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Matrix Reloads to $42.5 Million Opening
Dante Alighieri writes "Box Office Mojo,
the Washington Post, E!, and others reports that The Matrix Reloaded opened with a record of $42.5 million in ticket sales."
I saw it yesterday and have a variety of opinions on it, but the short review is that it isn't the original, but it's pretty damn cool, and I'm first in line for Revolution.
The first step on your way to shutting the fuck up about The Matrix is to realize that no one cares. Really. Nobody. And i'll tell you why. Whenever a movie is made, that movie is screened by groups of people chosen by the studio to reflect different social demographics. These "test audiences" tell the studios whether or not the movie sucks ass, and why. Usually, this results in a few editing changes, some scenes get cut, and most importantly, the marketing people get warning flags.
The second step is to realize how the marketing strategy decided. Depending on how a movie does in screening, the marketing department will correspondibly throttle the amount of money they spend on promoting it. Literally, it's an inverse function -- The more a movie sucks, the more it's promoted. When was the last time you saw "In The Bedroom" cereal, or "Slingblade" toys at McDonalds? You need to understand that the studios aren't stupid. They know ahead of time that if a movie comes back from screening with a great review, that word of mouth alone will sell the movie. If the test audiences say a big-budget movie sucks ass, however, the marketing department will go into high gear and cram the goddamn movie down the everyone's throat with endless product endorsements and tie-ins designed to help recoup costs. The studios know that for every dollar they spend on promoting a film, X number of people (who otherwise wouldn't) will spend $8 to go see it.
For example, lets say you, the studio, just spent $500M on a film, and the test audiences say it sucks ass. You know ahead of time roughly how many people will go see the damn thing regardless of how terrible it is. If you don't market it at all, you stand to lose potentially hundreds of millions of dollars. If you market it at a normal level, you'll still lose money at the box office, just not as bad. But If you spend ENORMOUS shitloads of money promoting it, knowing that every $1 in advertising generates $1.10 in box office proceeds, you can recoup the costs of your shitty film. Problem solved.
It's generally a a hard and fast rule. The more ass a movie sucks, the more hype it recieves, the more product tie-ins are made, and the more media time the studios buy to promote the damn thing. And predictably, stooges like you fall for it every time. The intelligent among us see it coming. In the case of Matrix Reloaded, the hype machine was up and running a full three months before the release date. And sure enough, the reviews of it (from regular Joe's like you and I, not ass-kiss film critics) have been correspondingly terrible. Have a look at any site that allows regular people like you and I to rate the movies that are currently in theatres. Last I saw, Matrix Reloaded averaged about 2.5 out of 5 stars.
So, for everyone's sake, including yours.....
Please shut the fuck up about the Matrix. Mmkay?
Thanks.
Bowie J. Poag
OR
I dont mean to troll, and I'm not. Its just very disapointing to see how many people have now seen two of the three movies, and fail to get the point of it all. You bozo's who think that The Matrix is about Kung-Fu and special effects really need to get your heads out of your asses.
The entire trilogy is nothing but a philosophy lesson, with some cool shit built into it to drag your asses to the theater. If anything, the films have proven to me just how fucked up and stupid most of us are, when it comes to anything requiring thought.
Think I'm wrong and just trolling? Here is a challenge: Can anyone tell me the significance of who was laying next to Neo at the cliffhanger? Can you tell me what it means? Not just who it is, but WHY it is? Can you even remember the cat's name?
Come on, give me a reason to believe that we are all not just a bunch of stupid assholes.
Since I am proud of my religion
wtf does that mean ??
wtf the does religion have to do with your pride ?
a sense of belonging to a clique ?
shallow fuck
> I thought it was an excellent movie and now I'm inclined to find out more about philosphy.
OMG. Some of you, Americans, are so ridiculous.