How do you compare the relative sucess of movies over time to each other?
For instance if THE ACME MOVIE made 5,000,000 in 1930 but THE NEW ACME MOVE made 300,000,000 in 2001 what is more sucessful?
Due to inflation it isn’t fair to compare box office receipts.
You also can’t really compare audiences as more people in 2001 have more options so don’t go to movies as much. Plus in 1930 you could see a movie twice by staying in the theater for the second show as they played right after each other (yes I know you were supposed to pay again but face it who did)
It used to be 100 million was a blockbuster, then a movie had to make 200 million, now it is 300 million.
Do they have a way to combine Total Money to People to cost -vs- profit so you can truly compare the sucess of one movie over time to another.
As ArchiveGuy’s link says, most pre-1980 movies are on the list because of multiple re-issues. For instance, Gone With the Wind was re-issued in 1947, 1954, 1961, 1967, and 1971. Disney animated features have routinely undergone re-issues. So, for accuracy’s sake, you would have to break down such a film by its grosses per issue, adjusting the inflation differently for each re-issue.
And then there is the tricky factor of home video release, which essentially means that the picture is in continuous release. How do you adjust for inflation then? Many movies have made more money in home video release than they did in theatrical release.
I throw up my hands and say that it is nearly impossible to do such a ranking.
You can get not only a “top 100 US” or “top 100 worldwide” list, but also the same lists adjusted by inflation.
You can also compare any two movies from the last three years, to see how each did on a week-by-week comparison.
You can also see how any major actor or actress has done (box-office gross wise) for all their movies, the movies they have starred in, their last 10 movies, etc.
For anyone who wants any kind of box-office stats, including the top 10 each weekend or the top 60 each week (sortable by week’s gross, total gross, number of venues, per screen average, percent change from the week before) then this is a great site.
I don’t think it was strictly allowed, but I’ve heard that it was a lot easier to stay in your seat after the first showing - perhaps because there was less of a gap between showings, because of the thick clouds of cigarette smoke ;-), because the usherettes didn’t make a habit of searching the cinema - not sure. My dad’s often told me how he hid in his seat if the film was a good one and watched it twice, even three times.
I am very surprised that some people posting here think that being able to stay through as many showings of a movie as you wish is something unusual or from times way long ago. It is neither! I have never been to a movie theater in my life where I could not stay through as many showings as I wished. I suppose that in the case where a movie is sold out, the management may shoo people out after a showing; but otherwise, you can stay as long as you wish.
“Shooing out” really didn’t begin as I remember until the middle to late 1960s. Pretty much before that you could go in at almost any time and leave at any time (like watching movies on TNT). You didn’t have to wait for the movie to begin to get in. If you remember, Lee Harvy Oswald went into a movie theater to “lie low” for a couple of hours.
Often if you were a bit hurting for money, you would pay your 75 cents (or whatever) and grab between three and five hours of sleep in the back rows. These were the people that the usher and usherettes were on the lookout for.
Exciting double features were especially good for sitting through movies more than once. You could catch not one, but two films twice plus previews, a cartoon and a newsreel. The embarrassing thing was when the manager would get up on the stage between movies and announce your name and say, “Your mom says, ‘Come home. Your dinner’s getting cold.’”