PopSyndicate.com

It’s a hot afternoon in June and you’re looking for something to do.  You decide to go to the movies and watch the latest big budget film with a large bag of popcorn.  After calling up a few friends or your significant other, you hop in the car, head over to the theater and get your ticket. 

It’s a hot afternoon in June and you’re looking for something to do.  You decide to go to the movies and watch the latest big budget film with a large bag of popcorn.  After calling up a few friends or your significant other, you hop in the car, head over to the theater and get your ticket. 

About two hours later you walk out of the theater thinking about the movie you just saw.  Most likely it was a film involving a healthy combination of guns, explosions, fire, innuendos, and sexy women. If you’re a guy, you’re walking out more than satisfied.  The girls in the audience are most likely slightly pleased by the few lines of romance that were tossed in the mix to keep the movie balanced.  This is the summer box office. 

When the average American heads to the multiplex during the summer months, he’s not looking to have his entire worldview changed.  She doesn’t expect to see a cinematic masterpiece that will win dozens of awards and critical acclaim.  The summer box office is escapism at its best. 

With the recent release of Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen, this view point is never more obvious.  RottenTomatoes.com gives the movie a 22% positive rating, which means only 22% of the critics who watched the movie thought it was worth watching.  Critics across the nation have nearly nothing but negative things to say about the movie.  Peter Travers of Rolling Stone Magazine said, “Transformers: The Revenge of The Fallen is beyond bad, it carves out its own category of godawfulness.”  Other critics have spoken of no plot or character development, and still others are angry at the anti-Arab subtext. 

Regardless of these terrible reviews, Transformers 2 will still more than likely be the highest grossing film of the summer, if not the year.  Fandango.com reports that they sold out more than 2000 screenings for the midnight showing.  This is the summer box office. 

The purpose of the summer box office is simple: Make money.  It’s during the summer months that films cross the much coveted $300million mark.  It’s during the summer that all the kids are home itching for something to do.  That’s when they go to the parents and ask for the money to go to the movie that will most likely be mindless fluff and explosions but extremely successful nonetheless.