Avatar vs. Titanic

[PKerr]

First off, congratulations to Mr. Cameron.

That said it looks like Avatar will meet and beat Titanic’s 1.8 worldwide number.

Not taking anything from Avatar as I’ve seen it twice BUT is it really a fair comparison?

I don’t know about you but at one theater I paid an Extra $3.00 and the other an extra $2.50 because of it being in 3D.


Is that extra $$$ being factored in the 1.8 billion number?
I haven’t heard/read either way so I’m not sure but an extra 2-3 dollars adds up really fast.

Wadda ya think?

 

[Mallet]

It's almost pointless to try and start breaking things down that way. First, lots of theaters world wide are not playing Avatar in 3D and are therefore only charging regular prices for it, so first you'd have to get a break down of which ones are playing in 3d and which arn't, then the difference in ticket prices in each and then how many ticket sales were for each. That can be really hard when you take, for example, a movie theater near my house that is playing it on like 7 different screens. 1 is IMAX, 5 more are digital 3D, and the last 2 are in regular, non-3D. That's a lot of calculations.

But that is only the start...

Then you'd have to figure out how many people went to see it specifically because it was in 3D, not because they were interested in the story. because it would not be fair to add those ticket sales into the total, since Titanic didn't have the option of being in 3D (at least until later this year, when it is being re-released in 3D).

Then you have to add in inflation, and population increase since 1997 when Titanic came out, and the number of new movie theaters and movie screens available worldwide now, as compared to how many there were back in 1997.

All in all there are way to many variables to try and adjust boxoffice totals for the comparison of major films released more then a couple of years apart.

No matter how you do it, it will always be speculative and inaccurate. That is whyit is simplest to just go by straight out boxoffice $$.

Of course this means as the worlds population increases and more and more people go to movies then boxoffice totals will get higher and higher. The current Earth population is about 6.6 Billion. By 2050 it should be about 13 Billion. That means there should be about twice as many people going to movies at that point and the boxoffice totals will be insane compared to current totals.

 

[belle]

I would have to say Avatar and Titanic are all my favortie movie.

 

[T'Baio]

How stupid do these people think we are?

Ooh...I'm gonna' click on your fuckin' retarded site!

 

[bigdaddy]

There will be lists for inflation and such in the future. Titanic is the 6th biggest movie ever. For the life of me I can't figure out why we don't use ticket sales. I read an article that said Titanic sold 130 million tickets and that Avatar will sell about half of that.

Either way, it's a movie, just enjoy movies for what they are, entertainment.

I also saw Avatar in 3D and it didn't cost me extra, it was $6 Tuesdays, so that might even out.... yeah OK it doesn't.

Avatar is at 34 right now....

http://boxofficemojo.com/alltime/adjusted.htm

 

[od0_ital]

The first time I saw Avatar, it was for free.

The second time, it was at the IMAX theater, which costs about fourteen dollars.

Think that will matter when they break down the overall box office?

 

[Snaploud]

For the life of me I can't figure out why we don't use ticket sales.

Such information may simply not be available (at least, for the older movies), but I agree that it would be an interesting comparison (though, not necessarily the best indicator of financial success).

I would also like a worldwide gross adjusted for inflation.

 

[chrisspringob]

I would also like a worldwide gross adjusted for inflation.

I don't think any such list is possible to compile, given that inflation runs at different rates in different countries, and you also have to worry about the exchange rates fluctuating over time. If you had the separate breakdowns of ticket sales for each country, you could piece it together, but that kind of info doesn't exist for older movies.

 

[Daedalus12]

First off, congratulations to Mr. Cameron.

That said it looks like Avatar will meet and beat Titanic’s 1.8 worldwide number.

Not taking anything from Avatar as I’ve seen it twice BUT is it really a fair comparison?

I don’t know about you but at one theater I paid an Extra $3.00 and the other an extra $2.50 because of it being in 3D.


Is that extra $$$ being factored in the 1.8 billion number?
I haven’t heard/read either way so I’m not sure but an extra 2-3 dollars adds up really fast.

Wadda ya think?

That depends on the comparison.. If you are just trying to determine which movie grossed the most then the only part of the ticket price difference between the 2 movies that should be taken into account is the inflation. I mean for example if I made a movie today and I charged $1 billion a ticket. If four rich tycoons showed up and paid the tickets then my movie would have grossed more than Titanic (inflation or not).. It doesn't matter that only 4 people watched it.

If you are just trying to compare the popularity of the 2 movies then you'll also need to define some metric. # of unique viewings? Total # of tickets sold?

 

[Harvey]

There will be lists for inflation and such in the future. Titanic is the 6th biggest movie ever. For the life of me I can't figure out why we don't use ticket sales. I read an article that said Titanic sold 130 million tickets and that Avatar will sell about half of that.

Simple. Studios love to have lines in advertising about how their movie has broken all sorts of box office records. It isn't about portraying an accurate image of how many tickets have been sold, or how profitable their films have been.

Regular ticket prices have inflated in the past 12 years. 3D and IMAX tickets are even more expensive than that. This obviously has had a serious effect on the grosses of Avatar.

 

[bigdaddy]

There will be lists for inflation and such in the future. Titanic is the 6th biggest movie ever. For the life of me I can't figure out why we don't use ticket sales. I read an article that said Titanic sold 130 million tickets and that Avatar will sell about half of that.

Simple. Studios love to have lines in advertising about how their movie has broken all sorts of box office records.

Oh I know that's the real reason, but I';m shocked someone doesn't keep count of ticket sales.

 

[M'rk son of Mogh]

Regular ticket prices have inflated in the past 12 years. 3D and IMAX tickets are even more expensive than that. This obviously has had a serious effect on the grosses of Avatar.

On one hand, yes. On the other... it STILL took this long for a movie to overtake Titanic, inflation included?!?!?!

That's impressive for BOTH movies.

 

[ring]

If you are really going to produce movies then comparison can be done, but if you are a simple audience then why go in such detail . just enjoy it and have fun ...analysis will give you a headache...