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Topic: Is 3-D Still Going Strong?

Buck Wilson
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 894
From: St. Joseph MO, USA
Registered: Sep 2010

posted 02-19-2015 09:07 PM

It may not do ANY good Terry. The point is that it is far more ACCURATE and beyond that, isn't even subject to inflation!

Imagine if we used ticket sales the whole time. Then we would know EXACTLY how "Star Wars" in the 70's stacked up to "50 Shades" this weekend. We wouldn't have to grind the science at it or try to figure the average ticket price or what have you. 50 million tickets sold in 1975 would be 50 million tickets today. It just makes more sense.

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Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."

Posts: 10973
From: Lawton, OK, USA
Registered: Apr 2001

posted 02-19-2015 10:25 PM

quote: Claude S. Ayakawa
What happened to the 3D discussion?

It got hijacked by the forum's current resident troll.

Yes, I said TROLL. No one, I mean NO ONE can be so honestly stupid or block-headed to keep going round and round the way Terry is doing. He is pretending not to get the point just to drag out the argument. Even people with a tenuous grasp of the English language can absorb a plainly obvious point. Clearly the dude is trolling.

Meanwhile "AndySu" has apparently disappeared from the pinned Dolby Atmos Fans Thread after crossing some lines with the moderators there.

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Terry Lynn-Stevens
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1081
From: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Registered: Dec 2012

posted 02-20-2015 12:00 AM

quote: Buck Wilson
It may not do ANY good Terry. The point is that it is far more ACCURATE and beyond that, isn't even subject to inflation!

Imagine if we used ticket sales the whole time. Then we would know EXACTLY how "Star Wars" in the 70's stacked up to "50 Shades" this weekend. We wouldn't have to grind the science at it or try to figure the average ticket price or what have you. 50 million tickets sold in 1975 would be 50 million tickets today. It just makes more sense.

There would be a number of other factors to take into account as to why the numbers were lower or higher or whatever, (internet, live sporting events in more cities, more sporting events on TV, Netflix, DVD, etc etc) and this list goes on, then there are all the sequels etc etc.

I just don't see from a marketing standpoint how reporting butts in the seats would help benefit any of the owners, employees or vendors who work in the industry who are on this forum.

And nobody who I know of who is an average person who goes to movies has ever mentioned how a movie today stacks up against the box office from 30 or 40 years ago. I don't think they really care.

quote:
What happened to the 3D discussion? [Confused]

-Claude

Claude, do you yourself watch all the movies you want to see in 3D if available or do you skip some of them and select a 2D presentation?

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Manny Montes
Master Film Handler

Posts: 270
From: United States
Registered: Feb 2010

posted 02-20-2015 12:51 AM

quote: Buck Wilson
It may not do ANY good Terry. The point is that it is far more ACCURATE and beyond that, isn't even subject to inflation!

Imagine if we used ticket sales the whole time. Then we would know EXACTLY how "Star Wars" in the 70's stacked up to "50 Shades" this weekend. We wouldn't have to grind the science at it or try to figure the average ticket price or what have you. 50 million tickets sold in 1975 would be 50 million tickets today. It just makes more sense.

Unfortunately ticket sales have the same issue, in 1975 (per your example, the US population was almost 100 million people less than it is today. You could probably break it into a per-capita number, but even then there are a lot of differing factors year to year.

While grosses aren't the best number to judge a movie on, it makes sense for our industry which at the end of the day is all about making money (unless your a non-profit of course!)

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Steve Guttag
We forgot the crackers Gromit!!!

Posts: 12814
From: Annapolis, MD
Registered: Dec 1999

posted 02-20-2015 06:36 AM

Exactly. The "honest" numbers are tickets sold as a percentage of population. You need to know how many people could have bought a ticket versus how many people did. If you capture 80% of a smaller population versus 25% of a larger one, it may make the 25% capture seem artificially high when in fact you have left 75% of the potential sales on the table.

Claude...the thread has gone in yet another dimension! [Wink]

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Allan Young
Expert Film Handler

Posts: 125
From: EGHAM, Surrey UK
Registered: Jun 2011

posted 02-20-2015 08:12 AM

quote: Buck Wilson
Imagine if we used ticket sales the whole time. Then we would know EXACTLY how "Star Wars" in the 70's stacked up to "50 Shades" this weekend. We wouldn't have to grind the science at it or try to figure the average ticket price or what have you. 50 million tickets sold in 1975 would be 50 million tickets today. It just makes more sense.

Indeed. It's what the French do.

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Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."

Posts: 10973
From: Lawton, OK, USA
Registered: Apr 2001

posted 02-20-2015 09:31 AM

quote: Terry Lynn-Stevens
I just don't see from a marketing standpoint how reporting butts in the seats would help benefit any of the owners, employees or vendors who work in the industry who are on this forum.

Yes you do see the point, Terry. You're just deliberately being ignorant and argumentative.

Theater operators will only benefit from knowing actual attendance figures. They can balance those numbers against the dollar figures colored by ticket price inflation. Attendance figures can be balanced against the specific movies showing at that time as well as other factors like economic conditions. All of that data can give theater operators a better educated idea of where business is trending.

quote: Terry Lynn-Stevens
And nobody who I know of who is an average person who goes to movies has ever mentioned how a movie today stacks up against the box office from 30 or 40 years ago. I don't think they really care.

Do you honestly think anyone gives a shit when the talking heads on Good Morning America talk about some new movie setting a new box office record for a particular opening weekend? When it comes to the ADHD-afflicted press, they only seem to care about opening weekend. They rarely check back to report an overall dollar gross as the movie is winding down its theatrical run. Maybe this is by design. All of the major broadcast networks in the United States are part of global media companies who also own major American movie studios.

quote: Manny Montes
Unfortunately ticket sales have the same issue, in 1975 (per your example, the US population was almost 100 million people less than it is today. You could probably break it into a per-capita number, but even then there are a lot of differing factors year to year.

Yes, the United States has 318 million people now versus 226 million people back in 1980. The larger population now might skew attendance figures higher for more recent movies versus those released 30 years ago. However, the situation might balance out in a different direction since we have so many more entertainment options now than we did back in 1980. There's more ways to see a movie and you don't have to wait long at all to see a new movie at home.

quote: Steve Guttag
Exactly. The "honest" numbers are tickets sold as a percentage of population. You need to know how many people could have bought a ticket versus how many people did. If you capture 80% of a smaller population versus 25% of a larger one, it may make the 25% capture seem artificially high when in fact you have left 75% of the potential sales on the table.

If one is going to dig deeper into that area, percentages of population won't provide a very accurate figure when plotted over time. Changing income demographics and economic conditions are going to skew those numbers from year to year.

Nevertheless, if movie theater chains and movie studios were publishing actual attendance figures it would be pretty simple for anyone to look up census figures to get a percentage of population.

It's far more complicated trying to determine just how truly popular a movie is by crude dollar gross figures alone. Ticket price inflation as well as huge price differences between various movie theaters distort the actual truth.

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Terry Lynn-Stevens
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1081
From: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Registered: Dec 2012

posted 02-20-2015 10:04 AM

quote: Allan Young
Indeed. It's what the French do.

Nice find!

Below is what looks like a fanboy site reporting the actual ticket stubs:

http://mrob.com/pub/film-video/topadj.html

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Mitchell Dvoskin
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1869
From: West Milford, NJ, USA
Registered: Jan 2001

posted 02-20-2015 10:30 AM

Or this wikipedia site for the USA and Canada.

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Mike Blakesley
Film God

Posts: 12767
From: Forsyth, Montana
Registered: Jun 99

posted 02-20-2015 11:54 AM

Really, comparing attendance figures to long-ago times is pointless because circumstances have changed too much. It's probably only sensible to compare in maybe a 3 year range, if that. Just think of the amount of change just in the last 5 - 10 years in the number of people with broadband internet, just to give one example.

Comparing these figures is fun for digit-heads like myself, but you can't allow yourself to get all bummed about the fact that "Gone With The Wind" sold ten times as many tickets as some of today's blockbusters. It is just a fact that there was not much else to do in the evenings in 1939 -- everybody went to the movies.

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Mitchell Dvoskin
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1869
From: West Milford, NJ, USA
Registered: Jan 2001

posted 02-20-2015 12:58 PM

There is also the related issue that in decades gone by, it was more common to see a movie in a theatre multiple times. Yes, it still happens from time to time, Titanic and Avatar come to mind, but for most films people wait for it to become available on DVD/Streaming if they want to see the film again.

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Mike Blakesley
Film God

Posts: 12767
From: Forsyth, Montana
Registered: Jun 99

posted 02-20-2015 01:01 PM

Yeah just imagine the amount of money the studios are leaving on the table with the 90 day video window. (Maybe the thread will go another direction now!)

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Justin Hamaker
Film God

Posts: 2253
From: Lakeport, CA USA
Registered: Jan 2004

posted 02-20-2015 01:27 PM

quote: Mitchell Dvoskin
There is also the related issue that in decades gone by, it was more common to see a movie in a theatre multiple times.

Part of the reason for this was because movie theatres were the only real choice to watch a movie again. Because there are now so many options for watching movies outside the theatre, it's easy to forget that it's only been a little more than 30 years since we've had the option to watch movies whenever we wanted. Before home video, you had to watch it in the theatre. And movies could inflate their lifetime gross by having multiple re-releases.

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Mike Blakesley
Film God

Posts: 12767
From: Forsyth, Montana
Registered: Jun 99

posted 02-20-2015 01:35 PM

Not long after we bought the Roxy in 1979 we had an open time slot in the calendar, so we decided to bring back the movie "Slap Shot" because it was one of our favorites and a lot of our friends liked it too. It was 2 years old at the time. The print we got was in good shape considering the age of the movie, and we did almost the same kind of business we would have with a much newer movie. And paid $75 for film rent.

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Andrew Thomas
Master Film Handler

Posts: 273
From: Pearland, TX, USA
Registered: Jun 2012

posted 02-20-2015 02:04 PM

The studios will always use dollar figures because it's all about marketing. Having an easy way to guarantee records keep getting broken is fantastic for generating hype.

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