From the WSJ Opinion Archives
LEISURE & ARTS
This Story Has a Happy Ending
Hollywood is doing just fine.
To read some reporting on the film industry over the past six months, you'd think the sky was falling--and the "H" on the "HOLLYWOOD" sign was about to fall off and crash down onto Mulholland Drive. It is true that this year has presented challenges for movie makers, but to paraphrase Mark Twain, reports of the death of our industry have been greatly exaggerated.
Over the past several weeks, millions of people have lined up at theaters around the world to see a boy wizard, a magical lion, a beautiful geisha, an American music legend, the greatest ape of all time, and many others. According to reports last week, this holiday period has shown promising box-office take--an 8% increase compared with the same holiday period last year, in fact. Just two weekends before Christmas, box-office receipts were up 18% compared with the same weekend last year--a clear indication that film companies are answering consumer demand for good movies. Internationally, taken together the three top grossing motion pictures in the box office made more than $110 million, almost double what the three top-grossing pictures in the same weekend of 2004 managed to pull in.
The opening weekend of "The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe" was the biggest debut ever for the comparable weekend and the second highest December opening of all time. "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire" was the 20th film to cross the $700 million mark in world-wide box office. The Johnny Cash biopic "Walk the Line" has grossed $82 million domestically--outstripping last year's biopic masterpiece "Ray." And the numbers for "King Kong" and "Narnia" kept climbing as they were discovered by families on holiday vacations.
This winter's slate of movies is demonstrating Hollywood's unique capacity to produce top-notch entertainment for everyone. "Syriana," "Capote," "Brokeback Mountain" and "Memoirs of a Geisha" have not only received critical acclaim, they continue to attract moviegoers as they open in new theaters throughout the county. And smaller films like "The Squid and the Whale" and "Wolf Creek" are demonstrating their important contribution to bringing in all kinds of audiences. Before the ball dropped in Times Square this New Year's Eve, millions flocked to see comedies like "Cassanova," "Fun With Dick and Jane," "The Producers," "Rumor Has It," and Steven Spielberg's much-anticipated political thriller "Munich." The quality of movies this year has been very promising.
Six motion pictures earned more than $200 million in the domestic box office--"Star Wars: Episode III--Revenge of the Sith," "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire," "War of the Worlds," "Wedding Crashers," "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" and "Batman Begins"--compared with only five movies grossing over $200 million in 2004. And over New Year's weekend, "The Chronicles of Narnia" crossed the $200 million mark as well.
DVD sales are strong. And movies like "Chicken Little" and "The Polar Express" have proved the appeal of the bigger, better visual experience of the biggest screens. "Chicken Little"'s 3-D take has nearly doubled its strong take in 2-D, while "The Polar Express" has made 30% of its total revenue from its IMAX release. The combination of "The Polar Express" and "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire" gave IMAX its biggest grossing weekend ever.
The movie industry continues to reinvent itself--which is why it has remained a constant in people's lives for so long. It is obvious we are never going back to the kind of theater experience I had when I was growing up in Wichita, Kan. Instead we'll see better quality movies on new digital screens and have more access to the films we want to see through the Web and through new, on-demand content delivery services to home entertainment centers, iPods, computers and maybe even cellphones. Technology is empowering filmmakers, which is why the hackneyed "movies vs. technology" storyline is such a false one. After all, the movie industry wants you to see our movies and for that reason we will continue to listen and learn from our audiences.
In the end, our industry is about storytelling--just as it always has been. Good stories married to modern technology will continue to provide powerful entertainment for years to come. And that is the core reason people who love movies have so much to celebrate.
Mr. Glickman is chairman and CEO of the Motion Picture Association of America.
