The L.A. Times has an article in today's paper speculating as to why some big budget films are failing at the box office this summer. Fine, as far as it goes. 

Not so fine: the headline, "Summer movie season cooling off"; and the basic premise of the article.

The summer movie season is more than halfway over and a vacation season that started off hot -- "Star Trek," "The Hangover," "Up" -- has now cooled considerably. Despite the fast start to the year's ticket sales, seasonal returns are now up only 5% since May 1, compared with a year ago.

Note the cooling:

 Week          Week Gross
05/01/09    $195,511,586
05/08/09    $201,198,958
05/15/09    $194,370,510
05/22/09    $261,111,146
05/29/09    $228,989,406
06/05/09    $245,386,286
06/12/09    $210,723,390
06/19/09    $309,316,760
06/26/09    $347,733,194
07/03/09    $213,036,839
 
The current week should conclude with about $260 million total.

In other words, the Times article gets its facts wrong. It also gets its interpretation wrong and in the same paragraph. The fast start to 2009's box office came largely in comparison to a weak start to 2008 with box office up 9.4%. The seemingly smaller 5% advantage for summer 09 vs. summer 08 is purely a function of comparing this year's summer session to the second highest-grossing summer in hitory. 

It would be like comparing a straight-set 6-0, 6-0, 6-0 victory over my 79 year-old mother to a five set win over Roger Federer that went to a tie-breaker and suggesting maybe I've lost a step.

And for those keeping score at home, summer 2009 is also ahead of the record summer of 2007 by roughly 1%. Brrrr.

NPD's "Entertainment Trends in America" reports that nearly 80 percent of frequent moviegoers plan to go to the theater the same amount or more often than they did last year, despite news about a declining U.S. economy. Even among infrequent moviegoers (those who attend movies once or twice within three months) 57 percent plan to hold steady, or even increase, their attendance this year. (emphasis mine)

Taken from a sample of more than 11,000 consumers, the report notes certain factors that drive consumers to the movies:

The top reason cited by consumers who intend to go to the movies more often this year is the social experience of going with family, friends, or significant others (73 percent). Nearly half (48 percent) pointed to the overall "movie-theater experience" (e.g., large screen, sound systems, etc.) as a primary reason they like to watch movies in the theater.

Makes sense - and it's something we've been saying here quite a lot. Something else we've been saying - home entertainment technologies are not a threat to moviegoing. Movie theaters and home entertainment are complementary. People who love movies are promiscuous. They'll watch movies over and over and in many different ways.

According to NPD's report, frequent moviegoers are 20 percent more likely than the average movie-ticket buyer to purchase DVDs of recent theatrical releases. They are also 60 percent more likely to rent a movie downloaded from the Web, and 40 percent more likely to purchase a movie as a digital download.

We don't expect frisky movie-goers to confine their love solely to the movie theater. But we do believe in serial monogamy - the preservation of the theatrical release window. 

To sum up, the sky is not falling, movie theaters continue to not die. Will the Wall Street Journal report it? "Buehler...? Buehler...?"

Betsy Schiffman, writing for Wired's Epicenter blog, does the digging that the Wall Street Journal neglected.

What is surprising is that the industry isn't showing signs of a slowdown. In fact, this may shape up to be the second consecutive record-breaking summer at the box office. To some extent, inflation helps explain the phenomenon (rising prices drives up box office grosses), but that doesn't explain strong attendance numbers.

In actually researching the story that the Journal couldn't be bothered with, Schiffman went to the trouble of contacting NATO for our reaction to the story. I link to her story not only because yours truly is extensively quoted, but because Betsy Schiffman did what reporters are paid to do: get both sides of the story.

So don't ignore the Journal article because I think it's one-sided and inaccurate. Read it. Then read the Wired post and The Reel Blog post commenting on the Journal article. Agree or dsagree, at least you'll have enough information to come to a sensible conclusion.

A commenter on the Epicenter blog notes that ticket prices in Southern California run @ $10.50. This is generally the case for an adult admission at prime movie-going times. You can go for much less at a matinee and in areas outside the big cities. The average ticket prices cited historically were derived in the same way - the $2.23 average price from 1977 ($8.03 adjusted for inflation) was not the top ticket price then,  just the average. The same kind of gap betwen the top price you would pay in 1977 and the average price existed then, too.

Using as its jumping-off point a study by Interpret LLC, the article contends that people may be giving up movie-going in favor of staying home. The proof? Interpret asked 1,000 people, in addition to whether they are seeing more or fewr movies in theaters, 'if they had decided not to buy one of seven specific items in the last six months because of "concern over the economy," more respondents chose movie ticket than a range of options, including a car, DVD, videogame system and house.'

Comparing putting off seeing a movie because of money concerns to putting off buying a house or car? How many people were contemplating buying a house or car to begin with? People consider going to a movie weekly - if not more often.

The article retails some conventional wisdom that just doesn't hold up. "Those consumer behaviors are reflected in part at the box office, where any increases in ticket revenue in recent years have been largely attributable to higher ticket prices. Actual attendance has usually declined."

Some facts: Over 16 years, admissions declined five times and rose eleven times. Three of those years were recent. The past two years have been modest increases.