Since it opened on July 18th, all anyone can talk about regarding movies is The Dark Knight. Heath ledger's performance. Christian Bale's rough batman growl. Those record-breaking box office receipts. Without a doubt, The Dark Knight has gained more hype and praise for any movie to come along easily since The Lord of the Rings trilogy, and maybe since Titanic.
Yet with all the hype surrounding The Dark Knight, it seems as if the rest of the releases over the course of August have failed miserably in the wake of the Batman franchise behemoth. While Warner Bros. is doing a happy dance, see why everyone else is kicking themselves, after the jump!
August has traditionally never been the strongest month for summer box-office, yet in recent years, several films have learned that the desire for summer entertainment certainly stretches into the final month of warm weather. Films such as the last two Bourne films, Superbad, The 40 Year-Old Virgin, Talladega Nights, Rush Hour 3, and Wedding Crashers, all easily crossed $100 million and were considered great successes.
This year however, seems to be different. The film closest to crossing the $100 million mark is The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, which will barely cross the mark, and will do so while paling in comparison to the greater successes of its predecessors (and its $140 million budget). Even having excellent word-of-mouth seems to have failed, as comedies Pineapple Express and Tropic Thunder will both struggle to see $100 million grosses. Considering Express's modest budget, there's no shame in that, but compared to previous summers where comedies have dominated August, the numbers put forth by both Express and Thunder are troublesome.
But is The Dark Knight to blame? Partially. Lots of things can be blamed for the lack of success for many movies in August. Heinous reviews for The Mummy. The hard-sell satire of Thunder. Stoners actually don't go to theatres to see stoner movies, so they're waiting for DVD to see Express. The Olympics. Yet all of these films are targeted by The Dark Knight demographic of young males, so would they have had bigger opening grosses if The Dark Knight wasn't so huge? You bet.
Some think that a big movie doesn't hinder others, but helps them, kind of like "well, The Dark Knight is sold out, let's go see Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants 2". This happened with the hoopla surrounding Titanic, as it helped other films, such as Good Will Hunting and As Good As It Gets, push their grosses past $100 million by simply getting people to actually trek to a theatre. Why this hasn't happened with The Dark Knight is a mystery. My best guess is that in summer (unlike with Titanic's winter release), with so many films being action-CGI-spectaculars all going for the same demographic, people just decided to go see the one of quality, instead of the one where Brendan Fraser is fighting the same thing we saw him fight back in 2000.
Or maybe people just thought all of the other August movies were a load of crap. After all, who greenlit Mirrors?
Yet with all the hype surrounding The Dark Knight, it seems as if the rest of the releases over the course of August have failed miserably in the wake of the Batman franchise behemoth. While Warner Bros. is doing a happy dance, see why everyone else is kicking themselves, after the jump!
August has traditionally never been the strongest month for summer box-office, yet in recent years, several films have learned that the desire for summer entertainment certainly stretches into the final month of warm weather. Films such as the last two Bourne films, Superbad, The 40 Year-Old Virgin, Talladega Nights, Rush Hour 3, and Wedding Crashers, all easily crossed $100 million and were considered great successes.
This year however, seems to be different. The film closest to crossing the $100 million mark is The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, which will barely cross the mark, and will do so while paling in comparison to the greater successes of its predecessors (and its $140 million budget). Even having excellent word-of-mouth seems to have failed, as comedies Pineapple Express and Tropic Thunder will both struggle to see $100 million grosses. Considering Express's modest budget, there's no shame in that, but compared to previous summers where comedies have dominated August, the numbers put forth by both Express and Thunder are troublesome.
But is The Dark Knight to blame? Partially. Lots of things can be blamed for the lack of success for many movies in August. Heinous reviews for The Mummy. The hard-sell satire of Thunder. Stoners actually don't go to theatres to see stoner movies, so they're waiting for DVD to see Express. The Olympics. Yet all of these films are targeted by The Dark Knight demographic of young males, so would they have had bigger opening grosses if The Dark Knight wasn't so huge? You bet.
Some think that a big movie doesn't hinder others, but helps them, kind of like "well, The Dark Knight is sold out, let's go see Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants 2". This happened with the hoopla surrounding Titanic, as it helped other films, such as Good Will Hunting and As Good As It Gets, push their grosses past $100 million by simply getting people to actually trek to a theatre. Why this hasn't happened with The Dark Knight is a mystery. My best guess is that in summer (unlike with Titanic's winter release), with so many films being action-CGI-spectaculars all going for the same demographic, people just decided to go see the one of quality, instead of the one where Brendan Fraser is fighting the same thing we saw him fight back in 2000.
Or maybe people just thought all of the other August movies were a load of crap. After all, who greenlit Mirrors?
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