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David Mumpower: The other point I would make with regards to the 3D ticket price inflation is that BOP's Chris Hyde always loved to point out that the overall trend of ticket sales has been down since the 1940s. Each decade finds new avenues of distraction for consumers that shrink the consumer base further and further. The industry plays sleight of hand with this by constantly finding new ways to sell tickets at a higher cost. Consider that the cost of living has increased roughly 26.6% from 2000 to today. Meanwhile, movie tickets went from an average of $5.39 in 2000 to $7.50 in 2009, a 39.1% bump, and most analysts (including myself) believe that the actual number is being downgraded to hide just how big the 3D boost has been. We paid $33 for a pair of tickets to see Resident Evil: Afterlife, as an example. Does that mean fewer tickets were sold this outing than in the past? That's probably the case. As long as the production cost hasn't gone up significantly (and it hasn't), do the kind people at Sony (Screen Gems) care? Absolutely not. It's always a shell game with the focus entirely upon revenue attained. The fourth Resident Evil film has done better than the inflation-adjusted total of the original and the third film and effectively matched the second one. It also has earned the most money. Any time a later title in a franchise accomplishes such a feat, I am impressed.

George Clooney has been The American. Brad Pitt has starred in The Mexican. What's next? Damon in The Australian?

Kim Hollis: The American, the George Clooney film that moviegoers seem to despise, earned $5.7 million this weekend and has a ten-day total of $28.1 million. Should Focus be satisfied with this result given the D- Cinemascore?





Josh Spiegel: Absolutely. George Clooney is a movie star in a lot of ways, but he's not in the manner of opening movies big. If you take out the Ocean's franchise - which doesn't market itself solely on Clooney's presence - he's the exact opposite of a proven quantity at the box office. Considering the film's pedigree, the so-called European style of the filmmaking, the low budget, and the extremely low Cinemascore, Focus probably doesn't care if the film doesn't have legs.

Tim Briody: Clooney has not really been one to make films designed to hit it big at the box office, so The American has done decently enough. It was, for all intents and purposes buried on Labor Day weekend (still the one true dumping ground) so that it's going to crack $30 million is fine.

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