DISQUS

Big Rob · 7 months ago

Not really. If I see a movie the draw for me is Actors or actress or directors or sometimes a preview. but I never go wow Obsessed made 28.5 million better go check that shit out. If i went by that I would be in 17 again with all the teenage girls wondering what the Hell i was doing there. so the Answer is OH HELL NO!

GuiltyTrace · 6 months ago

Agreed. "Ooh, Drumline made 55 mil at the box? Better go get it on DVD!" Shit...

Don B · 7 months ago

I hate it when domestic box office numbers are used to dictate whether or not a movie is a success or a failure without taking into account foreign receipts.Films like Watchmen and The Incredible Hulk are said to be failures because their domestic numbers didn't equal their production costs,but never have I heard any similar comments about Benjamin Button.The media picks and chooses which films they want to portray as bombs.I agree, box office numbers are in no way a measure of a films quality.

Tenika · 7 months ago

I personally could care less about box office numbers. Obsessed made $28 million over the weekend and I'm still not going to see that pile of sh*t. I also think studios and tv and all other media outlets shouldn't release how much a film cost/made over the box office weekend. Who cares about any of that if the movie is good?

_Christopher_M · 7 months ago

I just don't see the merit of using box office as a positive to the film's quality...it sort of makes a mockery of what film critics do for a living...it's like yeah "the movie made 30million, so it has to be good"....if Freddy Got Fingered made 200million people would have called it genius based on the numbers I'm sure....

I think it's more sad that Paul Blart is # 3 and Fast & Furious is #2 for highest domestic gross so far in 2009...if anything it shows how dim the majority of moviegoers are if they flock to crap like this

Don B · 7 months ago

It used to be that you never knew anything about a films box office numbers.That all changed in the summer of 1989 after the release of the first Batman movie.It was doing such huge numbers that newspapers started reporting how well it did over the weekend compared to the other films out at the time, and we've been hearing about weekend B.O. numbers for the last twenty years as a result.

Rob_Hunter · 7 months ago

So who exactly is getting/giving the "blowjob" here?

RobertFure · 7 months ago

I just wanted to see if I could slip it past Cole. What it refers to is critics giving lip service to box office numbers. Films with big box offices get all this publicity and positive coverage and it's really pretty ridiculous in the grand scheme of things. So the box office is getting the blow job from the media.

Bethany P · 7 months ago

lip service? try decent suction and some spiraling tongue. great article, rocketman.

Aleric · 7 months ago

Ok I had to give Bethany a thumbs up for that one.

_Christopher_M · 7 months ago

well box office numbers to people equal success....I mean 30million at the box office these days is a drop in the bucket..it's true that a movie like Superman Returns makes so much money then is still considered a critical failure and a studio actually listens to this it's very rare...look at all the shitty comic book movies we've had to endure over the years just because they made money... there are so many "bad" movies that make money because they find their niche and exploit it to the fullest....

when a crappy movie like 17 Again, Hannah Montana or Obsession makes 30 million it's like miracle or something..even though all those movies have marketing power of Zac Efron/High School Musical, Miley Cyrus/Hannah Montana and Boyece...none of them are really selling the movies themselves....I doubt critics in general are going to ignore these flukes... when most of their papers or sites have ties with these companies, celebs or through their advertising departments... sometimes even "indie" bloggers can be influenced heavily by a certain animation studio because of their access..and will never speak badly of their films

Aleric · 7 months ago

I have to agree with most here, I go to see a movie based in the story, the actors and who directed it, not on how much it made. In fact most of the films I love were not box office successes, 13th Warrior, Highlander, Rob Roy, Payback, to mention a few.

Mack41 · 7 months ago

I agree that it doesn't matter and shouldn't be made a big deal, but doesn't predicting the box office totals on Friday for the upcoming weekend just fuel the fire, which is a weekly thing on FSR?

_Christopher_M · 7 months ago

it does somewhat....but I wouldn't say it should be blamed for it...FSR does a better job of separating the good from the bad than most sites or even print critics...minus of course the opinions of Kevin Carr which I never agree with...

jack2jack · 7 months ago

I miss the days when Gene Siskel would give a movie a scathing review. And then called the audience idiots for going and supoorting the crappy movie. No one escaped his wrath, writers, producers, directors and studios. Gone are the discussions of films on it's merits. Not it's box office and sequel potential. When a movie received his thumbs up, it did so on merit alone. I do miss the combination of Siskel and Ebert at the movies.

Monopoly Guy · 7 months ago

The only thing box office numbers tell me is whether or not there will be a sequel. They also help me wallow in the collective stupidity of the average movie-goer as I see utterly terrible films make millions of cash dollars.

phrenetik · 6 months ago

Box office numbers are more of a trick of getting the marketing strategy and timing right. Obsessed made it because there was simply no better movie in the cinemas that could appease the adults (the tweens were captured by 17 Again and Hannah Montana). Plus the impression the poster gave was that it could somehow be the next Fatal Attraction. That all adds up somehow. O.O

HempKnight 757 · 6 months ago

I got a blowjob in the first pirates movie & I still thought it blew. SWOOSH!

TaiLung · 6 months ago

Don't you mean: Swash(belt)buckle?¨

:P

tmccar20 · 6 months ago

Box office numbers started to matter when Spielberg made Jaws and it made over a 100 million, it was the first real blockbuster. Today, the box office has become more important because there are hundreds if thousands of sites trying to give some more insight into a films and its dealings with money. Even this site does it, every week in fact, you even make estimates. This not a bad thing, first impressions of a film are very important, if it is able to having staying power over more than a few weeks at least the film has got to be decent, or have a good marketing compaign. People care more about films more than ever, and we want to greater knowledge of a film and its workings. This is just part of it. Star Trek is the first big summer film besides wolveine, of course money is on the brain. Plus it compounded by the fact that Dark Knight made a Billion and this is the first summer of the recession. Money is subject number right now.

TaiLung · 6 months ago

Couldn't agree more with everything you just said.

djjeffhall · 6 months ago

Frankly, I couldn't care less about how much a movie grosses. Yes, it's fun to see a film you enjoy do well, but ultimately, it means nothing.

I love the movie New Suit. I saw it in the theaters, bought the DVD when it came out. Total gross: $71,743 (USA) (28 November 2003) Does that make it a bad film? No, just and under appreciated film.

By the way, weren't the Wizard Of OZ and Citizen Kane relative flops at the box office when they were first released? I think history has proven both to be classics.

danney · 6 months ago

It's called lazy reporting. Box office numbers are eazy to report and no one has to give an opinion. In this day and age of metrics and the number of widgets per hour, how much box office, number of screens per film, and box office by screens is too easy to quantify.

With the number of critics decreasing and many papers only carrying reviews published by wire services, we are increasingly relying on places like FSR to give us an honest opinion of whether the film blows or is worth seeing. My choices may not always be the same as what the reviews may be, but an honest opinion is worth reading.

Grazer · 6 months ago

The only people who need to be worried about box office figures are studios and directors.

So if box office figures are not a measure of a movies quality, what is? What a critic says? If so which one? Sorry, capable of making my own judgement on a movie, don't need to be spoon fed my opinion. All a critic is, is a person with an opinion and gets paid for it. Just because they think its a good movie, doesn't mean I will agree.

If I'm supporting movies that people find crap, tuff shit. You're probably doing the same to me.