Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Family fare

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Posted by Charles Everett (Member # 889) on 07-07-2002, 12:25 PM:

This continues a discussion started on another thread.

Family fare has been doing surprisingly well in recent months. The family fare lineup from November through late June proves this true -- Monsters, Inc. (smash), Harry Potter (smash), Jimmy Neutron (broke even), Snow Dogs (broke even), Big Fat Liar (hit), Return to Neverland (broke even), Ice Age (smash), Clockstoppers (stiff), Spirit (stiff), Scooby-Doo (hit), Lilo & Stitch (hit). Not to mention non-family fare with kid appeal: E.T. (flop), The Rookie (hit), The Scorpion King (broke even), Spider-Man (biggest smash of the year), Men in Black 2 (likely will break even). And the summer isn't over yet -- there's a family-friendly picture every week for the next 5 weeks.

Now the family fare has hit a rough spot. Hey Arnold! and The Powerpuff Girls are tanking. Like Mike is doing OK in cities but not in suburbs/rural areas.

My regular theater, the Reading Cinemas in Manville NJ, loads up on family fare and usually does well with it. This weekend it didn't do well due to product quality and the Fourth of July.

If your theater runs family fare or anything with kid appeal, how large is your turnout?

Posted by Dennis Benjamin (Member # 1137) on 07-07-2002, 01:38 PM:

Here in downtown Las Vegas -the family movies do much better than expected. We are also running free kiddie shows on Thursday mornings and finding them to be quite successful. I believe the reason could be linked to the fact that 95% of all the theatres in town are attached to Casinos - which is a family deterrent. In order to get to the theatre in those locations you have to literally walk through a casino.

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"Running through life at 24 frames per second"

Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 07-07-2002, 03:59 PM:

I think films like "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone," "Monsters Inc." and "Ice Age" naturally have a built-in audience. The Harry Potter book series has done so well it would have been difficult for the film not to be a hit.

But films like "Harry Potter" make up a very small minority of film relases overall. I'll see regular live-action family oriented films come and go with very little support. "Hey Arnold" is not a bad film, but it just isn't getting well supported even though it is an animated film.

Probably the most ridiculous thing is how the Carmike 8 theater here in Lawton will actually book and play a religious oriented independent film and hardly anyone from all these church groups even shows up at all to support it. These are the same people complaining about all the PG-13 and R rated films. And yet when something live-action and G-rated plays, people stay away in droves.

A good example would be David Lynch's "The Straight Story." I have to say this G-rated movie is quite arguably one of the best films made in the past few years. The late Richard Farnsworth put in a great performance. But was this movie a hit? Nope.

I just think it is pretty typical of many Americans to whine and gripe about a problem and then actually contribute to that problem. It is like they have one standard of right and wrong for the general public and then a completely different standard for themselves. This is a very generalized observation about our culture on the whole, but I do think it lends itself to some of the hypocrisy happening in what kinds of movies Hollywood produces.

The way our culture works is you vote with your dollars. If someone really has a problem with R-rated stuff that person needs to take a stand and buy/rent/watch a lot less of it and shift his habits over to that family fare. Hollywood is making some family oriented movies, just not all that many.

Posted by Charles Everett (Member # 889) on 07-07-2002, 05:20 PM:

"Hollywood is making some family oriented movies, just not all that many."

We're in the middle of a 9-week cycle with at least one new family-friendly title every week. This cycle began with Scooby-Doo on 6/14 and ends with Spy Kids 2 on 8/7.

Bobby: Disney handled The Straight Story as an arthouse release.

Posted by David Stambaugh (Member # 1102) on 07-07-2002, 05:47 PM:

I don't think there's any shortage of family films, or of public support for them. Of all the titles currently/still playing in theaters, the top 10 grossers include:

1. Spiderman ($395M)
2. Lord of the Rings ($312M)
3. SW: Ep2 ($286M)
4. Ice Age ($175M)
5. Scooby Doo ($124M)
8. Lilo & Stitch ($77M)
9. The Rookie ($74M)

Now not all of these are suitable for 5-year-olds, but most of them play well to families with kids who are, say, 8-10 and older. MIIB is PG-13 and clearly siphoned off a lot of the younger customers this weekend, to the detriment of Like Mike.

Minority Report and Bourne Identity seemed slightly toned-down from what they might have originally been, in order to get a PG-13. Either could have easily warranted an R if that's what the makers had wanted. I noticed Minority Report had a character clearly mouthing the f-word but the dialog was replaced with something milder.

Posted by Mitchell Cope (Member # 32) on 07-07-2002, 07:57 PM:

Don't forget "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" which is rated PG. This film is getting excellent word of mouth and averaged $4061 per screen in its 11th week. Not bad. By the way, what is a film called whose target audience is adults but whose rating is PG? Is that Family Fare?

Posted by Peter Kerchinsky (Member # 1098) on 07-08-2002, 05:24 AM:

Howdy all-----
I can hardly wait for "Stuart Little 2".
We've been running about 3 different versions of the trailers and I've watched them at every show. The long trailer is the best one.
I believe this is going to be the "family fare" smash of the summer.
My grandkids can hardly wait also. Talk about WOM.

Posted by Mike Spaeth (Member # 524) on 07-08-2002, 11:39 AM:

At my discount theater family fare does MUCH better than regular fare (w/ the exception of urban-appeal films w/ crossover, i.e. Training Day, John Q).

For 2001, the top 10 films at my theater were:

Charlie's Angels
The Mummy Returns
Shrek
Training Day
Princess Diaries
Cast Away
Rush Hour 2
Save The Last Dance
Dr. Dolittle 2
Miss Congeniality

For 2002 thus far the list looks like:

Monsters, Inc.
John Q
Big Fat Liar
Snow Dogs
Scorpion King
Black Knight
Lord Of The Rings
Harry Potter
Panic Room
Clockstoppers

Posted by Thomas Procyk (Member # 1170) on 07-08-2002, 07:44 PM:

I noticed a lot of theaters weren't running a full set of Powerpuff Girls. (most had their final showing as early as 6:30) This is disappointing when older "kids" (like me) want to see a kid's flick but avoid the matinee shows and all the talking/screaming/crying that goes with them. But when there is no evening show...

That could have possibly boosted the box office some. Only one theater in my area (an independent) was running a full set.

=TMP=

Posted by Steve Scott (Member # 630) on 07-09-2002, 12:41 AM:

In my experience the families go early and they go once. Except in the case of huge animated hits like Monsters Inc.. Even Harry Potter died down after two weeks at my old place. Lilo and Stitch was packed, but I think Disney wants to build up hype for the movies so they can sell the toys, and then the home video.

Posted by Mike Spaeth (Member # 524) on 07-09-2002, 01:18 PM:

Thomas -

The reason for the matinee sets only were because WB (the distributor) said the last show had to start at 6:30 or later, thus allowing a double for the last show of another picture that would do more business in the evening that would have been final otherwise (in many cases, this picture was Juwanna Mann, another WB picture).

Posted by John Pytlak (Member # 331) on 07-09-2002, 03:46 PM:

Peter said: "I can hardly wait for "Stuart Little 2".
We've been running about 3 different versions of the trailers and I've watched them at every show. The long trailer is the best one.
I believe this is going to be the "family fare" smash of the summer.
My grandkids can hardly wait also. Talk about WOM."

"Stuart Little 2" is special for another reason: it used "Digital Intermediate" scanned and output at 4K resolution.
http://www.kodak.com/US/en/motion/newsletters/inCamera/july2002/stuartLittle.shtml

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John P. Pytlak, Senior Technical Specialist
Worldwide Technical Services, Entertainment Imaging
Research Labs, Building 69, Room 7525A
Rochester, New York, 14650-1922 USA
Tel: +1 585 477 5325 Cell: +1 585 781 4036 Fax: +1 585 722 7243
e-mail: john.pytlak@kodak.com
Web site: http://www.kodak.com/go/motion

Posted by Charles Everett (Member # 889) on 07-09-2002, 05:32 PM:

Mike S took the words out of my mouth -- matinees and 1st evening show only for The Powerpuff Girls, even in NYC. Paramount is doing the same thing with Hey Arnold!

Posted by Brad Haven (Member # 954) on 07-11-2002, 11:04 AM:

I work for an arthouse/crossover cinema and we just opened "bend it like beckham", just in time for the school holiday's. Normally we dont show kids/family films at all and i wouldn't even call this a kids film, but it's turned out to be a MASSIVE hit!.
The film is rated 'pg' (recomended parental guidance for under 15) and the main audience for us has been kids/families ( av 10-16years old). We just wish that they would give the kids a few more weeks off school so we can keep up this good business!