Hedline in Variety:

Summer season a smash success

The actual story:

Through the Monday holiday, summer box office was estimated at roughly $4.12 billion vs. $4.16 billion for summer 2007. Year to date, the domestic box office is down about 1% vs. last year. Final tallies will be released today. Attendance is down by about 3%-4% for the summer and the year to date.

In other words, the summer box office was lower than last year’s*.

Overall domestic box office is lower than last year’s too.

And, leaving aside Inflated Hollywood Play Money™, attendance is down a significant chunk as well, both this summer and for the year to date.

Other than that, however, things are “smashing.”

* Last summer’s box office was called a record as well. In 2002, about 650 million movie tickets were sold; this summer that figure was about 580 million. That’s a decline of more than 10 percent in six years–in the face of a sizable population increase as well.

———-

Previously in Hitsville:

Bogus box office and “The Dark Knight”
Box office records that aren’t
A record box office in 2007? Not so much
Crazy Nikki, PR person
The box office record that wasn’t, cont’d
A record summer that isn’t