James Cameron's AVATAR discussion thread

[barbelith]

Because Hollywood doesn't give two ____s about the adjusted for inflation, just nerds.

Let's put your money where your mouth is. I'll give you $100 and you can give me $100 in 1939 dollars adjusted for inflation.

You're completely missing the point. The studios behind Avatar are thrilled with its box office. Nobody else is making money like that right now. But to pretend it's the biggest haul ever is just asinine, and if they had the choice of two box offices you can bet they'd rather have the one that's three times larger in real terms. Nobody's saying that's a realistic option or that the studios are unhappy with the grosses. It's an academic point about perspective.

Same people will be having this same conversation in 20 years when the next HUGE movie comes out.

We had this conversation two years ago. And with inflation and the expansion of 3D and IMAX we're probably going to be having it again in just a few years.

 

[Something Sexy]

Let's put your money where your mouth is. I'll give you $100 and you can give me $100 in 1939 dollars adjusted for inflation.

You're completely missing the point. The studios behind Avatar are thrilled with its box office. Nobody else is making money like that right now. But to pretend it's the biggest haul ever is just asinine, and if they had the choice of two box offices you can bet they'd rather have the one that's three times larger in real terms. Nobody's saying that's a realistic option or that the studios are unhappy with the grosses. It's an academic point about perspective.



We had this conversation two years ago. And with inflation and the expansion of 3D and IMAX we're probably going to be having it again in just a few years.

I don't think you are getting the point. Like someone pointed out. Times have changed, movies have change, Hollywood has changed the way we see and view movies has changed. You can't compare that movie to a modern movie anymore. Do you think we should compare Gone with the Wind to movies that will come out in 20 years when we can see it instantly at home instead of having to go the the theater? Of course not.

Once again, you are living in the past.

This is NOW and unless you have a time machine, well your ____ out of luck.

 

[barbelith]

How so? How can that be definitive when you can watch a movie on TV, on a video cassette, on a disc, on a phone, projected onto the side of your neighbor's house etc.?

My mistake - I thought you were talking about theatrical performance.

The only way to paint an accurate picture of a film's popularity is to look at the big picture and that big picture shows that "Gone with the Wind" had more than a few advantages over modern movies.

I wonder if we will be seeing parodies of Avatar forty years later on the future equivalent of the Carol Burnett show.

Also, I'd be willing to bet that the various rights holders of both "GWtW" and "TWoO" (primarily MGM, Turner Entertainment and now Warner Bros.) have made a lot more money off of the latter over the decades, initial box office performance be damned.

You're probably right, and of course nobody has said anything to the contrary. But consider too that Avatar merchandise doesn't really seem to be moving. I don't think this is an avenue worth pursuing if the point is holding up Avatar as a broader victor.

 

[GuruAskew]

As far as I'm concerned the past 70 years have proven that "Gone with the Wind" isn't even the most popular movie directed by Victor Fleming in 1939, let alone the most popular movie of all time.

 

[barbelith]

I don't think you are getting the point.

In other words, you're not willing to put your money where your mouth is. Thought not.

 

[barbelith]

As far as I'm concerned the past 70 years have proven that "Gone with the Wind" isn't even the most popular movie directed by Victor Fleming in 1939, let alone the most popular movie of all time.

I agree. Actually I think the most popular movie of all time is probably Star Wars, although The Wizard of Oz has a good claim. Neither have anything to fear from Avatar in the pop culture impact stakes, I suspect.

 

[Something Sexy]

In other words, you're not willing to put your money where your mouth is. Thought not.

Well no ____ I would take that money from 1939, but like I said...unless you have some magic machine or a flux capacitor...that question was useless and proved nothing.

Fox studios...do you think they are sitting there and thinking the same thing? Hell no, they care ABOUT NOW. Which is my point. You can say that about anything. Gee if I would have invested more money in Microsoft early on I would be a lot richer now.

 

[Something Sexy]

My point being, no one in Hollywood is sitting there hoping that there movie beats the adjusted for inflation scale. They want to beat the studio down the road for that year, or maybe even for that decade.

 

[barbelith]

Well no ____ I would take that money from 1939, but like I said...unless you have some magic machine or a flux capacitor...that question was useless and proved nothing.

Well no, it proves that Gone With the Wind performed better than Avatar has so far in real dollar terms. Whether that's relevant to anything is a separate matter. I happen to think it's relevant to the question of "What movie is the box office champ?"

I've never said anything about the reasons for the haul, nor disputing that we're looking at very different theatrical landscapes. You're arguing with a straw man.

 

[barbelith]

My point being, no one in Hollywood is sitting there hoping that there movie beats the adjusted for inflation scale. They want to beat the studio down the road for that year, or maybe even for that decade.

I don't think anybody disagrees.

 

[Something Sexy]

I don't think anybody disagrees.

Well then not sure what any of this conversation was about because that is what I was saying from the beginning.

 

[GuruAskew]

No, I'm arguing with this statement that you made:

The bean counters will be looking at those impressive nominal dollars, but you can be sure they'd much rather have the real dollars Gone With the Wind raked in.

which is totally wrong because as I've said numerous times, "Avatar" has all sorts of ancillary means of making money that don't really apply to "Gone with the Wind". Back then it was all about box office but when it comes to how the studios make their money today "Gone with the Wind" really doesn't have much of a presence. Compared to other movies from the 20's, 30's and 40's it does pretty well but as I said before, you look at something like home video you can rest assured that "Gone with the Wind" can't complete with things like "Terminator: Salvation" and "Transformers 2".

 

[LChinoz]

Once again, you are living in the past.

I wonder if we will be seeing parodies of Avatar forty years later on the future equivalent of the Carol Burnett show.

Classic........

 

[GuruAskew]

At the end of the day I don't think any studio is pining away for the old days when box office was really their only source of income and copies of a movie wouldn't necessarily even be preserved if it tanked at the box office because that was the end of the line. I kinda doubt that they're too upset about the current state of their industry. There are obviously concerns over piracy and things but ultimately this diversified system works better than the primitive conditions when "Gone with the Wind" was released.

 

[barbelith]

...which is totally wrong because as I've said numerous times, "Avatar" has all sorts of ancillary means of making money that don't really apply to "Gone with the Wind".

Except that it does, because all of the avenues of ancillary revenue generation are open to both movies. It's true that Gone with the Wind didn't have those avenues available to it at the time, but if you're asking for a wholesale revision of how we account for a film's performance to include these things ... let's just say it'll take a better man than me to figure out how to compute that.

None of which is relevant anyway, because this discussion is only happening because Hollywood is currently in its "Avatar is the biggest movie of all time" hype phase. That title refers exclusively to theatrical box office and in real terms it's a false win in that context.

Now if we want to add home video and merchandising and cable and the like into the total hauls we can certainly do that, and no doubt everything will fall to Star Wars. I'm not even sure how we'd calculate that kind of thing, but hopefully Avatar will make enough in that department to offset the utterly massive gap in real box office and "reclaim" the title for people who have a stake in it doing so.

 

[barbelith]

Classic...

The point is that 40 years later Gone with the Wind was such a popular classic it could be referenced in a sketch comedy show and everybody got it. I wonder if Avatar will enjoy that sort of pop culture longevity.

 

[The Ween]

https://movies.yahoo.com/feature/forbes-avatar-box-office-king.html

 

[LChinoz]

At the end of the day I don't think any studio is pining away for the old days when box office was really their only source of income and copies of a movie wouldn't necessarily even be preserved if it tanked at the box office because that was the end of the line. I kinda doubt that they're too upset about the current state of their industry. There are obviously concerns over piracy and things but ultimately this diversified system works better than the primitive conditions when "Gone with the Wind" was released.

They never are. Studios only care about making a profit. This was true back in those days too. 20th Century Fox is very happy that Avatar is, for all intensive purposes, the all-time box office king. Any debate about real dollars and inflation is not being had by studios or most movie goers.

 

[barbelith]

I kinda doubt that they're too upset about the current state of their industry. There are obviously concerns over piracy and things but ultimately this diversified system works better than the primitive conditions when "Gone with the Wind" was released.

It's interesting, because it seems to work less well for the biggest hits (look where Avatar sits on the adjusted box office chart and then consider how truly massive those films must have been). But it's clearly a better model for most films, and home video has been a boon.

There is a lot of concern in Hollywood about the state of the industry, and actually 3D is a direct reaction to that. The entire point is to create an experience that can't be replicated outside of the theater, which raises some intriguing questions about the future of home video.

 

[barbelith]

20th Century Fox is very happy that Avatar is, for all intensive purposes, the all-time box office king. Any debate about real dollars and inflation is not being had by studios or most movie goers.

Right. But many people believing a thing doesn't make it so. Avatar is the box office king in nominal terms only. A victory to be sure, but a misleading one.