10 Figures or Bust!

Once upon a time... back before the day of the video cassette recorded, and now of DVD, crossing over milestones used to be considered a very nifty thing in the film business, with real bragging rights attached to going over 100M or the like in your US or global box office.  Nowadays... (a) some of those milestones are much more easily attained just because of inflation, so getting to 100M doesn't mean what it did in 1980. (b) foreign box office has become so much bigger that more and more films are getting to very big figures for global box office  (c)  the video business is so much bigger that the studios care more about the best date to maximize the video revenue than dragging out an extra $592,982 or even $2,592,982 in theatrical box office revenue.

So I've been watching the global box office in Variety for The Dark Knight, which has slowly crept over $990,000,000 and getting every so close to the billion mark, but almost certainly coming just a little too short of it.  There was no way the movie would have bragging rights unless Warner Bros. decided to make certain that it did.

So I have to tell you a smile came to my face when I saw this article in Variety.  Even though the film will already have been out in DVD, Warner Bros. has decided there's still something to be said for having the bragging rights on being only the 4th film to make the billion mark in global theatrical box office.  I'd like to swear that I'd even see it again, though if my reading pile isn't in better shape then than now I'm not sure I can do the repeat business.

You can read my original blog post on The Dark Knight here.