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December 13, 2005

to screen or not to screen

I wish I had a dime for every time this year I've scanned the movie listings, thinking to take my son to see a flim, and finding nothing worth seeing. And now this just in from AFP via Breitbart.com:

"Plunging movie ticket sales, after a string of uninspiring remakes and movie sequels coupled with an explosion of the DVD and video game markets, are keeping audiences at home and have sent Hollywood into a deep existential crisis."

Am I the only one that finds this bout of...existentialism hilarious? Studies have shown that G-Rated movies are more than 10 times more profitable than R-rated movies, and yet G-rated movie releases continue to lag far behind the other rating types. Of the 940 films released in 2003, only 29 were G rated.

"It's not just a slump in box office, but also in sales of DVDs," Jack Kyser, chief economist of the Los Angeles County Economic Development Corp., tells AFP.

These days the box office represents only about 20% of a film's earnings. The rest is merchandise, DVD sales & movie rentals. G-Rated films win again: seven of the top ten performing video rentals of all time are G-Rated (the other three are PG). And when's the last time you took your Saw II lunch box to work with you?

Hollywood is trying to walk on R-Rated water, immunne to the market forces which move $5 billion worth of DVD's through Wal-Mart & Sam's Club every year. As a PG-Rated Kevin Costner's Ray Kinsella might say, "If you build it, they will come."

Sources:
Plummeting 2005 box office sparks Hollywood crisis
The Disfunctional Family-Film Business

Posted by joel at December 13, 2005 02:58 PM

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Comments

preach it, brother, preach it!
my wife and i don't consider ourselves prudes, but the movie industry might. we go rent a dvd and it seems like half of them we don't finish ... we shut it off and turn it in. we can set through some bad stuff if the whole movie isn't scene after scene after scene after scene ... where's the story? and entertainment?

Posted by: uncle jim [TypeKey Profile Page] at December 14, 2005 12:10 PM

The R-rated movies are cheaper to make. It takes years to make an "animated classic." It takes a few months to make a piece o' crap. It's a costs/returns issue. Don't fool yourself for a second into thinking that Hollywood isn't about money.

Posted by: aldahlia [TypeKey Profile Page] at January 20, 2006 01:21 AM

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