Hollywood's Hopes 2: How the Sequels Failed at the Box Office

Nearly 30 of this year's major Hollywood films are sequels, but in the US ticket sales are down amidst a feeling that what seemed like a magic marketing notion no longer works.

The big three offerings over the weekend were sequels: Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines; Legally Blonde 2: Red, White and Blue; and Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle. According to the box office monitor, Nielsen EDI, sales were down 15% on last year's July 4 holiday weekend.

All three got massive promotion. Arnold Schwarzenegger, star of Terminator 3, even travelling to Baghdad to show the movie to US troops there. Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle had appearances by the stars on covers of men's magazines - but takings dropped by 63% from its opening weekend.

Dumb and Dumberer, sequel to the 1994 Dumb and Dumber, has been one of this year's most spectacular flops. Another sequel, Rugrats Go Wild, was also a disaster.

"There appears to be more protracted movie-going malaise at work presently," reported the movie paper Variety. "Industryites will surely be abuzz this week about whether summer 2003 has any hope of ever catching fire." In an editorial, Variety asked: "Could it possibly be that Hollywood has finally eaten too much of the devil's candy?" It suggested this summer be sub-titled: "The Audience Strikes Back."

Variety noted that takings were down 4% from last summer and 5% from last year in total. The fall in the number of tickets sold was particularly noticeable, with a drop of 8.2% from last year. Given the ever increasing budgets - Terminator 3 is estimated to have cost $200m to make - the drops are significant.

Terminator 3 also received unexpected promotion: political activists who do not want Schwarzegger to run for governor of California were encouraging film-goers to patronise the film by handing out $20 bills at last week's opening. The idea was that, if the film succeeded, the actor would feel no need to change careers.

The slump is comparative, however. Terminator 3 took $44m at its opening weekend, Legally Blonde 2 took $23m, and Charlie's Angels has taken $67m in its first two weeks. The studios have all declared themselves officially more than happy with the performance of the various franchises. Another factor is that the US is in a recession.

There is also increasing critical hostility to the sequel genre, with The Matrix Reloaded in particular attracting unfavourable reviews. This year, with its list of sequels, has been nicknamed "Year of the Colon" because the punctuation mark features so much.

The real test may come when the next batch arrives. Lara Croft: Tomb Raider - The Cradle of Life; American Wedding (part three of the American Pie series); and Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over, are due for release. Only then will it be clear whether the studios should embark on the film equivalent of colonic irrigation.