Posted on 01/03/2006 6:52:33 AM PST by RayChuang88
LOS ANGELES -- Hollywood ticket sales took a little swan dive in 2005. Why? The consensus hypothesis appears to be that the movies were -- brace yourselves -- not good.
The industry and its observers are also variously blaming DVDs, video games, iPods, cellular phones, HBO, crying babies, $10 tickets, Chinese pirates, big screen plasma TVs, an aging demographic, liberal bias, video-on-demand, annoying pre-feature commercials and the Bush administration's energy policy.
The Great Box Office Slump has been covered by the entertainment press with a kind of giddy obsession ever since the summer proved blockbuster-deficient. Each week, the prognosticators sought deeper meaning in the weekend tallies for undercooked turkeys such as "Stealth" and "The Legend of Zorro." There was hope in the Hollywood press that "King Kong" might "save the day," but alas, the big ape has so far "disappointed," if it is possible for a $66 million opening five-day gross to disappoint (which it is, since Peter Jackson and Universal spent $220 million making the monkey movie).
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
And, I would like to make a different commentary that someone may have already made, but I hadn't read it, so I'll post it here. And, will readily admit that it is slightly uninformed because I haven't seen and have no intention of seeing. It's my understanding that the 2 main characters aren't really cowboys. They're, essentially, sheperds.
Hmm. Now, let's look at Hollywood's values and perspective when they are making films.
I just wonder if it is a coincidence that these gay dudes were sheperds (sheep cowboys), as opposed to cattle rustlers?. Anyone else remember a famous Sheperd? Is it a coincidence that Jesus Christ is known as the Good Sheperd and Hollywood chose sheperds?
And Hollyweird wonders why, well, most everyone in America might find that allusion a little disturbing?1
I saw the trailer in the theater last week. It left no doubt as to the subject-matter. It showed one of the guys with a wife, but the major portion of the trailer showed the two guys together. It was disturbing. I was very upset to see that the kid who played Homer Hickam in October Sky is one of the gay cowboys.
When the preview started, I leaned over to my 15-year-old daughter and whispered, "This must be the gay cowboy movie." She thought I was nuts, but by the time the trailer ended, she was in total agreement.
No, no no...the Hollywood Reporter says that we don't understand the level of genius in Hollywood now. It's our fault. I'm not kidding.
Movies about gay cowboys and transsexuals will not make you a lot of money. Hollywood is so stupid.
Here's a movie that will make $300M - a young high school graduate rejects his liberal parents and joins the ROTC in college. He eventually fights in Iraq and becomes a hero. All the time, his parents reject him. But, when he finally becomes a national hero, his parents seize the spotlight and claim now they supported him all along. Upon finally reuniting with his parents, his spits on their shoes and says, "I love my country more than I love you." Final line in the movie.
People will be wrapped around the corner to see it.
That's because with a decent home theater system you enjoy the following advantages:
1. Picture quality will be generally very good with decent sharpness and brightness.
2. Sound quality will be generally very good.
3. You can make your own concessions at way lower cost.
4. The film on DVD often is a longer edition the director intended, without having to consider MPAA ratings or excessive running time.
5. Also, the film on DVD often has a commentary track, which is often very insightful on various aspects of the movie.
6. Finally, you can pause or stop the playback in case someone calls or you need to use the restroom.
I've taken that a step further, no cable or satelite either & I rarely watch air broadcast tv.
Have you seen "The Great Raid", totally awesome movie!!!!! It wasn't released in hardly any theatres, because of its Pro American theme, it is out on DVD now.
ABC CBS NBC CNN its all the SAME, Propaganda.
Might as well call them all AmeriJazerra.
Show them how much Gravitas Hugh Bris has. Vote with your remote! Shut down the Alphabet channels.
He's Got A Plan
Zippo Hero
I go to perhaps two movies every three years anymore. I don't feel that I've missed anything. I see two basic problems:
1. (Almost) any movie with a number at the end of the title is going to suck.
2. A dearth of good writers/writing. (This is even more of a problem in the television industry.) No originality any more. And they do every good idea to death. No one willing to take a risk on an unproven concept...SSZ
Along those lines, saw the Family Stone with my girlfriend over the weekend. It was ok, but the only "normal" couple were the two gay guys. Everyone else was portrayed as a disfunctional mess.
Sure it did, but there were others that made more money, they just weren't as "surprising" as F911:
1 $441,226,247 Shrek 2 2 $373,585,825 Spider-Man 2 3 $370,274,604 The Passion of the Christ 4 $279,261,160 Meet the Fockers 5 $261,441,092 The Incredibles 6 $249,541,069 Harry Potter - Azkaban 7 $186,740,799 The Day After Tomorrow 8 $176,241,941 The Bourne Supremacy 9 $173,008,894 National Treasure 10 $162,775,358 The Polar Express 11 $160,861,908 Shark Tale 12 $144,801,023 I, Robot 13 $133,378,256 Troy 14 $125,544,280 Ocean's Twelve 15 $120,908,074 50 First Dates 16 $120,177,084 Van Helsing 17 $119,194,771 Fahrenheit 9/11
I agree with this. I don't really care so much that they disagreed with the President because I often do too especially on the issues of Federal spending and immigration. But the Hollywood crowd went way beyond disagreeing to down right anti-American and seditious. Many are also on the wrong side of the culture wars and I refuse to support their decadence. There is little forgiveness in me for these offenses and there are a lot of the actors who I can no longer stomach seeing their face even on free TV. I certainly will not pay to see them. This seems to be an ever expanding group. The latest is Heath Ledger who I used to kind of like but after his role in Buttcrack Mount'n is forever banned from my TV screen.
A couple other things are influencing my movie viewing behavior. First, the movie offerings stunk. There were very few must see movies in 2005. Second, home theater is getting much better and even if you buy the movies at first release on DVD this works out cheaper than a visit to the theater. I have not yet bought one of the new flat screen TVs (LCD or Plasma) but I intend to buy one after about one more step down the cost curve. I did invest in a really good audio video receiver and surround speaker system and Dolby 5.1 has made even my current TV amazingly better.
Kong was the only movie I saw during the holidays.
I think they did some really cool things, but certain parts were a bit over the top.
I have to say, though, that the ending was excruciatingly poignant. I found myself really fighting back the tears until I realized that my big, brawny husband was wiping away a few himself. My husband is a hunter, and he has often talked about how much he admires the way the male of the species reigns dominant over his territory, and even though he will shoot a big buck, there's a part of him that mourns a little for the greatness of the animal. That's kind of how you feel at the end of Kong.
I havent seen the theater trailer, but the one I did see on the TV did not lead anyone to believe the two were Homo's.
As I say, I thought it was very deceptive.
$10 for a sitter!!! In our area, baby sitters get anywhere from 7-10 per hour, and that's if you can get to them first.
For all the hype about Brokeback Mountain, the following is a little marketplace reality:
Narnia (current estimated domestic receipts) - $225 million
Narnia (current estimated worldwide receipts) - $382 million
Brokeback Mountain (current domestic receipts) - $15 million
Both movies have been out for 4 weeks. While BBM is in fewer theaters, I would argue that that is again because the markets would not support more theaters.
The point is, for all the hype, BBM is a very, very narrowly supported movie - just as one would expect.
Might have something to do with the fact that more sheep are grazed out west than you would ever imagine, stories about cattlemen vs. sheep raisers to the contrary.
Our christmas for my hubby and I this year was the DVD and some movies that we both enjoy....next year comes the new T.V.
I did happen to go to a friend's house and watch 'War of the Worlds' on their t.v. and I was impressed with the make over, I don't like Tom Cruise, but the movie was great....they have the surround sound and the whole bit, it was a great night at the 'home movies'
Well, the hype over Brokeback Mountain seems to have fallen off lately. They released it into NY, LY and SF homo-cities and somehow thought its success there would mean a success in Peoria. But nobody is talking about how it is doing now, which tells me it went over like a hemmoroid in a bathhouse.
The reason Hollyweird is failing, is that the place is chock-full of nuts that have no idea how to produce movies that are interesting to the average person.
I'm with Rothman. Considering that domestic gross is only about 1/4 of what most movies make in their lifetime (overseas tickets, soundtrack, novelisation, DVD, pay-per-view, toys... the alternate sources of income are pretty impressive) that 9 billion in domestic grosses represents about 36 billion in total revenue. Hard to say the industry is on the ropes with that kind of cash coming in.
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