A solid holiday season and the success of “Dark Knight” helped push the U.S. box office totals two percent higher with $9.78 billion in estimated grosses last year according to the Hollywood Reporter. The box-office results set a new record for Hollywood even though overall ticket sales were down from 2007.
2008 saw 1.35 billion movie tickets sold while 2007 saw 1.40 billion sold. The jump in revenue comes from an increase in ticket prices, which rose by 4.7 percent last year. On average, movie-goers paid $7.20 per ticket last year.
“There were a lot of predictions this would be a really, really hard year for movie theaters, but this year in big ways and small ways turned out to be a really strong year,” said Patrick Corcoran, media and research director for the National Association of Theatre Owners. “We had ‘Dark Knight’ in the summer, which was huge, and films grossing under $100 million apiece totaled $500 million more than the same category of films in the summer of 2007.”
In terms of studio success, the big winner of the year was Warner Brothers. With the success of “Dark Knight,” the studio enjoyed a $1.79 billion year, powered by “Dark Knight” and the success of “Sex in the City” and “Get Smart.” Industry analysts say Warner Brothers could have had a bigger year if the fifth Harry Potter film had opened in November. Instead, the studio moved the film to the summer of 2009.
Last year’s top studio, Paramount was second this year, powered by the success of “Iron Man” and “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.” The holiday season’s “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” also helped Paramount ring up sales of $1.60 billion.
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