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.

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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.

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More impressively, "Overall, ticket sales continued to outperform last summer for the fourth weekend in a row. The weekend's estimated $139 million was up 6% from the comparable weekend last year, when "Evan Almighty" led the list with an opening take of $31.2 million, according to Nielsen EDI. As a result, summer boxoffice is now running 3% ahead of last summer."

This box office performance comes without a single movie with a "3" in the title.

The comparisons for the rest of the summer remain tough:

The 2008 summer films listed represent only my guess of likely suspects for comparison to 2007. There will be the usual box office disappointments and surprises. Nobody really knows anything until the audience shows up.

What are your guesses for summer box office contenders?

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Before getting outside the box office, they get right into it:

THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER: Will summer 2008 set another new boxoffice record?

CAMPBELL: We have a strong slate of films this summer, but what you’re missing is what I’d call the three money-in-the bank films you saw last year in May. There’s a lot of diversity in product this summer, but will it be a record summer? I can’t say that.

FITHIAN: This year we have a few more unknowns. Some of those will surprise on the upside and some on the downside.

THR: And the year?

CAMPBELL: What I would say about the fourth quarter is that last year that was our weakest quarter, so on a comparable basis I think there’s more powerful product in that quarter of this year.

FITHIAN: I don’t disagree at all. I think it’s also important to remember we are coming off two up years in a row.

 On ratings:

THR: Exhibitors tend to like less restrictive ratings, yet there continues to be a regular flow of R-rated movies. Are you OK with that?

CAMPBELL: From a selfish, economic point of view as an exhibitor, we do better with PG and PG-13 films, and on any given year you generally see 17 or 18 of the top 20 films as PG or PG-13. There is still a place for R-rated films, but we do better at the boxoffice and at the concessions with PG and PG-13 films.

FITHIAN: I am mystified why everybody in Hollywood wants to be Quentin Tarantino instead of trying to sell movie tickets.

 
THR: Any other specific advice for Hollywood on the kind of pictures they should make?

FITHIAN: More family titles of any genre. When you take an action film and decided to make it PG-13 instead of R, it does better. And in most cases, if you have a comedy and decide to make it PG-13 it does better, although there certainly is a role for the harder-edge comedies as well. But as the father of a 5-year-old, there are times I am looking to go to the movies with my child and can’t.

Year-round movie-going: 

THR: You like to encourage “ 12-month releasing.” Isn’t there a limit to how many tentpoles can open while school is in session?

FITHIAN: Yes, but we’re still doing it wrong. Virtually every school in the country is still in session the first weekend in May, and the biggest movies in 2007 were released over the first weekend in May. Yet we leave April almost entirely off the table, and the circumstances of school are very similar in April and May.

There are only so many blockbusters you can tolerate in the year, but in summer when they are so close together we are losing money. With those huge titles last May, we lost— in my estimation —$50 million$100 million because we had them all in one month. If one of those had been in April, I think we would have made a lot more money.

CAMPBELL: We could increase the boxoffice several percentage points by having a release schedule that was spread a little more evenly.

Read the rest here. 

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