not good; completely original, remake, prequel, sequel, spinoff, spoof, what have you. Blood, sex, drugs, and language also are nonfactors as long as they're used well. The Departed? Good use of all of the above. Turistas? Not a good use of all of the above. Movies are bad or good, the objectionable factors about them do not. There have been plenty of good sequels, and there have been plenty of bad sequels. If they turn out good, though, I don't care how many sequels Hollywood gives us (because really, if you think about it, a fair few of this year's sequels ranged from passable to great. The Bourne Ultimatum, Spider-Man 3, Ocean's Thirteen, etc. Yes we have the occasional Pirates of the Caribbean 3: At World's End and Fantastic Four 2: Rise of the Silver Surfer, but I'm willing to ignore those in favor of the good ones that come out).

(Reply to this)

ipisking writes:
on Jan 05 2008 01:15 AM

Yea!!!!! let the writers stay on strike for a few more months and it will be a good year

(Reply to this)

High School With Money writes:
on Jan 05 2008 01:52 AM

Regardless of how much or little [i]Dark Knight [/i]and [i]Indy [/i]make, 2008 won't break any box office records, and we'll have to hear the same "Will Work For Food" song and dance about how "disappointing its box office total" will be.

[b]Yes, to the STUDIOS, the money is all that counts. And yes, they do love to trumpet those "record breaking" numbers. But I'd like to see something a little more impartial to truly measure movie's successes and failures. We could compare a movie like "Gone with the Wind" to "Titanic" a little better if we used numbers like tickets sold, percentage of available tickets sold, things like that. Granted those movies were released in entirely different environments, which is different today and will constantly evolve, but there are better ways to measure this than sales, even when you adjust for inflation. And you might even be able to use entertainment market share or something like that to account for the changing landscape.[/b]

What's needed is a website that provides some sort of currency exchange codec that automatically figures in variables like inflation, ticket prices per era, theater audience average (though Golden Age roadshow venues would be hard to prove), and the like. Then all that needs to happen is for some AICN or IMDb nutjob hacker to screw with the system so that [i]Navy Seals[/i] becomes the #1 earning movie of all time.

[b]The idea is that it would be an objective measurement, so it would never come from the studios... [/b]

Where do box office figures come from? I was hoping they were impartial. Miramax had a bit of trouble convincing Tinseltown that [i]Pulp Fiction [/i]opened with $10 million.

[b]and let's not mention the huge plothole of "Why doesn't a water vaporizer vaporize human beings, who are 75% water and therefore easy pickings?"[/b]

That there was even a "water vaporizor" in the first place makes it no better than an Adam West or Schumacher circus flick, except with better acting.

(Reply to this)

kdbarrett writes:
on Jan 05 2008 08:27 AM

Where do box office figures come from?
Exhibitor Relations, for one (http://www.ercboxoffice.com/erc/main.php). I don't know exactly what data they collect or if there are other services. Maybe RT can get some custom reports from them... :-)

(Reply to this)

Truye writes:
on Jan 05 2008 08:36 AM

In reply to this comment (#1425884)
Gone with the Wind budget was somewhere in between $3.5-4 million, estimated. Then it made almost $400,000,000 worldwide (The almost $200,000,000 was domestic). [not adjusted for inflation] Yes it was considered one of the most expensive movies ever made at the time, but it didn't even get close to bombing. My beau's grandmother saw the movie more than five times in the theater and I know other patron's did too.

Also consider with grosses adjusted for inflation the second highest grossing movie of all time is STAR WARS (!!): A New Hope.

ANNNNNNNND another thing. There were plenty of entertainment options when Titanic hauled in it's 600,000,000 domestic. It did not stop hundreds upon hundreds of teenage girls from flocking to the movie (I saw that trash 7 times! 7 TIMES IN THE THEATER!!!)

http://www.boxofficemojo.com/alltime/adjusted.htm

(Reply to this)

punktuate writes:
on Jan 05 2008 11:14 AM

for one Iron Man is not a franchise wannabe what franchise pertail? Yes Iron Man is in the Marvel Universe but he is not a wannabe he's the $#@%.....Harvey Weinstein is a douche for not wanting to make violent movies and less sequels or remakes is good lets get some new stories, new ideas, and new bad@$$ movies.

(Reply to this)

eltouche writes:
on Jan 06 2008 09:20 AM

rt_hire_me ... couldn't agree more. Sequel, blood - none of it matters if the script is good. Sooo many crap sequels are released that people just assume... but can you blame anyone for that?

Grosses are important only to the bottom line, that's all... other than financers, who cares? You can't compare ticket receipts from 60 years ago and today - for so many reasons that I don't even have the time to list them all.

Gimy... I would agree that the length of 'grindhouse' turned people away. It's a niche audience to begin with. They could have "sold" it better, but I'm not sure it would have made a difference. I found it enjoyable enough, but still think the trailers were the best part.

(Reply to this)

indiefilmfan2 writes:
on Jan 06 2008 10:24 PM

In reply to this comment (#1433015)
I believe that the movie that will eventually top Titanic's $600 mil gross will come out of nowhere. It will be a movie that's completely under the radar but will gradually become a phenomenon through strong word of mouth and low-key but persistent media attention, not because of a monstrous mega-blockbuster like opening. While not quite there, do you think anyone saw My Big Fat Greek Wedding making even close to 240 mil before it came out in 2002? It took several months to even become a true wide release and was in theaters for nearly a year, rare by today's standards.

Imagine a film of that caliber that draws in both genders equally and has broad ethnic appeal. While still very early, Juno has expanded strongly week after week and with 2 months of award season still ahead of it this film has nearly limitless potential. Juno The rest of its theatrical run will be very interesting to follow, though Titanic's record still looks very safe.

No film will ever sell more tickets than Gone with the Wind though because that film reached its status through multiple viewings over a period of several decades which will not happen anymore because theatrical windows are so short. The average time it takes for film to reach dvd/hi-def is now about 4 months so fans don't have to wait very long to see their favorite movies again. This pattern has even changed since Titanic when dvd had not even debuted yet.

(Reply to this)

Related Links

Rambo

Related Articles

Most Discussed

Latest News

Latest Interviews

Latest Features

Sponsored Links