The Movie Business Book, Third Edition
Introduction
by Jason E. Squire
This book is all about the business side of movies. Spawned over a century ago, motion pictures matured in one generation into a complex mixture of art and commerce, capturing the imaginations of worldwide audiences and having a profound impact on behavior, culture, politics and economics.
At its simplest, the feature film is the arranging of light images to win hearts in dark rooms. At its most complex, it is a massive venture of global commerce, a vast creative enterprise requiring the logistical discipline of the military, the financial forecasting of the Federal Reserve, and the gambling instinct of wildcat oil drillers, all harnessed in private hands on behalf of the telling of a story. The profit motive is at work here, but the formula that attracts audiences is as speculative, uncertain and elusive as can be.
Movies as Product
To the new reader, a warm welcome.
To the returning reader, there have been profound changes in the movie business since our last time together.
The theatrical market has shifted from a profit center to a loss leader.
The industry is in transition from analog to digital. This changeover is complete in postproduction. A growing number of movies are also being sh ... read full excerpt from The Movie Business Book, Third Edition ebook
