The efficacy of Hollywood's choice in content

[The Jade Knight]

According to an article in this month's Atlantic Monthly, 52% of all movies released are R, while only 4% are G.  However, the R-rated films netted less than 10% of profits, and G-rated moves around 50% of all film profits.

Just goes to show that Hollywood isn't in it for the money.

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

I'd be interested in the definition of "10% of profits" means. There's a lot of room for statistical manipulation in there.

[The Jade Knight]

Unfortunately, I'm running mostly on memory.  You're welcome to stop by your local library and look at the article.  It's this month's (September) issue of Atlantic Monthly.

[42]

Actually, this doesn't surprise me. Theater owners have been screaming about this for years now.

Unfortunately, a lot of filmmakers are in the business of convincing everyone else to his (sometimes her) personal way of thinking. Hence much of the snobbery among the Hollywood elite.

[Legion]

According to an article in this month's Atlantic Monthly, 52% of all movies released are R, while only 4% are G.  However, the R-rated films netted less than 10% of profits, and G-rated moves around 50% of all film profits.

Just goes to show that Hollywood isn't in it for the money.

You also have to look at how much do R rated movies cost to put out as opposed to a G rated movie.  If it costs 10 million to put out a R rated movie, and only 1 million to put out a G rated movie then with the R movie you are making about 11 million and with the G you are making 1.5 million.   Does that sound right?

[Entsuropi]

True, but a lot of the G rated movies are ones that cost mega bucks in animation costs - Shrek, Incredibles, and so on.

[Legion]

True but with R rated movies you need to rent and build sets, lighting (a lot more then with animation) location, permits, zoneing laws, lawers to do a lot of legal issues, Special Effects, and trying them into a live actor.  Multiple takes, and so on.  So I am not sure but I would think that Real movies might end up costing a whole bunch more in the long run, because in animation is more of a fixed cost not a lot of hidden costs that come up.

[Entsuropi]

Nope. Animation requires obscene amounts of money to pull off, plus the amount they have to pay voice actors. I think animation is more expensive, still.

[42]

Animation is more expensive than live-action. An animator can easily make almost a million dollar per film depending on how experienced they are and how long the project will last. Not to mention the millions you will spend on animation equipment.

And who would ever make a film for only $1 million? It costs more than that to just to play it in LA and New York.

G-rated movie make more money becuase they play to a larger audience. A large percentage of the U.S. population will simply not go to a movie if it is rated R.

[Skar]

I can say without a doubt that if there were more films I could safely take my family to and be entertained myself we would all go to the movies about ten times more than we do.  Frankly most of the "good" films I've seen in the last five years could have had the R-rated material chopped out with an axe and not suffered at all.   Hollywood plainly has some sort of agenda, whether it's an organized cabal or not they act pretty much in concert and not entirely to the tune of the money song.

[The Jade Knight]

If one is to believe this Atlantic Monthly report, not at all in tune to the money.

[stacer]

We had a fireside in which a guy--whose name I've forgotten, sorry--who was a state legislator in California, and before that a movie company lawyer, talked about the agenda-making he witnessed in the 60s and 70s in the movie studios. He said that they really did have an agenda to make porn more acceptable because they recognized it was a money-maker (and, I believe he said liquor makers were in on it too, because they do well in similar sex-industry businesses). The reasoning was that if they could sell sex openly (eventually) in the home, then they'd make more money.

I think we've been seeing the fruits of that all our lives, the loosening of media standards. Remember all that about the V-chip? If everyone has a V-chip and TV shows are rated, then there's no need for TV stations to worry about their content, because you can just avoid the shows you wouldn't want to see, that kind of reasoning. Do any of us use a V-chip? I know I don't.

Now, there's no real reason for you to believe what I say--it's secondhand knowledge at this point and I can't remember the guy's name--but I believe it's entirely possible, and I definitely wouldn't put it past Hollywood.

[The Jade Knight]

I also heard a similar sort of thing when we watched a documentary in Latimer's AmHer class, but I was actually able to see specific percentages (it was a pie graph with #s) and much more up-to-date in this article.

[Gemm: Rock & Roll Star; Born to Rock]

Hooray for boobies! And hooray for more posterity in our lives.

[JP Dogberry]

I just saw the word boobies. I have no idea what we're talking about, but I want in on it.