Cinema tickets cost a lot more now than they did decades ago, but the business done decades ago is what was, so why should we apply today's ticket prices to movies that did business in cinemas decades ago in order to perceive the true value of how much they made?
Good and services get more expensive with inflation as time goes on, that's just the way things go.
It isn't a measure of tickets sold, but how much a movie made, and it makes comparisons across time more apples to apples. However, while adjusting for inflation helps with the comparison, it doesn't take into account the rapid growth in the U.S. and world population. Now there are more people that go to movies than 30-40 years ago and that affects box office totals.
Very true. I find it silly to compare simply box office returns even in film of today versus 10 years ago because even if you had a static population, which you don't you still have other factors that come into play. Simply using inflation doesn't account for the change in cinema prices... An inflation adjustment puts yesterday's dollars in an apple to apple with today's dollars, but it still doesn't account for the fact that theaters today even adjusting for inflation charge a lot more on average because the their are more of the luxury theaters today where they charge about double the price but give you the heated reclining seats and serve food and wine while you watch.
To me the most appropriate way to compare how a movie does now veruses one in the past is to look at the percentage of the population that saw the movie... Of course you can't do it on the population of the world you need to stick with one country like the US... look at Gone with the Wind from 1939 to 1942 it sold 59 million tickets.. given the population of the US was 135 million you can work out that assuming people didn't watch it over and over, then 43% of the people saw it... now take a movie like Avatar and 62 million tickets were sold domestically so only a few more tickets sold but when the US population was about 320 million at the time of Avatar you only had 19% of the people possibly watching it. To me that type of an analysis makes more sense because it shows the actual reach a movie had on the population not simply how much did it make which can be influence by things like the price of an IMAX ticket or luxury ticket.
So I would really like to know how many domestic tickets has Star Wars Rise sold in the US... get that number and you can get a better idea of how successful it was compared to other movies. I doubt it has achieved the same penetration numbers as the original even though it is going to make a lot more revenue.
People in 1939 didn't have TV sets or DVDs so it's unfair to compare Gone with the Wind to Avatar. The only way to see movies back then was in the movie theater which explains the large box office.
It's even unfair to compare the original trilogy with the prequels or new trilogy because the SFX and Dolby sound system in 1977 were brand new and people repeatedly went to the theater to experience it which is one of the main reasons why it lasted over a year. Lucas didn't even want to release SW on video or have it shown on TV.
Rise isn't as successful as the original. The buzz isn't there. The originals are innovative, groundbreaking classics. Rise is a forgettable bad POS.
You can always find issues with technology and how it changing impacts how people view media such as films. But what you are ignoring is that Gone with the Wind was viewed by most everyone in the country, Avatar wasn't even if you throw in streaming or DVDs, it just wasn't as popular.
shareSW was very different. Lucas introduced groundbreaking technology and literally revolutionized the moviegoing experience. People were literally returning to see/experience SW numerous times in the theater.
I saw the movie in the theater in 1977 and was literally shocked by what I experienced in the first 5 minutes. The moving sound going from the right side of the theater to the left, and realistic SFX that filled the huge screen. It's very difficult to express the emotion, but I literally heard people gasping in the theater.
I never said Avatar was popular and personally I don't like the movie. But, if a person wanted to see Gone with the Wind in the 1930s, their only option was to go to the theater. I often won't go to the theater to see a movie because I know it will be released on DVD in a few months. And let's face it, people illegally download too. BTW, Gone with the Wind was also being released in the movie theater over the decades. I saw it when I was 6 years old as a rerelease in the theater. I hated it.
Well aware that Gone with the Wind has been in and out of theaters since the time it was first released. That was why only used the number of people that went in the first 4 years of its release. I quite certain you would have a much higher number if you were to use everyone that has ever seen it. I'm also aware that you could only see it in a theater as it wasn't broadcast on TV until the mid 70's. You can add in the sales of Avatar in the US and your number only goes up by about 10 million. Of course I seriously doubt that most of those sales were to people that hadn't seen the movie, probably a majority were people that had already seen it... but even if you assumed they were all new eyes you still fail to get the penetration of Gone with the Wind. My point is simply that using the current box office revenue even when adjusting for inflation is a poor way to compare movies. I'm sure when the population of the US double that you will have movies making more money than Avatar probably seen by more people that saw Avatar but still not really getting the same level of penetration and that is the problem with comparisons that leave out the percent of viewers.
shareAmerican studios are more money-oriented so they use dollars for stats. I've seen foreign countries use tickets sold.
I just found out that Gone with the Wind was popular because it was one of the first technicolor movies. That makes sense. People would've wanted to see the new technology.
It's playing in the theaters now! Go figure!
It was an early color film, but by no means the first. Technicolor movies had been coming out for 2 or 3 years before Gone with the Wind, and the novelty didn't help bad movies get an audience... Tom Sawyer was a technicolor film in 1938 that was based on a book which was probably more well known than Gone with the Wind at the time but it had terrible results at the box office and lost money... Then Wizard of Oz came out in 1939 and failed to make a profit... I don't think it was the novelty of the color that got the audience to watch Gone with the Wind, probably had a lot more to do with good marketing when it was first released and then followed up with word of mouth which is why it floated around in various forms for about 4 years when it was first released.
shareMy mother saw it when it first came out and believed my brother and I would be in tears while watching it so she gave us handkerchiefs just before sending us off to the theater. That didn't happen. I never asked her why she liked the movie so much.
Wizard of Oz = Thumbs up!
I've tried to watch Gone with the Wind but couldn't sit through it, to this day I don't understand why it was such a big deal at the time. I have to wonder if part of it was because of the depression era that gave people a greater desire to escape to a different time.
shareIt's complicated. My parents generation grew up during the Depression and referred to it repeatedly as the Good Old Days. To fully understand the movie's popularity, we'd have to live at that time. It's not just the movie, but the era. WWII began in 1939, too.
My wild guesses re: popularity:
I know Clark Gable was a huge sex symbol, there was romance in it, endurance from hardship theme (Depression, WWII), award-winning quality, very epic with technicolor (a visual treat), escapism, very dramatic, strong characters esp. Scarlet O'Hara, etc.
Olivia de Havilland is 103 y.o..
However, while adjusting for inflation helps with the comparison, it doesn't take into account the rapid growth in the U.S. and world population. Now there are more people that go to movies than 30-40 years ago and that affects box office totals.
It shows which film had a bigger cultural impact. Therefore when ignorant people like yourself attempt to say the prequels had a bigger cultural impact than the Disney Star Wars that can get shut down immediately.
shareIt's pointless to keep baiting me with the Star Wars Prequels, MF505, since I've decided I no longer care about anything Star Wars-related anymore. I actually threw out ALL of my SW Blu-rays before the end of last year, I just lost interest and I didn't like what the Sequels were, neither. The lore and rules of the SW universe have altered so much, and are so finicky, I just hate the inconsistencies, and I certainly don't like any of the new characters. So yeah, Star Wars has already died for me.
Good I am glad you lost interest in Star Wars. It is a trash franchise anyway. As it stands though the Disney films are better received than the prequels. Whether you like it or not.
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