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Fox News - Brokeback Faces Burnout at the Box Office?

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brokebackmountain:
'Brokeback' Faces Burnout at Box Office
Friday, December 23, 2005
By Roger Friedman

Brokeback Burnout? Cowboys Collapsing?

You wouldn’t know it from all the hype and the endless critics’ awards. But Ang Lee’s "Brokeback Mountain" may be suffering a little burnout in its third week of release.

Indeed, "Brokeback"—-aka the Gay Cowboy movie—-has seen declines at the box office every day this week after a huge premiere and subsequent run in gay-concentrated neighborhoods.

But now it may be that reality is setting in, and reality bites, as we all know. On Monday, "Brokeback" was 51 percent off from Sunday. On Tuesday, it was down 9.1 percent from Monday. By Wednesday, it was off another 7.6 percent. All in all, it dropped to No. 10 on its 13th day out.

Today, "Brokeback" nearly doubles its number of theaters to 217, but this may be a real litmus test. There is hardly a straight male in the U.S. who will see this movie voluntarily. No matter how well made it is—-and it is very well crafted by a hugely talented group of people—-it’s hard to imagine a suburban wife coaxing hubby to the Cineplex on Saturday night to see two men consummate their passion.

ennisandjack:
I really hope the overemphasis by the media on the importance of straight male attendance to the success of the movie is wrong. Clearly it would be great if more of them attended because its a great story they'd be missing otherwise. But other audiences have money that they would like to spend on seeing a beautiful love story. Straight men are only about 40% of the population, how many millions does that leave left??? I'd say enough for a blockbuster.

ranchgal:
Actually--he isn't telling the whole story of the % breaks either---every movie out dropped that much and more in the same timeframe-BBM had one of the least drops--and the fact that most all of them started out in more theaters than BBM did--is a significant fact that he chooses not to discuss.

They are very strange over there anyway, and really tend to SKEW things to suit them at the time, so I wouldn't worry about this blurb too much untill some other main industry sources start saying something like this.

the money coming in per theater is still way above most of the others--so this is not something/someone I would base much stock in. Just my own opinion, but every entertainment mag lists it in the top 20 of movies out right now, and Entertainment Weekly just listed it this week in their "MUST SEE" list for everyone.

This guy doesn't have a clue about the female population of this country, and just how many women will be taking and escorted by males/husbands/boyfriends/friends to see this movie.   I already know quite a few who are planning on doing just that---and some straight guys will be going to see it alone too mark my words.    I am one of the women,, so I know he isn't speaking about all of us by any means.

brokebackmountain:
I am so glad that you guys voice your take on this.

Here are my takes.

"Brokeback Burnout? Cowboys Collapsing?"

The author used question marks. So he was tryin to make some hypotheses as follow.

"Ang Lee’s "Brokeback Mountain" may be suffering a little burnout in its third week of release."

Third week of release with only 69 theaters that topped $3.4 million is impressive. It may be burnout in the cities in the third week. I don't see that from other cities yet to be released.

"There is hardly a straight male in the U.S. who will see this movie voluntarily"

Hmm...voluntarily. Interesting. I, at least, for one know other straight males "voluntarily" see the movie and I am not the only one. We don't need more "Ennis." Just wait to see the DVD sales record.

"It’s hard to imagine a suburban wife coaxing hubby to the Cineplex on Saturday night to see two men consummate their passion."

To sum up, it is all imagination and should not be taken seriously.

ennisandjack:
I hope you are both right because clearly there are alot of people who want this movie to fail financially so that another film like it will never be made again. However, I too think there are alot of people interested in this film. And maybe the universality of the story will provide more diverse audiences than expected. I hope the numbers continue to surprise because this film really deserves to be seen by everyone.

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