* the rare exceptions merely prove the rule
Posted on 12/26/2012 8:45:48 AM PST by Olog-hai
The big deal for Hollywood is not the record $10.8 billion that studios took in domestically in 2012. It’s the fact that the number of tickets sold went up for the first time in three years.
Thanks to inflation, revenue generally rises in Hollywood as admission prices climb each year. The real story is told in tickets, whose sales have been on a general decline for a decade, bottoming out in 2011 at 1.29 billion, their lowest level since 1995.
The industry rebounded this year, with ticket sales projected to rise 5.6 percent to 1.36 billion by Dec. 31, according to box-office tracker Hollywood.com. That's still well below the modern peak of 1.6 billion tickets sold in 2002, but in an age of cozy home theater setups and endless entertainment gadgets, studio executives consider it a triumph that they were able to put more butts in cinema seats this year than last. …
(Excerpt) Read more at bigstory.ap.org ...
This year there were some major box-office hits. “The Avengers”, “The Dark Knight Rises”, “The Hobbit, part 1”, “Skyfall” and some others, so not really a surprise to see better numbers.
And some movies just beg to be seen on the big screen. “Avengers” and “Dark Knight Rises” certainly work better in a cinema. The opening airplane escape in “Dark Knight Rises” is spectacular, worthy of a James Bond film, and seeing it big-screen adds to it.
As for next year, who knows? “Star Trek Into Darkness” I’ll likely see in a local cinema.
Historically, movie theaters do well in hard times. Even at today’s high ticket prices it’s relatively cheap entertainment, and it takes people’s minds off things for a while.
I saw “The Hobbit: Part 1” in the theater because it was filmed at 48 frames per second. That was worth the price of entry.
I intend to see it for that reason as well. It’s coming to my local theater next week.
A plethora of family films and comic book movies are what pushed the box office to that ticket sales increase. You’ll notice that NOT ONE soap-box piece from Oliver Stone or Matt Damon was mentioned as a part of that success. This just goes to prove that family values are what most Americans REALLY want to see in a movie.
* the rare exceptions merely prove the rule
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