Without tax dollars the motion picture industry would have to go out of business. The same is true of every industry subsidized with tax dollars. Wind power and the solar panel industry are two examples.
Folks who write about the movies always tell us how much the latest release grossed; i.e. ticket sales:
Forget about the gross. The customer base for movie theaters is the best kept secret in Hollywood. After years of analyzing ticket sales based on newspaper articles, gross revenues, etc., I put the number of audience size at somewhere between 8 and 15 percent of the adult population. Parents buy the tickets for their kids; so the critical factor is knowing the number of ticket-buyers above the age of 21.
NOTE: Many years ago, people matured out of movie-going around the age of 36. The maturity age surely dropped considerably in the past twenty years.
Twenty years ago I did not believe 4,100 movie houses still existed in North America, even counting every screen in those multiplex theaters as a separate movie theater.
My best guesstimate today is that the total number of single screen movie theaters is closer to 2,000.
Supermarkets and retail stores RESTOCK the same items. Movie theaters must supply ticket-buyers with new items. I remember when every town and hamlet had at least one movie theater; so that every few years Hollywood studies could re-release an earlier hit. Today’s new movies are so terrible nobody wants to buy a ticket twice. Most of the crap shows up on TV in a few months. One or two mega-hits a year is big news, but they hardly overcome the stink factor.
Everything about the movie industry is wrapped up in tax dollar subsidies. Someday the number of movie screens will drop so low it will be economically impossible to produce new movies to keep the subsidies flowing.
Unlike television that is funded by tax deductible advertising dollars the movie industry has to be subsidized directly in order to survive. It is absurd to deny that big stars get their huge salaries from subsidies while everything else is paid for by subsidies. Ask yourself who in their right would invest in an industry that died a long time ago?
Subsidies are connected to keeping movie theaters open. It will not be long before movie theaters disappear entirely. A generation or two at most. Even then, subsidies will continue to pay for the other aspects of the entertainment leg of the media-education-entertainment complex.
Let me remind point out that the sound track saved Hollywood and gave us Socialist/Communist propaganda reinforced by pictures. Political propaganda was inevitable after dialogue replaced music as the primary audience-controlling factor in a theater. In short: Silent films were never silent.
Even in the silent film era, musicians were hired to accompany the film being shown; in most cases they played a piano or an organ. Many of the larger theaters hired a small orchestra. Think about the cost involved when one or more musicians played at every showing in every movie house in the country before sound. The more astute studio heads, along with the owners of the large theater chains, wanted sound added to motion pictures so they could eliminate the staggering cost of paying those musicians. Had sound never been added to film, the novelty of viewing moving pictures would have worn thin decades ago.
One of the most believed lies of the last century is the one that says adding a sound track to film ruined the careers of silent screen stars. Hollywood itself promoted that falsehood for obvious reasons. Studio moguls always knew that without sound of some kind motion pictures would soon become as boring as looking at someone else’s family photo album.
The fictional character of faded silent screen star Norma Desmond in the movie Sunset Boulevard was dead wrong when she said "We had faces."
Turn off the sound on your TV some evening and force yourself to look at “faces.” Then, when you have time on another evening, reverse the procedure. If you last an hour with either experiment you can demand an Emmy.
You might also try visualizing sitting in a large auditorium with hundreds of strangers watching a film that is absolutely silent. The audience would go bonkers in a matter of minutes without sound to control them. It is the sound track that keeps the audience in their seats the same way musicians accomplished the same control in the silent film era. Since the audience is sitting there listening they watch the moving pictures.
The black & white social dramas made by Hollywood soon after sound was added to motion pictures became the foundation for sound & image propaganda. Television effectively built upon the prototype. In short: No picture, or pictures, ever converted anyone to anything, while the spoken word has done just that on many occasions. Pictures beguile —— sound persuades.
“Sight is the first law of sales” only comes into play when you are selling a product. Even then, “product sight” is often supported by the words of a salesperson as in the case of automobiles, real estate, etc. When you are trying to sell hot air, electronic vocal chords accompanied by a torrent of words is the tool to use. If you doubt it, imagine being brainwashed into accepting Socialism/Communism by pictures alone. It is not possible. By combining sound and images, and then having them seen and heard in a relaxed home atmosphere rather than in an impersonal theater, has been a boon to collectivism and devastating to individuality. The devastation is worldwide. Every major country has its own movie industry. (India produces ten times more movies every year than does Hollywood.)
U.N. propaganda shows up in many foreign language movies as well as in Hollywood movies. It does not take much to get some money from the U.N. A line or two of dialogue extolling the U.N.’s legitimacy, a plug for International law, and so on is heard by hundreds of millions worldwide.
A scene that makes the U.N. look good is a lot more expensive than a few words of dialogue. Call it the equivalent of a full page ad in a major newspaper, or a commercial run during the Super Bowl. Propaganda/advertising is paid for with tax dollars funneled through the United Nations.
Do not underestimate the effectiveness of U.N.-financed movies starring actors who shill for the United Nations full-time. Question: Did you ever hear a bad word about the United Nations in a movie or TV show?
The screen is never quiet, even when the characters in a movie are not delivering dialogue. Silence is the cardinal sin to movie makers. In television and radio it is called dead air time. Look back over your life and see if you can remember having “heard” any dead air time on TV?
The printed word is the least effective form of advertising; hence, printed words, at their inception, is the least dangerous method of spreading totalitarian doctrine. Demagogues must add sound to the printed word in order to sell an enslaving ideology. Before the arrival of electronically transmitted voices, proposed quixotic fantasies that first appeared in print ran out of steam before they could do any real harm. Modern propaganda apparatus spread totalitarian ideologies at warp speed; as well as giving governing concepts like Socialism/Communism many more decades of additional life.
The protection of any form of totalitarianism is further enhanced when the Ministry of Propaganda (FCC) stifles electronic opposition. Clearly, the printed word cannot travel as fast as does government-controlled electronic propaganda machinery reaching hundreds of millions of people worldwide every day. A small handful of Internet political message boards and blogs do not make much of a dent by any stretch of the imagination, but it is a start.
Fascism was a reaction to Soviet Communism. No one ever used sound more effectively than did Hitler and his minister of propaganda Joseph Goebbels. If there is a Propaganda Hall of Fame in hell, Goebbels is the custodian. Nazi Germany was beaten, the Soviet Union imploded, but totalitarian government is alive and well under the name Socialist Incrementalism.
NOTE: The Founding Fathers did not need electronic propaganda to establish their form of government, nor did they need propagandists advising them on the contents of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Nor was the media needed to sell limited government to Colonial Americans. I wonder how the Founders managed all of that without input from propagandists?
Finally, Hollywood parasites hate President Trump because he threatens their tax dollar incomes.
p.s. See this thread for a bit about subsidizing ‘government art’:
https://www.justplainpolitics.com/s...s-To-The-Academy-Awards&p=2809383#post2809383
Folks who write about the movies always tell us how much the latest release grossed; i.e. ticket sales:
Amid Box Office Woes, Momentum Grows for Variable Pricing at Movie Theaters
by Pamela McClintock
6:55 AM PDT 7/22/2019
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/n...d-movie-theaters-try-variable-pricing-1225420
by Pamela McClintock
6:55 AM PDT 7/22/2019
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/n...d-movie-theaters-try-variable-pricing-1225420
Forget about the gross. The customer base for movie theaters is the best kept secret in Hollywood. After years of analyzing ticket sales based on newspaper articles, gross revenues, etc., I put the number of audience size at somewhere between 8 and 15 percent of the adult population. Parents buy the tickets for their kids; so the critical factor is knowing the number of ticket-buyers above the age of 21.
NOTE: Many years ago, people matured out of movie-going around the age of 36. The maturity age surely dropped considerably in the past twenty years.
Twenty years ago I did not believe 4,100 movie houses still existed in North America, even counting every screen in those multiplex theaters as a separate movie theater.
‘Star Wars’ to Open in 4,100-Plus Theaters, Record for December
By Christopher Palmeri Anousha Sakoui
December 14, 2015 — 4:16 PM EST
Updated on December 14, 2015 — 7:31 PM EST
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...en-in-4-100-plus-theaters-record-for-december
By Christopher Palmeri Anousha Sakoui
December 14, 2015 — 4:16 PM EST
Updated on December 14, 2015 — 7:31 PM EST
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...en-in-4-100-plus-theaters-record-for-december
My best guesstimate today is that the total number of single screen movie theaters is closer to 2,000.
Supermarkets and retail stores RESTOCK the same items. Movie theaters must supply ticket-buyers with new items. I remember when every town and hamlet had at least one movie theater; so that every few years Hollywood studies could re-release an earlier hit. Today’s new movies are so terrible nobody wants to buy a ticket twice. Most of the crap shows up on TV in a few months. One or two mega-hits a year is big news, but they hardly overcome the stink factor.
Everything about the movie industry is wrapped up in tax dollar subsidies. Someday the number of movie screens will drop so low it will be economically impossible to produce new movies to keep the subsidies flowing.
Unlike television that is funded by tax deductible advertising dollars the movie industry has to be subsidized directly in order to survive. It is absurd to deny that big stars get their huge salaries from subsidies while everything else is paid for by subsidies. Ask yourself who in their right would invest in an industry that died a long time ago?
Subsidies are connected to keeping movie theaters open. It will not be long before movie theaters disappear entirely. A generation or two at most. Even then, subsidies will continue to pay for the other aspects of the entertainment leg of the media-education-entertainment complex.
Let me remind point out that the sound track saved Hollywood and gave us Socialist/Communist propaganda reinforced by pictures. Political propaganda was inevitable after dialogue replaced music as the primary audience-controlling factor in a theater. In short: Silent films were never silent.
Even in the silent film era, musicians were hired to accompany the film being shown; in most cases they played a piano or an organ. Many of the larger theaters hired a small orchestra. Think about the cost involved when one or more musicians played at every showing in every movie house in the country before sound. The more astute studio heads, along with the owners of the large theater chains, wanted sound added to motion pictures so they could eliminate the staggering cost of paying those musicians. Had sound never been added to film, the novelty of viewing moving pictures would have worn thin decades ago.
One of the most believed lies of the last century is the one that says adding a sound track to film ruined the careers of silent screen stars. Hollywood itself promoted that falsehood for obvious reasons. Studio moguls always knew that without sound of some kind motion pictures would soon become as boring as looking at someone else’s family photo album.
The fictional character of faded silent screen star Norma Desmond in the movie Sunset Boulevard was dead wrong when she said "We had faces."
Turn off the sound on your TV some evening and force yourself to look at “faces.” Then, when you have time on another evening, reverse the procedure. If you last an hour with either experiment you can demand an Emmy.
You might also try visualizing sitting in a large auditorium with hundreds of strangers watching a film that is absolutely silent. The audience would go bonkers in a matter of minutes without sound to control them. It is the sound track that keeps the audience in their seats the same way musicians accomplished the same control in the silent film era. Since the audience is sitting there listening they watch the moving pictures.
The black & white social dramas made by Hollywood soon after sound was added to motion pictures became the foundation for sound & image propaganda. Television effectively built upon the prototype. In short: No picture, or pictures, ever converted anyone to anything, while the spoken word has done just that on many occasions. Pictures beguile —— sound persuades.
“Sight is the first law of sales” only comes into play when you are selling a product. Even then, “product sight” is often supported by the words of a salesperson as in the case of automobiles, real estate, etc. When you are trying to sell hot air, electronic vocal chords accompanied by a torrent of words is the tool to use. If you doubt it, imagine being brainwashed into accepting Socialism/Communism by pictures alone. It is not possible. By combining sound and images, and then having them seen and heard in a relaxed home atmosphere rather than in an impersonal theater, has been a boon to collectivism and devastating to individuality. The devastation is worldwide. Every major country has its own movie industry. (India produces ten times more movies every year than does Hollywood.)
U.N. propaganda shows up in many foreign language movies as well as in Hollywood movies. It does not take much to get some money from the U.N. A line or two of dialogue extolling the U.N.’s legitimacy, a plug for International law, and so on is heard by hundreds of millions worldwide.
A scene that makes the U.N. look good is a lot more expensive than a few words of dialogue. Call it the equivalent of a full page ad in a major newspaper, or a commercial run during the Super Bowl. Propaganda/advertising is paid for with tax dollars funneled through the United Nations.
Do not underestimate the effectiveness of U.N.-financed movies starring actors who shill for the United Nations full-time. Question: Did you ever hear a bad word about the United Nations in a movie or TV show?
The screen is never quiet, even when the characters in a movie are not delivering dialogue. Silence is the cardinal sin to movie makers. In television and radio it is called dead air time. Look back over your life and see if you can remember having “heard” any dead air time on TV?
The printed word is the least effective form of advertising; hence, printed words, at their inception, is the least dangerous method of spreading totalitarian doctrine. Demagogues must add sound to the printed word in order to sell an enslaving ideology. Before the arrival of electronically transmitted voices, proposed quixotic fantasies that first appeared in print ran out of steam before they could do any real harm. Modern propaganda apparatus spread totalitarian ideologies at warp speed; as well as giving governing concepts like Socialism/Communism many more decades of additional life.
The protection of any form of totalitarianism is further enhanced when the Ministry of Propaganda (FCC) stifles electronic opposition. Clearly, the printed word cannot travel as fast as does government-controlled electronic propaganda machinery reaching hundreds of millions of people worldwide every day. A small handful of Internet political message boards and blogs do not make much of a dent by any stretch of the imagination, but it is a start.
Fascism was a reaction to Soviet Communism. No one ever used sound more effectively than did Hitler and his minister of propaganda Joseph Goebbels. If there is a Propaganda Hall of Fame in hell, Goebbels is the custodian. Nazi Germany was beaten, the Soviet Union imploded, but totalitarian government is alive and well under the name Socialist Incrementalism.
NOTE: The Founding Fathers did not need electronic propaganda to establish their form of government, nor did they need propagandists advising them on the contents of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Nor was the media needed to sell limited government to Colonial Americans. I wonder how the Founders managed all of that without input from propagandists?
Finally, Hollywood parasites hate President Trump because he threatens their tax dollar incomes.
p.s. See this thread for a bit about subsidizing ‘government art’:
https://www.justplainpolitics.com/s...s-To-The-Academy-Awards&p=2809383#post2809383
