March
16
ShoWest: Product Glut Hits Mid-range Movies
During his annual state of the industry ShoWest address, MPAA chairman Dan Glickman raved about what a great year 2007 was, with 5 % growth in both the domestic and worldwide boxoffice, both all-time highs.
In 2002, there were about 450 movies total released in the U.S., he said, and some 600 titles released in 2007. "All of that growth is independent film," he said. This was a good thing for the industry, he said.
Is that true?
Sure, the studios can ram their movies through the clutter of noise with big ad spends and buy themselves some theater time. But the sector of the market that got killed in 2007 was neither the micro nor big-budget pics but the movies in the $15-million to $70-million range, the ones in the middle, the ones that can't afford the big-studio four-quadrant campaigns. That's where many outside investors have been putting their money. And that's where, going forward, more constriction and consolidation is going to continue.
The market can't sustain all these distributors, all with release slates big enough to justify their existence. The studio subsidiaries are adapting to the over-crowded, competitive market by making more commercial, accessible, bigger-budget movies with stars--and are thus competing for smaller slices of the boxoffice pie with the other distribs in the same universe: Lionsgate, Yari Film Group, MGM, The Weinstein Co., and now, newcomers Summit and Overture.
Some fallout in the indie sector has already begun. Warner Bros. is paring back New Line Cinema and folding it as a label into the parent company; the co's new mandate is still to be delineated. Picturehouse and Warner Independent are likely to forge some kind of merger, yielding one specialty label where there once were two.
Industry observers speculate about the fate of real estate mogul-turned-filmmaking entrepreneur Bob Yari, who was perhaps cursed by two early hits (Crash and The Illusionist) and is now finding heavy sledding, and MGM and two of its key suppliers, Sidney Kimmel Entertainment, which will withdraw from the release pact at year's end, and has pared back on production, and Weinstein Co., which is still seeking some breakout hits.
In the meantime, Overture and Summit are jumping into choppier waters than they may have anticipated when they finalized their financing and business plans. (For more on this, see this week's column.)
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