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WHY THE SLUMP?
Wednesday, August 24 2005
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The summer movie season, which officially ends on Labor Day, Sept. 5, is expected to produce box-office results 9 percent below those of 2004 and attendance figures 11.5 percent below, according to box-office tracker Exhibitor Relations. In separate interviews with today's (Wednesday) New York Times studio executives generally acknowledged that the downturn could be attributed to unexceptional and unexciting films. New Line Cinema Chairman Robert Shaye, whose studio produced Wedding Crashers, one of the summer's few blockbuster hits, told the Times that in previous years, "you could still count on enough people to come whether you failed at entertaining them or not, out of habit, or boredom, or a desire to get out of the house. You had a little bit of backstop." Universal Vice Chairman Marc Shmuger remarked similarly that "there's a cumulative wearing down effect. We're beginning to witness the results of that. People are just beginning to wake up that what used to pass as summer excitement isn't that exciting, or that entertaining." Michael Lynton, chairman of Sony Pictures Entertainment, vowed that from now on, his studio will be making "only movies we hope will be really good." But Tim Rothman, co-chairman of 20th Century Fox, disagreed with his peers. ""Everybody keeps saying it's the worst of times; it seems fine to me," he said.
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