It's a bought and paid for bragging point, but it's still a bragging point.

On Sunday, Chris Mooney and Randy Olsen both tried to make the case that Ben Stein's "Evolution Caused the Holocaust" movie was a success at the box office. Both of them have been rather spectacularly condemned for calling Expelled a success, but I'm not sure that they're entirely wrong. I just don't think that they took a hard enough look at some of the issues involved.

Let's start with the basic facts. Expelled hit theaters on Friday. It was aggressively marketed prior to release, and opened on 1,052 screens - the most ever for any documentary. On Sunday, estimates suggested that the movie would bring in well over $3 million for the weekend, but the actual figures were not quite that high. That's probably because (Randy Olsen's assertion notwithstanding) ticket sales fell off rapidly over the course of the weekend. (Expelled brought in $1.2 million on Friday, but only $990,000 on Saturday, making it the only movie in the top 50 in theaters this weekend to drop from Friday to Saturday. The slide continued on Sunday, when the movie brought in $775,000.)

$3 million is a lot of money, and Expelled is one of the highest-grossing documentaries ever. Both of those things are facts, and we ignore them only at our own risk. Both Chris and Randy are right to point that out. They are also right when they call a movie that has opening statistics like that a "success" - because that is exactly how other people will spin those figures.

There are, of course, other things that they don't point out. Despite the box office figures, the movie can charitably be described as a critical laughingstock. The opening weekend box office totals, although significant, came in a full order of magnitude below what the producer claimed was possible, and a full order of magnitude below the most successful documentary opening ever.

The level of success that Expelled managed to achieve came as a result of a very aggressive marketing campaign. Television ads for the movie appeared in prime time on at least two cable networks (CNN and Comedy Central) during the week before release. Incentive programs have been established that promise awards and kickbacks to schools and churches that bring lots of people to see the movie. A traveling road show of private screenings (no scientists allowed) for "faith" groups was held before the public release. In short, a hell of a lot of money was spent to try and put butts into seats this weekend.

Chris and Randy are the professionals, and they might have a different take on things than I do, but to me all of this indicates that Expelled's producers, and the anti-evolution movement as a whole, got exactly as much of a victory from the release of the movie as they were able to buy, and nothing more. They demonstrated that if you are willing to spend a huge amount of money, you'll be able to show something for it - even if it's a lot less than what you were hoping for.

If that's the case, I'm not sure what we could have done to keep any of that from happening.

More like this

Preaching Expelled to a bought and paid for choir is not a success. I think that Randy and Chris know this; I do not know why they do not want to admit it.

Once the Church Buses stop bringing the True Believers(TM) to the seats, this turd will be flushed faster than a dodo with a good haircut.

Well-written.

Most of the arguments about this seem to derive from different people looking at different indicators of success: money (divided into opening, and subsequent), critical reaction, or overall social impact.

In this short piece, you've managed to cover them all (wisely waiting to assess social impact), briefly and civilly.

By Jason Failes (not verified) on 22 Apr 2008 #permalink

I wonder what the box office take is if you exclude the contribution from committed fundamentalists (the population that's already lost to reason). Given the number you state (less than 3 million total for the opening weekend), I would guess that it's pretty meager. If the goal was to reach the undecided, I suggest that this movie is a dismal flop.

By T. Bruce McNeely (not verified) on 22 Apr 2008 #permalink

I don't know much about the movie biz but I do know a few things about finance in general. Per Variety.com, the movie did $3 million on 1,100 screens, or about $2800 per screen. That puts it #6 on the per-screen revenue for the weekend for films open on more than 100 screens, beating Horton Hears a Who (which is clearly winding down) and a few other "legit" movies. That's not bad at all.
To get a sense of how fast Expelled is going to go away, wait for the full week numbers in Variety on Thursday or Friday, and see how much incremental revenue they've been able to capture on weekdays where the kiddies are presumably busy with their Bible Study and Falwell Youth group activities. If the revenue number stalls, then look for it to close fairly quickly.
The second major point of interest would be to try to figure out what the cost of the film is and what the promo budget might have been, to figure out just how much money they're losing. The good news is that if they've spent $8 million on a film that captures $4 million in box office and takes a few more years to reap the same amount on DVD, then that means they don't have any additional funding for a sequel or another project... It would be very painful if they were able to throw off enough money to keep making sequels and turn out an endless stream of this stuff. Keep your fingers crossed.

By A. Capitalist (not verified) on 22 Apr 2008 #permalink

So, the implication is that this Sunday drop off is because it was a church growing crowd that was going (in large part) to begin with, yes?

Pretty much every movie had a drop off in sales from Saturday to Sunday, and I'd guess that's perfectly normal. Friday and Saturday nights are "have fun" nights. Sunday night is a "work tomorrow" night. The lack of any gain on Sunday - or even just a leveling out - shows that the "after church" crowd that people were talking about simply didn't materialize.

The drop from Friday to Saturday, which was experienced by no other movie in the top 50, is different. To me, that indicates that most of the people that the producers got interested ahead of time showed up on Friday, but that there wasn't much (if any) real buzz generated to get anyone other than the firmly committed to plop down their dollars and pay to see the train wreck.

It really bugs me that box office is reported in terms of dollars, not tickets: 100 people showing up for a $6 matinee comes out the same as 60 people at a $10 show.

There's a lot of reason to expect many of the butts in the seats at Expelled were transported there and back again in church buses and given group discounts, so the eyeball count may be significantly higher than the dollar totals indicate.

By Pierce R. Butler (not verified) on 22 Apr 2008 #permalink

This is a well thought-out analysis of the opening. It had a huge bankroll and that had to show up in the box office results. I'm not sure it's a victory for them since they did a lot of work showing the religious connection to ID. That will no doubt help the side of reason in the next court battle.

I think a lot of people had problems with Chris saying "I'm merely reporting the facts" and then neglecting all facts that pointed to the opening as a disappointment.

Mike, as usual you are bending over backwards to be fair, and way too far in this case.

Expelled has been a flop beyond my wildest dreams (and I have some wild ones). Clearly what has happened is it played in front of the bussed-in choir, some masochists like Rosenhouse, and few others. It persuaded no one, fooled no one, and made even more people aware of what a lying snake pit the ID crowd is. Even Fox news panned it.

Of course the faithful showed up, and of course this would translate into a deceptively large box office gross compared to other documentaries (and I'd argue it shouldn't even be called that). So what? We knew the creationist population already, we knew from Ken Ham's experience (now there's a financial success) that there is a lot of creationist money to go around. Financially, gross means nothing, it is NET that matters. They spent $10M to make $3M. This is a commercial flop of grand proportions.

Expelled met 0% of its goals that can be currently measured. They took in 1/4 of what they prdicted/hoped. Anyone calling this movie a success is playing semantic games.

I like Chris Mooney a lot, but his obsession with PZ and the whole framing thing seems to be driving him a bit nuts on Expelled. This is the second time he's tried to spin a blatant PR disaster for the film as a coup, and it doesn't wash this time either. There's no way Expelled is going to make money on those numbers. 1,052 venues means 1,052 prints, and prints are extremely expensive. The cost of prints alone might eat up the net revenue from the opening weekend, and that's before we get into production costs, marketing costs, the huge numbers of subsidised tickets/bribes, and other overheads. It will probably end up in the black once they sell DVDs to fundie churches, but it's definitely a box office flop. $1,000 per screen is terrible box office. An average cinema expects to take about $1m revenue per screen each year. If a cinema were relying only on films with the pull of Expelled, it would go bust in months.

More to the point, the whole point of Expelled, if it had any point at all, was to spread the "Darwinism=atheism=Nazism" beyond the people who already believed that. It needed to get Farenheit 9/11 type numbers to do that. There's no point selling tickets only to the committed. They hoped their massive pre-marketing and bribe campaign would spread the word of mouth, and they failed.

By Ginger Yellow (not verified) on 24 Apr 2008 #permalink

Mike Dunford said,

Despite the box office figures, the movie can charitably be described as a critical laughingstock.

That the movie did as well as it did despite being a "critical laughingstock" redounds to the movie's credit, not discredit.

A huge number of theatres -- 1052 opening theatres for "Expelled" -- hurts the per theatre averages because many of the theatres are competing in the same market areas.

You Darwinists are crowing that "Expelled" is a "flop," but you are mainly comparing "Expelled" to the documentaries of Michael Moore -- whose name alone can attract big audiences -- and not to the many documentaries that did not do as well as "Expelled." And what is more important than how many people actually see "Expelled" is the effect of the movie on the thinking of people who will never see it. "Expelled" has made a lot more people aware of censorship of criticism of Darwinism, persecution of critics of Darwinism, and the Darwin-to-Hitler connection. I have personally experienced such persecution and censorship -- my ideas about co-evolution have been banned on the Panda's Thumb blog and the Florida Citizens for Science blog -- see
http://im-from-missouri.blogspot.com/2008/04/co-evolution-theory-censor…

Also, it seems that the movie statistics might be misinterpreted. It was reported that Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11 opened with $23.9 million on 868 screens. That works out to an average of $27,534 per screen. At an average admission of $10, that works out to an average of 2,753 viewers per screen. Does such an average seem realistic, considering that many of those 868 screens were competing for viewers in the same markets? Assuming an average of 15 showings per screen over the three days of the weekend, that means an average of 184 viewers per showing, including matinees and late shows. Many modern theatres are multiplexes with small projection rooms, and viewers might have to be standing on heads to pack that many into each screening room. Are those figures for Fahrenheit 9/11 just for opening weekends, or for the entire runs in the first-run theatres?

Also, some movies open early in the week instead of on weekends. Is it fair to compare the opening revenues of those movies with the opening revenues of movies that open on weekends? Also, the strength of the competition when a movie opens can be a very important factor -- it is a big disadvantage to open when several blockbusters are being shown. I think that there is too much emphasis on the opening statistics.

As for the Darwin-to-Hitler idea: it is one thing to say that any connection between Darwin and Hitler has nothing to do with the scientific merits of Darwinism, and another thing entirely to say that the Darwin to Hitler connection does not exist.

"As for the Darwin-to-Hitler idea: it is one thing to say that any connection between Darwin and Hitler has nothing to do with the scientific merits of Darwinism, and another thing entirely to say that the Darwin to Hitler connection does not exist.

Considering that Hitler also claimed to be a Christian you could equally say that there is a Hitler to Jesus connection. It would be stupid but then that fits you.

By Voice in the U… (not verified) on 26 Apr 2008 #permalink

*Hands Larry Fafarman a calculator*

Now, 2700 divided by three days is...

By Shirakawasuna (not verified) on 27 Apr 2008 #permalink

Hands Larry Fafarman a calculator*
Now, 2700 divided by three days is...

I don't need a calculator. I assumed an average of 5 shows per day (two matinees plus three evening shows) -- or 15 shows over three days -- to come up with the average of 184 viewers per show.

The numbers Larry cites for Fahrenheit 9/11 are indeed for the opening weekend only.

184 per showing? That few? Even a small projection room can fit 150. When you figure in the large 350+ seating rooms, the average theater occupancy is over 200.

I think Larry is also way off-base in his assumption that the theaters were competing for viewers in the same market. Theaters go to great pains to avoid overlapping with other theaters in the same market (a close relative works at a theater, so I get to hear all about it). It should be noted that the market area is based on population density, so a metropolitan area can support quite a few markets without significant competition.

So, yes, 184 per showing sounds quite reasonable.

"I have personally experienced such persecution and censorship -- my ideas about co-evolution have been banned on the Panda's Thumb blog and the Florida Citizens for Science blog"

That's because you're a nutter. And you forgot Ed's blog. If the best example of "persecution and censorship" you can come up with is an annoying loon being kicked off some people's blogs, I really don't think the creationists have to fear an incipient holocaust.

By Ginger Yellow (not verified) on 28 Apr 2008 #permalink

Kevin Vicklund said,

184 per showing? That few? Even a small projection room can fit 150.

Well, I think that projection rooms today tend to be small because so many theatres are multiplexes (16-screen theatres are not uncommon). As I said, imagine packing an average of 184 people per showing into 868 projection rooms, including matinees and late-night shows (I assumed 15 shows over a three-day weekend).

I have seen some new tables that explain the exact meanings of the statistics and so I now see the 184 viewer per showing figure as realistic. But it never hurts to be skeptical. You are just never skeptical about anything that is not a criticism of evolution and not one of my legal theories.

think Larry is also way off-base in his assumption that the theaters were competing for viewers in the same market.

When a movie is shown on a huge number of screens, around 1000 or more, some competition for viewers is inevitable. People don't always go to the theatre closed to home -- they may go to a theatre close to work, go to a theatre during a shopping trip, etc.. Theatres sometimes even compete with themselves -- a movie might be shown on two or more screens in the same theatre. Anyway, my point is that showing a movie on several screens in the same movie-marketing area is likely to reduce the per-screen revenues.

Ginger Yellow driveled,

That's because you're a nutter. And you forgot Ed's blog.

And you are a stupid crackpot.

No, I haven't forgotten the blog of unscrupulous BVD-clad blogger Fatheaded Ed Brayton. He kicked me off his blog permanently when he disagreed with my literal interpretation of a federal court rule. I didn't get a single chance to respond to his disagreement -- he kicked me off immediately because he saw that my arguments were too persuasive.

On the blogs of unscrupulous BVD-clad bloggers, only the most persuasive dissenting comments are arbitrarily censored and unpersuasive dissenting comments are retained for the purpose of trying to give the false impression that the opposition is weak.

"I'm always kicking their butts -- that's why they don't like me."
-- Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger

"But it never hurts to be skeptical. You are just never skeptical about anything that is not a criticism of evolution and not one of my legal theories."

Shame on us for not thinking there might be a conspiracy to inflate the box office of a documentary, a conspiracy so incompetent as to be physically impossible. All the while not thinking there's a conspiracy to inflate the box office of another documentary. I've torn up my official skeptic card in self-loathing.

By Ginger Yellow (not verified) on 30 Apr 2008 #permalink

"On the blogs of unscrupulous BVD-clad bloggers, only the most persuasive dissenting comments are arbitrarily censored and unpersuasive dissenting comments are retained for the purpose of trying to give the false impression that the opposition is weak."

At last we have an explanation for the continued censorship on your own blog and why your "Association of Non-Censoring Bloggers" has no members.

By Voice in the U… (not verified) on 01 May 2008 #permalink

Larry likes to bleat the "Best Butter" story over and over. It is a classic case of projection. He just doesn't understand who the hare represents.

We are always kicking Larry's butt. That's why he doesn't like us.

"He (Ed Brayton) kicked me off his blog permanently when he disagreed with my literal interpretation of a federal court rule."

You have never come up with a literal interpretation of anything in your life and the reason that you were kicked out has been covered many times. There is no reason to repeat it.

"he saw that my arguments were too persuasive."

If you have persuasive arguments, why don't you use them here, or for that matter, on your own blog? All you do is repeat the same old discredited crap.

Ed had several threads that were just on you and your entertainment value. He finally dropped them because he said he didn't think it was right to mess with the clinically insane.

By Voice in the U… (not verified) on 01 May 2008 #permalink

Look at the trolls' lack of originality. All they can do is just repeat my witticisms.

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.

By Larry Fafarman (not verified) on 02 May 2008 #permalink

"All they can do is just repeat my witticisms."

Witticisms?
Repetition?