New at BOP: Review: Matrix Resurrections Movie Review: Moonfall Movie Reviews: Scream The #1 Movie in America November Forecast The Many Saints of Newark October Forecast New Trivia Question All site updates Share & Save   Tweet Print this column

Kim Hollis: We are now slightly over halfway though the summer box office campaign. What are your thoughts about the summer thus far (not including releases from July 19th-21st?

Jay Barney: I haven't seen all of the movies that I wanted to, but it has pretty much developed as expected. I'm surprised by how much the international box office is playing in the success or failure of films. Some media outlets don't embrace the reality of the overseas markets, but this summer's numbers show how much they mean.

Iron Man 3: $1.2 billion
Star Trek Into Darkness : $445 million
Fast and Furious 6: $700 million
The Great Gatsby: $326 million
The Hangover Part III: $346 million
Man of Steel: $619 million
World War Z: $420 million
Monsters University: $474 million
Despicable Me 2: $470 million
After Earth:$200 million

With these numbers, even if a flick under-performs in the United States, studios can have some confidence that the global box will work out for them... This is especially true of films like After Earth and The Hangover Part III. Both didn't do so will here in America but had respectable showings from viewers in other markets. This is not to say that domestic box office doesn't matter, because it most certainly does, but I have been a little more attentive to how films do outside the U.S.

Bruce Hall: It's been a big year. More so than a lot of people probably realize. June domestic box office stands at $1.25 billion, a new record. That's enough to bring 2013 back within sniffing distance of this time last year. I think the technical term for this is "a shot in the arm."

Other tidbits - laugh at Disney if you want, but they're sitting atop the heap at one billion domestically so far this year, which is the primary reason Robert Downey Jr. can now afford his own planet. Say what you want about the Man of Steel, but he's the reason Warner Bros is sitting just a hair behind at number two. Second hair back is Universal, thanks to the one two punch of Vin Diesel and a bunch of little yellow penises.

Just goes to show you, for every Lone Ranger, Jack the Giant Slayer or (sorry, I can find no bad news for Universal this year), there is also an upside.

So much for the death of cinema.

Edwin Davies: I keep being surprised at how strong this year's crop of summer films are performing. Maybe it's just that I still haven't recovered from the incredibly drab first four months of the year, or maybe it's because I still have memories from last summer playing in my head, but it seems a little subdued. Yet the numbers don't really bear that feeling out. Perhaps it's just that very few films seem to have sparked the same passion and discussion that we saw last year when everyone was jazzed about The Avengers, bitterly split on Prometheus and shocked by the success of Ted. With some exceptions, a lot of this year's blockbusters seem a tad forgettable, and do about as well as everyone expects them to. It's great from a commercial standpoint, but it hasn't been terribly surprising.

Continued:       1       2