Can 3D Really Be The Future Of The Movie Industry?

In spite of the manufacturers claiming that we are all going to be watching 3D movies I thought a blast of icy reality was required from the left brain of the movie industry (the logical side).

The biggest film this year is expected to be Avatar a 3D extravaganza which has been the main film for the end of the year at movie theater world wide.

This movie cost to produce and market around $400 million dollars the experts say for a film to break even it needs to gross around 2.5 times it’s original outlay.

So in the case of Avatar we are talking gross of $1 billion dollars to cover it’s costs alone.With all the hype and publicity and the potential of mass market saturation this movie will make a profit at possibly a pretty decent one. A few other movies of this year (sorry last year) have had similar impetus but they are few and far between.

G.I Joe, Terminator, Watchman, The Taking of Pelham 123, Land of the Lost, Surrogates,IMagine That and Pandorum are reported to have lost between them over $1 billion dollars.

I have to say some of that is probably due to the fact they were all pretty terrible films but you have to wonder how many films a studio can make before it starts having to tighten the purse strings.

This then throws in to question where all the expensive to make movies in 3D are going to come from to watch on your even more expensive 3D HDTV and 3D Blu ray player.

Wouldn’t we be better off encouraging film makers to make better quality films on lower budgets and sticking to regular Blu ray and DVD for few years.

As after all my favorite films of this year were Harry Brown and Gran Torino maybe I am getting old but surely a film is about acting and not about the big bangs and special effects isn’t it?

Some Other Points Of View On The Future Of The Movie Industry in 2010 and Beyond

• Experience, Not Effects (derrickkwa.com)
• The Trade-Off: Why ‘Avatar’ Won’t Spark a 3-D Bonanza (dailyfinance.com)
• What Catalog Films to Expect on Blu-ray in 2010 (cinematical.com)

The Future of The Movie Industry in 2010 and Beyond (Seen Magazine).