AfterDawn: News

'The Dark Knight' spurs increase in DVD revenue leading up to premiere

Last year's flat revenue in the DVD market compared to the year before had many in the movie industry concerned about the format's future. Based on information from the first weekend in theatres for the new blockbuster 'The Dark Knight' seems to suggest that the real issue may have been a lack of excitement over theatrical offerings. According to Rentrak firgures, sales last week for the 2005 title 'Batman Begins' on DVD increased 345% from the week before,

In part the increase can be attributed to a limited edition gift set released earlier in the month 2008 to coincide with the July 18, 2008 theatrical release of the sequel. But that wouldn't account for the accompanying 76% increase in rentals.



While last year was a record year for US box office revenue, that doesn't tell the entire story. The increase in revenue from 2006 was actually due to a corresponding ticket price increase with attendance actually remaining flat.

This year, on the other hand, seems to already have more than its share of blockbusters and increased DVD revenue.

Written by: Rich Fiscus @ 25 Jul 2008 14:28

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• 12 comments

• diabolic

  Amazing!
  the winning formula: bettermovies = more revenue
  
  who woulda thunk it?

  25.7.2008 14:53 #1

• spydah

  Quote:The Dark Knight' seems to suggest that the real issue may have been a lack of excitement over theatrical offerings.This quote is golden. I think somebody may have gotten the picture some where along the line. This summer so far as been decent for a few quality movies like Hulk, Hancock, Ironman, & Batman Dark Knight. I know I may have missed 1 but the point is that they have created so much BS havoc on internet users for their lack of quality films. It took this movie for them to see that. That is sad. They couldn't reach in your pockets before with those low quality films so they used other platforms to get money. I hope this is a start for more good things to come movie wise besides this summer.

  25.7.2008 15:33 #2

• 13thHouR

  Originally posted by diabolic: Amazing!
  the winning formula: bettermovies = more revenue
  
  who woulda thunk it?but the MPAA are only concerned with making dollars not quality movies as these cost more to produce, and you can always blame bad ticket sales on piracy so you can lock down hardware with more drm (BLU-RAY, DTV, HDTV), and force governments to pass more legislation (ACTA) to allow the cabal of kleptocrats to continue to dictate only media that they get a share of the profits of is allowed air time on only hardware they allow, just take a look at who the MPAA members are and you understand a little.
  
  you do realise that the MPAA is a trade body name to protect this list of fecktards from bad press don't you.
  
  1. The Walt Disney Company
  2. Sony Pictures
  3. Paramount Pictures Viacom—(DreamWorks owners since February 2006)
  4. 20th Century Fox (News Corporation)
  5. Universal Studios (NBC Universal)
  6. Warner Bros. (Time Warner)
  
  

  
  

  25.7.2008 15:42 #3

• ematrix

  DVD isn't dying, is the movie industry that has been digging their own grave by producing crappy films. Finally they're beginning to admit what we have been saying for so long, that if they actually make good films worth seeing, people will be more willing to spend money on them, and that would reflect on higher revenues from movie tickets and DVD sales, than in the past years.

  25.7.2008 15:42 #4

• SProdigy

  The other reason would be that Batman Begins was being offered at Target and Best Buy for an average of $7. For all the hype surrounding Dark Knight, many people picked up the DVD for a VERY reasonable price, including myself (though I had seen BB when it came out.)
  
  Quality movies + quality prices = consumers opening their wallet
  
  Think Hollywood has figured this out yet? Probably not. For every decent movie this year, we still had crap like Space Chimps, trying to pry a few bucks from the family crowd.

  25.7.2008 15:44 #5

• ripxrush

  I believe that the movie & music industry are doing the same things Maybe the movie industry has caught on tho... MAYBE... More and more stuff is coming out that may only reach a niche market not the main stream and it is part do to the technology especially in music costing less to produce entertainment so more is coming out at a cheaper cost but this more is not a good more, there is more quantity but less quality! NO demand for junk!

  26.7.2008 02:19 #6

• pcaddict

  Good stuff seems to originate from comics books.
  
  DC / Marvel.

  26.7.2008 05:31 #7

• ALIS123

  Come on, does it really take this frikkin long for them to realise that good movies make money? Everyones known that since the time first black and white movies were made. Only difference is that now they can blame piracy for bad sales of crappy movies.
  
  Crappy movie = 0$
  Good movie = 10000000$
  
  It's just that simple. Piracy has nothing to do with it.

  26.7.2008 11:16 #8

• embo22000

  Originally posted by ALIS123: Come on, does it really take this frikkin long for them to realise that good movies make money? Everyones known that since the time first black and white movies were made. Only difference is that now they can blame piracy for bad sales of crappy movies.
  
  Crappy movie = 0$
  Good movie = 10000000$
  
  It's just that simple. Piracy has nothing to do with it.Come on now the movie and music and videogame etc industries loose a lot of money over piracy. It's true that most people download a lot of pirated music and games that they wouldn't buy but lets say 1 million people have 10 pirated games and would've only bought one legally cause it the only game they liked and play ubt guess what now that they've aquired it illegally they won't so some company is loosing 60 million dollars and that's a lot of money.

  27.7.2008 13:34 #9

• atomicxl

  I kinda LOL @ some of the posts.
  
  I'm sure that any other time, people would be saying 150 million dollar budget summer blockbusters are whats bad with hollywood, not the saving grace. I think Dark Knight proves the power of death. Most comic book movies are well reviewed and earn crazy money at the box office. Spider-Man 3 sucked and it still made insane money. There is nothing new about this.

  27.7.2008 15:21 #10

• varnull

  It's not even like it's a great film.. only adequate, which equates as frikkin amazing compared to the last 18 months of complete driver.
  
  It's the hype that has sold it, same as Spiderman, and that abortion they have the audacity to call entertainment Transformers.
  
  CGI isn't expensive, it is cheap compared to having a quality script and a class director with vision.
  
  Again I downloaded it, and again it has saved me money when it comes out for rental or on dvd to buy.. because it isn't worth the price. What happened to challenging films with sensible subjects? All we are getting is these no brain superhero crap films over and over again. Dunno about the rest of you, but I like a calm film with a story to think about sometimes. None of the last 18 months outspoutings will ever hit the "greatest top ten" lists.
  
  Seems all hollywood can do is rake over the same old crap.. same as the mainstream music industry.
  

  
  
  Free open source software = made by end users who want an application to work. OOps.. Im sorry... thats a rectal thermometer 0.0

  27.7.2008 20:28 #11

• G_Hubcap

  Originally posted by atomicxl: I kinda LOL @ some of the posts.
  
  I'm sure that any other time, people would be saying 150 million dollar budget summer blockbusters are whats bad with hollywood, not the saving grace. I think Dark Knight proves the power of death. Most comic book movies are well reviewed and earn crazy money at the box office. Spider-Man 3 sucked and it still made insane money. There is nothing new about this.I swear you read my mind and stole my post before I could type it~ :)

  28.7.2008 15:34 #12