March 29, 2008

Why Titanic’s Box Office Record Will Never Be Broken

Every time a film has a huge opening weekend (and I am talking 100+ million dollars), the film is inevitably compared to the box office of Titanic. This is especially true if there is massive hype surrounding a film’s release. The last two Star Wars films, Spider-Man 3, and the last Pirates installment—they all went through the hype on whether or not they could approach the golden numbers of Titanic. The films always do well, yet they never come close. You would actually have to add up the box office totals of the last two Star Wars films to break the holy grail of box office records.

Titanic earned over 600 million dollars in the U.S, and worldwide, the numbers jump to a staggering $1.8 billion. Look at those numbers carefully people, because they are unreachable. It is like Wilt Chamberlain’s 100 points in basketball or Brett Favre’s 253 consecutive games played in football. It is an achievement that will stand for an eternity (or at least until ticket prices become 25 dollars a person).

So why will the records of Titanic stand? Here we take a closer look at the astounding numbers it has set.

• 15 consecutive weeks / 4 months at the #1 spot at the box office
• 26 weekends / half of a year in the top 10 at the box office
• Titanic’s soundtrack spent 4 months at the #1 spot on Billboard’s top selling album.
• $1. 2 billion in DVD sales and rentals worldwideWhat is even more impressive than Titanic’s total gross, is that it was able to maintain the #1 spot at the box office for 4 months. That is just freakin’ ridiculous. The only think my brain can compare it to is if someone were to score 200 points in a basketball game. I cannot comprehend something like this. The film spent half of an entire year in the top 10 at the box office. No film will ever approach numbers like that. Titanic is the Michael Jordan of movie records.

  Here are the first 5 weekends at the box office:

  Weekend 1—$28.6 million
  Weekend 2—$35.4 million
  Weekend 3—$33.3 million
  Weekend 4—$28.7 million
  Weekend 5—$36 million

  As you can see, the film actually increases its weekend gross after the first weekend, something that never happens. How can a movie spend a month at the box office, and in its fifth weekend, make more money than the previous four? Then in its ninth weekend, it jumps from a few weeks of $20 million to $32 million. The staying power of this film was unprecedented at the time, and 11 years later, hasn’t even been touched.

  Nowadays, it is extremely rare for a move to spend more than four to six months at the box office. Films are released, have monster opening weekends, and are released on DVD relatively quickly. In six months at the box office, a film would have to average 25 million dollars every single weekend to match Titanic. In four months, it would have to average nearly 40 million dollars every single weekend to match Titanic.

  The numbers don’t lie. What is more amazing about them is that Titanic never really has a monster opening weekend. You see films like Spider-Man 3, Harry Potter, or Pirates have these 100+ million dollar opening weekends, and yet they slowly fizzle after a few weeks.

  This graph compares the Star Wars: The Phantom Menace to Titanic’s numbers. As you can see, The Phantom Menace jumps out to an early lead, but eventually hits a plateau. This happens with every movie released today. It races out to big numbers, and then cools off and dies. Titanic just kept on going.

  Looking back, it wasn’t just a movie, it was a cultural phenomenon. I worked at a movie theater during this time, and it was absolute insanity. Customers would see it for a second and third time. Something about this film kept bringing people back to the theater. I was one of those people, seeing it three times. No other movie can boast that type of viewer commitment. People will watch a movie at the theater, and they may love it, but usually will wait until it is released on DVD to buy it. Some may see it a second time, but that is rare nowadays. This is an integral reason on why Titanic’s numbers won’t be broken. So they next time you read on how a film has a shot to break this unbeatable record, you’ll shake your head and laugh. It is never going to happen. Ever.

  Tony Liccardello is a screenwriter and filmmaker in search of Hollywood.

  
  
  

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