# of screens for Frozen vs. # of screens for 12 Years a Slave. Fair or not fair?

[AniNate]

Here's the main problem: When the movie industry chooses to make Transformers part 7 or Grown Ups part 5, they are essentially telling us (the audience) that those are the kinds of movies we as the audience want to see.  It is kind of like how when a parent feeds a young child, they can choose to feed the kid McDonald's everyday or they can choose to feed the kid fruits and vegetables.  Either way, the child is going to eat.  And either way, people are going to go to the movies and buy tickets for what is showing.  If the movie industry stopped making 75% of its commercial films be escapism aimed at kids/teenagers, people would still come out to the movies to see intelligent movies or those that are based on true stories.  I do not believe that a movie like 12 Years a Slave or Captain Phillips has a "limited audience" because of its subject matter.  I believe that the industry does not give those movies a chance to succeed, thus they rarely succeed.  (Captain Phillips was a hit, and it was given a lot more screens than 12 Years a Slave).  The industry underestimates the intelligence of the typical moviegoer, and feeds them McDonald's most of the time.

 

You would let a five-year-old child watch a woman being brutally whipped and raped? Ok, then...

[Ando918]

If my accounting is correct, I saw about 23 or 24 movies that were released in 2013.

 

And while Man of Steel has flaws, there are a lot of things that I like a lot about it. I put it in the top 5 because some things really resonated with me. I tend to appreciate films that are daring in some way and try to do interesting things, even if they don't always succeed in those things. Ambitious but flawed will probably top conservative but stable in my book.

 

I mean, Frozen's my #1 film of the year, and I think it has some problems. The lack of prominent non-white people is a big one, and it could have easily been averted.

 

Suffice to say, there are no perfect films. When you get down to it, I'm going to respond to a film emotionally, and the ones that garner a stronger emotional response are going to be the ones I regard better.

I agree with you that movies that attempt to be daring or bold should get bonus points.  I just disagree that Man of Steel was daring.  I thought the script was a rehash of Superman 1 and 2, just going through the motions in a very lazy manner  Visual effects were ugly and a blur to watch, and there were too many of them.  It is semi original that they attempted to make Superman more realistic, but then they went ahead and mixed that with Russell Crowe flying around on a giant cicada.

[Fancyarcher]

I agree with you that movies that attempt to be daring or bold should get bonus points.  I just disagree that Man of Steel was daring.  I thought the script was a rehash of Superman 1 and 2, just going through the motions in a very lazy manner  Visual effects were ugly and a blur to watch, and there were too many of them.  It is semi original that they attempted to make Superman more realistic, but then they went ahead and mixed that with Russell Crowe flying around on a giant cicada.

 

What are you talking about? Are you suggesting that Superman in Superman: The Movie was traveling across America, with a beard and trying to be a Wolverine wannabe?

[a2k]

Here's the main problem: When the movie industry chooses to make Transformers part 7 or Grown Ups part 5, they are essentially telling us (the audience) that those are the kinds of movies we as the audience want to see.  It is kind of like how when a parent feeds a young child, they can choose to feed the kid McDonald's everyday or they can choose to feed the kid fruits and vegetables.  Either way, the child is going to eat.  And either way, people are going to go to the movies and buy tickets for what is showing.  If the movie industry stopped making 75% of its commercial films be escapism aimed at kids/teenagers, people would still come out to the movies to see intelligent movies or those that are based on true stories.  I do not believe that a movie like 12 Years a Slave or Captain Phillips has a "limited audience" because of its subject matter.  I believe that the industry does not give those movies a chance to succeed, thus they rarely succeed.  (Captain Phillips was a hit, and it was given a lot more screens than 12 Years a Slave).  The industry underestimates the intelligence of the typical moviegoer, and feeds them McDonald's most of the time.

 

Yeah when people are starving for entertainment they will consume anything. But then this is a bigger issue about the common view that supply respects the demand, vs. your view to which I adhere to somewhat, that supply can sometimes manipulate demand.

[iceroll]

Here's the main problem: When the movie industry chooses to make Transformers part 7 or Grown Ups part 5, they are essentially telling us (the audience) that those are the kinds of movies we as the audience want to see.  It is kind of like how when a parent feeds a young child, they can choose to feed the kid McDonald's everyday or they can choose to feed the kid fruits and vegetables.  Either way, the child is going to eat.  And either way, people are going to go to the movies and buy tickets for what is showing.  If the movie industry stopped making 75% of its commercial films be escapism aimed at kids/teenagers, people would still come out to the movies to see intelligent movies or those that are based on true stories.  I do not believe that a movie like 12 Years a Slave or Captain Phillips has a "limited audience" because of its subject matter.  I believe that the industry does not give those movies a chance to succeed, thus they rarely succeed.  (Captain Phillips was a hit, and it was given a lot more screens than 12 Years a Slave).  The industry underestimates the intelligence of the typical moviegoer, and feeds them McDonald's most of the time.

I think you have a bad understanding of audiences and box office in general.  The reason why Transformers and Grown Ups make so much money is precisely because people do want to see it.  And it's not like they've been tricked or forced to watch, they liked the originals and tuned in for the sequels.

 

If you look at 12YAS's box office run, you can see that Fox Searchlight tried to give it every opportunity it had to expand, it's still an indie studio and 1474 theaters is the 23rd most number of theaters they've put a film in, out of 146 tracked movies:

http://boxofficemojo.com/studio/chart/?yr=&view=company&view2=allmovies&studio=foxsearchlight.htm&sort=theaters&order=DESC&p=.htm

 

The reason why it didn't get more showings was because even as it opened and expanded in the early stages, the PTA and grosses were not up to par for the type of movie that's supposed to be highly acclaimed and catching everybody's attention.  They did try expanding it but since the grosses were falling and the PTA was around half of what Precious: Based on the Novel "Push" by Sapphire (lol what a name) did they didn't feel the need to push it more at the time and theaters didn't want to give it more showings.  

 

Not everybody wants to watch gritty, dark and depressing movies all the time, post people go to have fun and as an escape.  And the comparison to food is dumb, you're not going to make a kid obese and suffer long-term health risks by bringing them to a showing of The Nut Job...

[BadAtGender]

If 12YAS manages to pull one of the big oscars (Best Picture seems like the best shot), then I'd expect it will then have an expansion, increased audience interest, and gross. But you'll need to wait another month.

[Ando918]

Yeah when people are starving for entertainment they will consume anything. But then this is a bigger issue about the common view that supply respects the demand, vs. your view to which I adhere to somewhat, that supply can sometimes manipulate demand.

Yep.  Take a look at the box office numbers for a very intelligent blockbuster summer movie like The Dark Knight.  Take a look at the box office numbers for a very intelligent summer movie like Spider-Man 2.  Take a look at the box office numbers for a very intelligent summer movie like The Bourne Ultimatum.  Take a look at the box office numbers for Catching Fire.  Over and over and over again, intelligent big budget movies with an artsy feel are very, very successful.  Transformers movies are also really financially successful, too.  But, if you ask audiences who saw those movies which were better, audience members will tell you that the first 4 were much better.  Audiences want more of those.  They want more movies like Lincoln.  They want more movies Captain Phillips.  They want more movies like 12 Years a Slave.  The studios just tend to dumb the industry down and focus on 15 year old White males who love to play video games. 

[Lordmandeep]

You have a narrow point of view.

 

Hollywood has to look at the global audience for making films.

 

Yes Transformers 3 did not make as much as TDK or CF domestic, but it way more overseas.

 

So the point is simply...

 

Hollywood looks at what the global audience wants and they want big epic action movies like TF3 and TA. 

 

Yes films like TDK and CF make a lot of money but so did films like TF3. 

Edited February 1, 2014 by Lordmandeep

[Ball Lightning]

 Audiences want more of those.  They want more movies like Lincoln.  They want more movies Captain Phillips.  They want more movies like 12 Years a Slave.  The studios just tend to dumb the industry down and focus on 15 year old White males who love to play video games. 

 

These are very different films from The Dark Knight, Catching Fire, Spiderman 2 or Bourne. People had plenty of chances to see 12 Years a Slave. It is in 1,200 theatres, which reaches a very large percentage of America. Its PTA was down to $6,000 when it went over 1000 theatres but then fell to $3,000 the next week. People just weren't that into seeing it.

 

Compare that to The Kings Speech. It was roughly in the same situation, It had a slower role out to begin with, but had a $6,000 PTA when it went over 1000 theatres. But it only dropped to $4,500 the next week, with only 100 new theatres unlike 12 Years a Slave which had 400. This was a huge incentive for more theatres to take it on and it went on to 2500 theatres. Still with an average of $4,000+.

 

This is because people wanted to see it. Many of these artsy films just aren't what most movie-goers want to see. They want to escape from the real world, not see depressing true stories. 

[Ando918]

These are very different films from The Dark Knight, Catching Fire, Spiderman 2 or Bourne. People had plenty of chances to see 12 Years a Slave. It is in 1,200 theatres, which reaches a very large percentage of America. Its PTA was down to $6,000 when it went over 1000 theatres but then fell to $3,000 the next week. People just weren't that into seeing it.

 

Compare that to The Kings Speech. It was roughly in the same situation, It had a slower role out to begin with, but had a $6,000 PTA when it went over 1000 theatres. But it only dropped to $4,500 the next week, with only 100 new theatres unlike 12 Years a Slave which had 400. This was a huge incentive for more theatres to take it on and it went on to 2500 theatres. Still with an average of $4,000+.

 

This is because people wanted to see it. Many of these artsy films just aren't what most movie-goers want to see. They want to escape from the real world, not see depressing true stories. 

Of course most moviegoers want escapism and don't want to see true stories.  The problem is that the artsy-leaning movies or true stories make up about 10% of the commercial movies.  80-90% of the movies produced are silly escapism.  Let's not be shocked when we see studies showing that American students' ACT and SAT scores continue to drop....

[BadAtGender]

Of course most moviegoers want escapism and don't want to see true stories.  The problem is that the artsy-leaning movies or true stories make up about 10% of the commercial movies.  80-90% of the movies produced are silly escapism.  Let's not be shocked when we see studies showing that American students' ACT and SAT scores continue to drop....

 

Congratulations. You've discovered Sturgeon's Law.

[baumer]

So here we are once again being told by some film snob what is smart and what's dumb. I think I'm intelligent enough to know what I like and don't like.

[Lordmandeep]

The success of The King Speech that year over the other Oscar films clearly shows the audiences prefer feel good escapism movies. 

[Ando918]

So I'm a film snob because I believe Hollywood makes way too many dumb movies aimed at Michael Bay and Adam Sandler fans....but not enough movies with substance like Lincoln, Captain Phillips, or 12 Years a Slave?  Okay then.  I guess that makes me a film snob.

[AniNate]

So I'm a film snob because I believe Hollywood makes way too many dumb movies aimed at Michael Bay and Adam Sandler fans....but not enough movies with substance like Lincoln, Captain Phillips, or 12 Years a Slave?  Okay then.  I guess that makes me a film snob.

 

I think your frustration is misguided, at least. Bad movies have and always will exist, and you can't just force everyone to watch something more substantive when the primary motive for going to the movies is to kill a couple hours with family/friends/dates.

[baumer]

So I'm a film snob because I believe Hollywood makes way too many dumb movies aimed at Michael Bay and Adam Sandler fans....but not enough movies with substance like Lincoln, Captain Phillips, or 12 Years a Slave?  Okay then.  I guess that makes me a film snob.

 

Dumb movies according to who?  I'm a massive Michael Bay fan and I don't think his films are dumb.  

 

How I choose to spend my money is up to me, I'll not be told what I should see just because it's apparently a smart movie.  

Edited February 1, 2014 by Christmas baumer

[DeeCee]

Hollywood makes a shitload of "worthy" films based on true stories and they get plenty of opportunity to find an audience. The simple fact is they often don't. At least not on the scale of a comic book or young adult novel adaptation.

[The Panda]

Ummm, im not going to even try...

 

Not worth it.

[Ando918]

Hollywood makes a shitload of "worthy" films based on true stories and they get plenty of opportunity to find an audience. The simple fact is they often don't. At least not on the scale of a comic book or young adult novel adaptation.

I completey disagree with you that Hollywood makes a ton of movies based on true stories.  They don't get much of an opportunity to find an audience.  I would love to see a movie like "Lincoln" get a release date in August where it is not competing against other Oscar contenders in December.  I think it would do extremely well in August.  The studios should release more of them throughout the year.  Give them 2,000 screens.  12 Years a Slave now has 1,200 screens, but for the first month of its release it was only getting 600-800 screens.  WTF?  If you give a movie only 700 screens, you can't expect it to ever make much money.

[The Panda]

I completey disagree with you that Hollywood makes a ton of movies based on true stories.  They don't get much of an opportunity to find an audience.  I would love to see a movie like "Lincoln" get a release date in August where it is not competing against other Oscar contenders in December.  I think it would do extremely well in August.  The studios should release more of them throughout the year.  Give them 2,000 screens.  12 Years a Slave now has 1,200 screens, but for the first month of its release it was only getting 600-800 screens.  WTF?  If you give a movie only 700 screens, you can't expect it to ever make much money.

 

You realize Lincoln was very successful, right?