The Impact of 3D on Hollywood

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Hollywood has always been about money. Studios won’t greenlight a new project unless they’re certain it’ll return them a profit. It hasn’t been very long since we were introduced to 3D, but look at how popular it has become. Looking back and beginning with Chicken Little in 2005 – Disney’s first 3D movie – it would be hard to find an animated movie being produced in America that wasn’t being released in 3D. In terms of live-action films, 3D has generated immense popularity only recently, after Avatar succeeded on so many different levels and became the highest grossing film of all time. 

However, I’m concerned about Hollywood’s future intentions with 3D. Now that it has proven to be able to generate greater financial cash flows for studios, an increased amount of focus is being directed towards how studios can make the most money, without much care for the movies that viewers want adapted. Who honestly wanted to see a sequel to Clash of the Titans? The first movie received very poor critiques, as it should have. Yet it made a profit, mainly because 3D had recently become popular (with Avatar) and the studio knew that the 3D option would attract other viewers. Wrath of the Titans got equally crap reviews, but luckily for the studio, the international impact helped the film generate a profit.

Billion Dollar Movies and Future High Earners

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It doesn’t seem like a major accomplishment for a movie to surpass $1 billion at the box office anymore. Before The Dark Knight was released in the summer of 2008, there were only three movies to reach that milestone: Titanic, Lord of the Rings: Return of the King and Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest. Now the list contains ten films.

Avatar – I’m not sure if this comes as a surprise because I had no idea how people would accept a fully computer generated film. I knew the movie would make money because James Cameron had taken a 12 year hiatus from the movie industry in order to work on the film, and it promised a great experience. No one probably expected it to make $2.7 billion worldwide, and no movie will even have a chance of beating it until Avatar 2 is released.

Titanic – I really don’t see why Titanic was so incredibly popular. Everyone knew about the sinking ship, but what made it better than all the movies back in the 1990s? I read in a demographic novel that it was helped by girls who had seen the movie countless times just because of Leonardo DiCaprio, but it still seemed like a random film to be the first to reach $1 billion.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 – This one is not a surprise because all of the other films had made close to $1 billion and besides being the last chapter in the series, it was helped by its post conversion to 3D which boosted ticket prices.

Lord of the Ring: The Return of the King – Again, the previous parts had made hefty amounts at the box office and this was the concluding chapter. It was praised by critics and was greatly successful overseas.