islandclaws

What are your thoughts on Prometheus, then? It's certainly going to be the most original tentpole film of this year.

banthafett

Wife and I, and kids went today (Tues) for the first showing of the day at noon. Biggest crowd Ive ever seen on a school day. Had great fun with it and so did the family.

Reading this thread, Im still amazed and still dont understand how the hell Avatar made that much. Still think there was some fixing of some numbers with that turd.

starman9000

Says the guy that can't see a difference between the Avengers and ANY other comic book movie.

Supermallet

Sorry, to me it sounds like you're stuck with a case of "Everything new is crap" and "Everything old is great."

Don't get me wrong, I adore Terminator and Raiders, but I promise you in 30 years someone is going to say "Why can't they make movies as good as The Avengers anymore?"

Matthew Chmiel

James Cameron, the person who brought us the biggest film of all time up to that point in history, made an event film that had to be seen in 3D.

I went and saw Avatar on a Monday afternoon when I had a day off of work. IIRC, it was the second week after it was released. Guess what? The screening was packed.

bluetoast

No matter what, James Cameron knows what the hell he's doing. At all times.

Giles

as I recall Avatar did not have a big opening, it was the word of mouth and the fact that the audience draw was significant enough to make it a box office success over a period of months. Even Dreamworks 'How to Train Your Dragon' didn't have a boffo initial weekend, it's another instance where it's popularity and box office gross stemmed from again, basic word of mouth and praise - I saw this opening weekend and the crowd number was hardly indicative of it's eventual status.

starman9000

The only reason Avatar made so much money is that a lot of people went to it.

Michael Corvin

The execs in the DC offices have to be kicking themselves for relying on Batman and to a lesser extent Superman to carry the whole division.

Marvel had a plan and executed it flawlessly.

Supermallet

Enough with the crackpot theories already.

Matthew Chmiel

Similar to Titanic, showings were limited as 3D wasn't installed in many theaters at that point. While newer theaters were playing the 3D version on multiple screens, a lot of theaters only had the 3D version playing on a single screen. Cameron made the film to be shown in 3D and a lot of people either held off until they could make a trip to see it in 3D or saw it once in 2D and again in 3D. Or like some friends of mine, multiple trips in various different 3D formats (digital, IMAX, etc).

Not only did Avatar just wreck Titanic's records, but it also became the first IMAX film to gross more than $100 million globally.

Rypro 525

also the week Avatar came out there was a HUGE blizzard that wiped through the entire east coast, so many people saw '75 mil' and assumed flop. the people who saw it the next weekend was most of the east coast

Paul_SD

I think that would say just as much about the state of films 30 years from now as it does about the inherent quality of a film today.

And while I did enjoy The Avengers and am currently looking back even more fondly on it now than when initially left the theater yesterday, one big thing I felt then and still feel was that - I was surprised how much more transcendent films like Raiders, Star Wars and even Jaws still remain. I feel a little sorry that kids today see this movie as 'their star wars' because there definitely felt like something was still missing. It may be the lack of an edifying spiritual component, i don't know.
And I like Whedon- a lot! He's from the same generation as I am, and I've felt in the past he learned from the best genre films of his era (Star wars, Raiders) as well as learning what not to do from the worst (Jedi). In the aughts, I felt he put out far more interesting, creative, and entertaining material than either Spielberg or Lucas.

But having seen all these films first run, no way I would put Avengers in that realm. If people really view it like that, it probably just speaks to how lousy the competition has been the last 30 years, more than anything else.

Iron_Giant

...3D screenings accounted for 52 percent of the opening weekend gross

In my area 3D is $13.50
Non-3D is $10.00

That is a 35% increase

$105million - 37million = $68million

Total without 3D = about $168million (number is not perfect, but is close)


I know that HP 7.2 was in 3D also, but at least the theaters gave us a choice.

So, yes Avengers made a ton of $$$ because a ton of people went to see it, including me and I loved it.

But, I hate that they pushed 3D on people, I am all for choice.

GreenVulture

Do you sing in a band called Coldplay, by any chance?

Matthew Chmiel

I could tell you that here in Vegas, nearly half of the showings available for the film are in 2D.

RoboDad

I'm a bit confused by your outrage. 3D accounted for just over half of the gross (by your claim), yet you feel that 3D was "pushed" on people? Even by your own calculations, more people saw the film in 2D than 3D by a fairly significant margin. How exactly is that not "choice"?

DonnachaOne

Iron, you're also wrong in assuming cinemas pushed it on people by not offering 2D shows in advance. This may have been the case at your particular cinema, but I know for a fact that my one, as well as dozens in the area, had 2D shows on sales for at least two weeks beforehand.

fitprod

Whoops! Based upon the book, Nothing Last Forever.

fitprod

Ash Ketchum

STAR WARS and RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK were both "inspired" by so many older genres. To call them originals is really stretching things. Yes, they were "new" to younger viewers who'd never seen anything like them before. And to those viewers they had the sort of magic that previous generations had experienced watching Flash Gordon, Buck Rogers and the typical Hollywood adventure or western serial of the golden age. And they were done with considerable style, polish and imagination, with budgets far higher than their earlier counterparts had. I'm not knocking either film. I enjoyed them, too. But let's not call them "original," okay?

Michael Corvin

You know, Gweneth has never been on my "hot celebs" radar, but the scene with her in jean shorts made me a convert. She has some killer legs.

Jaymole

Totally disagree...the quality of popcorn films being made today are as good as they were 30 years ago. Nostalgia and time once again play tricks on people's critical perceptions.

Strevlac

I think you know very well what I am talking about. We all know that there is nothing new under the sun, and there are really only about 10 basic stories to tell. Everything is inspired by something else because creativity cannot exist in a vaccum.

What I am talking about is much less complicated: new movies not based on existing properties. Or at least not well-known existing properties. If some movie comes along and is based on a dime-store novel that nobody read (Die Hard), for all intents and purposes it is "original"

As for the mention of 2001, the movie and the novel were developed simultaneously. If anything, the novel sprang forth because of the movie and was then further embellished.

Strevlac

The best of today is no where near as good as the best of 25-30 years ago. I can count on one hand the amount of movies that have come out in the last decade that lingered in my mind and made me want to revisit for further viewings. And most of them were directed by one person.

Solid Snake

ah. So we're going w/ a bias here. Alright. So if YOU like them a lot is the gauge/meter?