About the Box Office

Film in the United States began in the 1920s, when the first silent films hit the silver screens.  Since that time, major film studios have developed as titans for worldwide cinema experiences, while independent films are featured at festivals celebrating the art of filmmaking and provide possible distribution.

Gotlieb in a March 2010 lecture at Western Kentucky University explained that movies rely on word of mouth communication.  Further, he explained the effects of word of mouth are so powerful on the intent to see a movie that advertising for a movie may even become useless after an opening weekend.  He contends that movie patrons want to know what their friends think about a movie more than any other influence on purchasing behavior.  This is an obvious extension of the common “movie review” one can find in a newspaper.  In the most present sense of the box office, the film industry has been analyzed with even larger reach online through movie reviews, blogs, and other forms of social media.