Avatar vs. Monsters vs. Aliens - 2009 !
Be prepared for battle. Memorial Day weekend, 2009 is desperately wanted by both James Cameron's Avatar (20th Century Fox) and Jeffrey Katzenberg's Monsters vs. Aliens. BOTH are 3D and there will only be 5 to 6 thousand theaters built by then (only 700 today). That is a problem. They both want awesome opening weekend box office takes, and have laid down their gauntlets.
Click the image to enlarge.
There is little doubt both of these films will be spectacular as I have already pointed out in earlier posts (Avatar). But I would wager that Avatar will do better as the effects involve humans and not cartoons. I am staggered by the technology that Cameron is employing in his production.
Recently, production companies have needed to solidify their toehold for a release date as far out as possible as the opening weekend stakes are high (up to 25% of total revenue) - and this is further complicated by the fact that theater owners need to spend an average of $40,000 to upgrade their existing equipment to the new, theater experience savior, 3D Digital.
With many homes now outfitted with their own theaters, many people are simply choosing to stay home as new releases are released quickly to DVD nowadays. Something needs to excite them to come back to the cinema. 3D is it ! Believe me, you will be so enthralled by the new technology that many of you will be watching Avatar over and over again just for the experience.
And - someone is going to make a lot of money selling those 3D glasses. Not those 50 year old blue and red ones, but the new polarized ones (if you have been to an Imax 3D movie, you know what I mean). I am going to want to own my own set and not worry about using a properly cleansed set from a theater. I will buy my own.
If that wasn't enough conflict for ya -- Don't forget Steven Spielberg is releasing Interstellar in the summer of 2009 as well (putting Kip Thorne's theories to work). And then there is that little video game movie coming out... ahh what was it? Oh yeah: GEARS OF WAR. Yes sir, 2009 is going to be a heck of a summer.
