2006 TO BE A MAKE OR BREAK YEAR FOR HOLLYWOOD

Ad Age.com ^ | 1/24/06 | T.L. Stanley

[Millee]

This is a make-or-break year for Hollywood.

“One down year is an anomaly, but two could be a trend,” said Paul Dergarabedian, president of box office-tracking firm Exhibitor Relations Co. “This year is really a turning point.”

Keenly aware of the 7% drop in movie attendance in 2005, studio executives are pinning their hopes on a better slate of films to draw consumers back to the multiplex. But industry watchers say the business has more far-reaching problems that a few good films can’t necessarily fix as in-control consumers turn to entertainment alternatives like Netflix, the Internet and on-demand programming.

Box office down With box office down and costs up -- the average Hollywood film now costs about $65 million to produce and another $35 million for prints and advertising—this could well be a watershed year as executives are forced to rethink some of the traditional tenets of the business. Among them: cinemas getting first crack at releases; top acting talent getting sweetheart deals; and rethinking the hallowed concept of tent-pole movies.

Moreover, pundits predict that studio marketing dollars will continue to migrate away from TV and toward the Internet, grassroots events and guerrilla marketing.

[Maximus of Texas]

I thought it was pretty funny.

[PaulaB]

Haven't seen it

We watched "Wedding Crashers" over the weekend have you guys seen that?

[peacebaby]

no, haven't seen it, but is suppose to be very funny.

Sideways? Anyone seen that?

[Chanticleer]

I'm just a kid at heart! I like seeing a movie in a nice movie theater... when I can afford it. I don't have a big screen tv yet or a sound system that makes the walls tremble. I don't have a couch big enough to fit the six of us, and microwave popcorn just isn't quite the same as the artery-clogging grease-soaked delights at the theater.

However, I also don't like to drop $80 or so to take the family to the theater ... especially when the movies stink.

I'm hopeful for 2006. I plan to see End of the Spear this weekend. I'm looking forward to X3, Pirates of the Carribean: Dead Man's Chest, Cars and Superman Returns. None of those will probably win any awards, but I bet we'll have fun.

[PaulaB]

It did have some funny parts where hubby and I were

really laughing but it is crude...BEWARE

[Millee]

Yea, pretty funny. I thought the gal who played the psycho gf to Vince Vaughn was pretty good. Luke Wilson(?) is very strange looking though.

[peacebaby]

I'm not much on bathroom humor, if it's that kind of crude.

Nothing turns me off more, and yet I can sit through a crude, rude movie like "Closer."

[PaulaB]

I keep wondering why he doesn't get a nose job

listen when he did the balloon bike for that awful

kid...hubby and I lost it

[PaulaB]

No it's sex crude...not bathroom crude

[EX52D]

Haven't seen it yet...

[PaulaB]

And when the mother in law said

"kitty kitty grrrrr"


we had tears

[End Times Sentinel]

Speaking of movies, have you ever seen a tear-jerker before?

"Tear" jerker?  That's a new colloquialism to me, we use a different word, but yeah.  Mainly late at night on the internet.  But that's rather a personal question, don't you think?

Owl_Eagle

(If what I just wrote makes you sad or angry,

 it was probably sarcasm)

[SoothingDave]

I react to Julia Roberts the way Dracula reacts to a mirror.

You're invisible to Julia Roberts?

SD

[Dashing Dasher]

Closer...

Yes, saw it - I would definitely call it "edgy" and somewhat compelling to watch.

[peacebaby]

Closer is verbally sexually crude. Actually, crude isn't the word for it. Nix this as a movie for you.

[peacebaby]

It was compelling to watch, wasn't it? It was offensive, but compelling. Good verbage, Dashing Dasher!

And how self absorbed can people be?

[Dashing Dasher]

Exactly..

Self centered oddballs... but you couldn't turn away.

[PaulaB]

I am a closet hack and slash fan

I love movies where there is a sicko and everyone

has to run, figure out what's going on, and try to survive.

Texas Chainsaw is a great one

Also did anyone see High Tension? Weird but I never

figured out the killer to the end....freaked me out

I love those kind of movies

[peacebaby]

ewwww, no! I do not do scary movies.

I dream in color.

[martin_fierro]

2006 TO BE A MAKE OR BREAK BROKEBACK YEAR FOR HOLLYWOOD