I’m a big movie buff, not just of films themselves, but of the whole movie business, so I always look forward to seeing the weekend box office numbers on Monday. This weekend, it seems that horror beat Zorro, with Saw II taking in almost twice as much as The Legend of Zorro over the Halloween weekend. No-brainer, right?
Anyway, what struck me was this section from the AP story:
Considering ticket prices are up about one-third since [1998], “Legend of Zorro” drew only about half the crowds domestically as the first movie [The Mask of Zorro] over opening weekend.
Distributor Sony noted that solid returns in Latin America and Europe offset the weaker showing for “Legend of Zorro” on the homefront. In about 50 international markets, the sequel took in $27 million, up 22 percent from the debut of “Mask of Zorro” in those same countries, said Rory Bruer, Sony head of distribution.
“In regards to how you go about releasing your film, it’s just a matter of what brings the most dollars in box office, whether domestic or worldwide,” Bruer said.
The reason I found this part interesting is that I spent a fair amount of time down at the office for El Tiempo Latino last week, and it was chock full of promotional materials for the movie (Zorro, not Saw II). I can only assume that the same would have been true for the other Latin-market papers in the area; clearly, Sony decided to make a major push for the movie’s marketing in this direction.
To me, this makes a lot of sense; in the past 10 years or so there have been a number of movies which were heavily marketed to African-Americans (Soul Food and Barbershop being just two examples) and as a result debuted with surprisingly large box office returns — surprising to caucasian reviewers and executives, that is. Given the swelling Latino population in America, it’s smart business to start developing films specifically geared to that market. To be sure, this film isn’t designed specifically to appeal to that audience, but I expect that before long you’ll see Spanish-language films playing at the local Googleplex — and doing big business as well.
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