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There's also another factor that'll contribute to the future quality of big budget movies - the Chinese box office. The US domestic box office is becoming less important, which means producers will need to pay attention to what plays well in China. The Chinese have been isolated from western culture for so long and therefore didn't grow up with 1980s action movies that we sneer at now. It's all new for them.
Would you believe, the current highest grossing film of the year in China is Titanic 3D with over $150m, and over 21m tickets sold. And it's probably going to stay at the top.
Battleship, by comparison has made $50m and sold just under 9m tickets.
When I watched the movie with the commentary, I just paused every so often when it got a little too out of sync. Now though, I listen to it when I go to sleep.
Wouldn't it be better, with the iTunes, to have the two feeds as they are? Keep the main one for commentaries, and the now renamed Intermission one for everything that's not commentaries? It'd be it more organised that way. Although if you've already worked everything out, then never mind.
And without yet having listened to the commentary, I'd like to point out that in its 29th day in release, John Carter finally managed to beat The Hunger Games' opening day.
Slump or slightly down off an Avatar all-time high? We'll see what happens this year with Dark Knight Rises, Prometheus, and The Hobbit.
Put it this way, 2011 was the least attended year since 1995, and the first year since then to go under 1.3b tickets. If that's not a slump, I don't know what is. 2010 wasn't exactly pretty either.
Thankfully this year has so far shown much improvement of 2011, so it could be the start of a turnaround.
The fact that fewer people are going to the movies is what I mean by "slump".
What slump? The international market is increasing every year as formerly poor countries become rich countries. And even the UK box office is at an all time record high... http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-16810021
I know atleast in the UK that the numbers are down in terms of bums on seats. You absolutely right that the box office is at an all time high but it's because they are charging less people more money.
That's actually not the case, there were 171.6m tickets sold last year, up slightly from 2010.
In summary: Try to imagine John Williams's theme for the Ark, the one that plays in the Map Room at Tanis, as the soundtrack for any scene in ToD. You can't do it, can you?
I have read and heard criticisms of the sequels, I've heard Mark Kermode on AWE and OST, and I'll even acknowledge some of those criticisms, but my opinion has never been changed. They're just too fun to hate.
