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M O N D AY, M A R C H 1 9 , 2 0 0 7Movie Box Office Is ExplodingHollywood is getting off to a great start at the box office, when Janthrough March is usually a dead zone. "300" has grossed $125 millionand could hit $175 to $200 million. John Travolta's "Wild Hogs" is over$100 mil and should hit $150 mil. Nicolas Cage's "Ghost Rider" cost ahefty $120 mil, but for a movie they effectively dumped, it's going tomake about $125 million and went from an expected flop to a moviethat will bring a profit. I'm not sure how the budget works out for"Norbit," but it is just a shade under $100 mil. And "Bridge ToTerabithia" is a definite word of mouth hit at $75 mil for a no-starsfamily flick. "Music and Lyrics" is just at about $50 mil, another moviethat opened so-so but had good word of mouth and can now expect tobe profitable thanks to a good run and presumably strong DVD sales.So, we've already got three $100 mil+ hits, and break-out indie flickwith "Terabithia" and a solid Eddie Murphy grosser. That's a lot ofsuccess stories so early in 2007.It all reminds me of a story that slipped by while I was away. The headof the MPAA addressed ShoWest and banged the drum for howsuccessful movies have been. Don't believe anyone who tells youmovies are struggling because of some year-to-year comparison orrising budgets. It doesn't get simpler than this look at admissions:The 1970s -- 980 million admissions average per yearThe 1980s -- 1.1 billion admissions average per yearThe 1990s -- 1.3 billion admissions average per yearThe 2000s -- 1.5 billion admissions average per yearDid you catch that? Decade by decade, movie admissions have steadilyincreased, with the 2000s averaging 50% more tickets sold than in the70s. How can anyone think movies are in trouble? Usually becausethey're stupid or compare one year to a previous year. Even if theprevious year set all sorts of records, they think it's a disaster if themovies don't ALWAYS gross more than the year before. That should beimpossible. But the simple truth is that in the long term the businessHAS been growing steadily, decade by decade.Now here's something more to keep in mind. In the 70s, the overseasNext Blog»sal1mineo@hotmail.comSEARCH BLOG FLAG BLOGFOLLOW BLOGP O P S U R F I N G . C O MS U R F I N G T H E WAV E S O F P O P U L A R C U LT U R EB Y M I C H A E L G I LT Z & F R I E N D SPOPSURFING.COM: Movie Box Office Is Explodinghttp://popsurfing.blogspot.com/2007/03/movie-box-office-is-ex...
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POPSURFING.COM: Movie Box Office Is Explodinghttp://popsurfing.blogspot.com/2007/03/movie-box-office-is-ex...
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