I just saw that Freaky Friday, released almost exactly ten years ago, now adjusts to $149.2 million. Holy shit, how did that happen?!!! I don't believe a film like that, with any star in the leading role, could have made this much nowadays or even close. Same for The Princess Diaries adjusting to $156 million!!

I mean I understand Mean Girls adjusting to $113 million, it was kind of a small phenomenon, but Freaky Friday??

Also, Bringing Down the House (forgot it existed) adjusting to almost $180 million and having occupied the top spot for three weeks is batshit insane. I know I saw it in theatres and I have no idea what it's about anymore.

Bringing Down the House had awesome trailers, and made the PG 13 comedy popular again.

Freaky Friday I think is pretty normal. It's a remake of a popular Disney Classic , with Lohan extremely huge at the time especially with families (Her two disney channel films avg like 15 million viewers each. And Jamie Lee Curtis still was at least a top 20 leading lady at the time.

I think the main thing is they don't really make Live Action family comedy films anymore with a popular star that look appealing, or without any CGI. It's been years.

Edit: Just looked, the last PG typical live action family comedy with a star I can find is Paul Blart back in 09

Lecter I was thinking of starting a "forgotten BO Runs/WTF" thread and Freaky was going to be on the list. You beat me to it.

I'm more surprised by BDTH.

I am having a hard time wrapping my brain around the fact that My Big Fat Greek Wedding adjusts to nearly $340 million. Of course its original gross is already baffling, but still. That's just so much money for such an insignificant film.

I am often amazed by adjusted earnings. Ransom, for example, which adjusts to 250 million, which is just a phenomenal number for a solid, if largely unspectacular suspense film.

A lot of Oscar winners from the 70s/80s fit this bill for me. Shit like On Golden Pond adjusts to $330m today.

People used to see some shitty movies.

It just occurred to me that the majority of films mentioned were Disney/Touchstone. Under Michael Eisner, we would get at least 1-2 regular (non-tentpole) releases a year that adjust to those kinds of numbers - The Sixth Sense, Remember the Titans, Sweet Home Alabama, etc.

In the years since Iger took over, the amount of non-tentpole live action Disney releases that made that much can be counted on one hand (Wild Hogs, The Proposal, and The Help - not sure if The Pacifier counts, was that greenlit while Eisner was still in?)

Say what you will about Eisner, at least he ran the live-action division like an actual movie studio. If not for Marvel (and soon Lucasfilm), the all-tentpole strategy would be a colossal failure.

The market has certainly changed since the early 2000s, with the rise of made-for-cable TV shows, VOD, and such, but I think they've overreacted with this whole approach of "we have to make everything BIGGER and MORE EXPENSIVE to get people back into theaters!"

No, what gets people into theaters are movies they want to see. For every Iron Man 3 there's an After Earth, just like for every Heat there's an Internship. The difference is that films like The Internship don't lose gobs of money when they flop.

Also, Lincoln was from Touchstone Pictures/DreamWorks like The Help was

Oh, The Help was DW? I forgot. In that case, there hasn't been a Disney-originated non-tentpole breakout since The Proposal.

The scaled-back production schedule and "all-tentpole" approach may have been good ideas on paper, but it only works if all the films on the schedule make money.

Pulling the topic back to shocking adjusted totals, another Disney one: George of the Jungle adjusts to $187 million. Really.

(And that number puts into even more perspective how massively Dudley Do-Right tanked - it only made $16 mil adjusted.)

Another shocker that many forget:

Double Jeopardy adjusts to $187 million (with an R-rating no less!). For a generic run-of-the-mill thriller. Were Ashley Judd/Tommy Lee Jones such huge draws? Three weeks at #1 too. An R-rated thriloler like this, even with good reception, does no more than $70-90 million nowadays.

The Princess Bride only adjusts to $64 mil. Which is shocking to me.

How the Grinch Stole Christmas adjusts to $393 million!!

!

!!

So, what's the explanation? I assume Tommy Lee Jones must have been a big thing back then with Men in Black and U.S. Marshalls (and soon after that Space Cowboys).

I also meantt the explanation for its success. I can only assume, TLJ was a major draw. I mean at least The Interpreter was PG-13, IIRC.

Freaky Friday is freaking awesome. I love that movie and it deserves every penny of that adjusted $150M gross. lol



Double Jeopardy struck a chord because it had very appealing ads that made it look like a female version of The Fugitive. Plus the premise, despite being legally ridiculous, is compelling. And Ashley Judd/TLJ was a great starpower combo.

Why ARE thrillers less popular now, anyway?

I wonder if the fact that the Baby Boomers reached retirement age in the 2000s was a contributing factor; when you're on a fixed income and movie tickets are getting more expensive, maybe it's more convenient to stay home and watch CSI.

This really makes me ponder why it's so shocking to us that these films would have been such big hits. Something changed starting around 2004 - not all at once, to be sure, but something was happening before the economic crash, or the rise of Internet video/VOD/etc., or any of the visible things which are often floated as causes for the trend of declining admissions.

It seems strange that Vin Diesel did not do XXX 2 or Fast 2. Unless his plan all along was to start franchises, leave them in shambles, and resurrect them later.

Definitely a factor. And just generally it seems that the home market would appeal to the thriller demo a lot.

I think CSI, NCIS and their ilk having replaced the thriller movies seems like a very valid point to me. here is a reason why CSI used to pull such HUUUUGE numbers.

I wonder what movies' adjusted gross will we lok back in ten years and also think WTF? I am pretty sure Identity Thief will be on there.

That has to be one of the biggest post-theatrical improvement success stories of all time.

Good point too - lots of excellent tv dramas on lots of networks, and they were available on dvd.

Paul Blart: Mall Cop will be on the list.

Paul Blart is ALREADY on the list, lol.