{"id":229058,"date":"2017-01-02T16:31:27","date_gmt":"2017-01-02T18:31:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/?p=229058"},"modified":"2017-01-02T16:31:27","modified_gmt":"2017-01-02T18:31:27","slug":"movies-at-the-mall","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/movies-at-the-mall\/","title":{"rendered":"Movies at the mall"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"New

Alf Ribeiro\/Folhapress <\/span>New patterns of film exhibition mean more space for the best-selling filmsAlf Ribeiro\/Folhapress <\/span><\/p><\/div>\n

When comparing charts of data on film production in Brazil, Mexico, and Argentina\u2014the three leading cinematographic producing countries in Latin America\u2014sociologist Anita Simis found that the lines declined dizzyingly in the same period, in the early 1990s.\u00a0 She observed that most of the research about this phenomenon dealt with the production by each individual country, its period of crisis, and its recovery.\u00a0 She decided instead to conduct her research on a road not yet traveled: she would compare the cinema output of those three countries from the standpoint of exhibition, examining the period prior to the crisis (first half of the 1980s) until the era when it was overcome (the mid-1990s).\u00a0 Her main conclusion is that there has been a change in the movie theater model; today, theaters are part of a chain that provides products that are enjoyed by a limited number of moviegoers.<\/p>\n

Despite the historical specificities of the movie studios in Brazil, Mexico, and Argentina, says Simis, they have always faced a single competitor: U.S. cinema.\u00a0 This competition resulted in each of the countries experiencing similar difficulties in developing their markets.\u00a0 However, although the three had gone through previous crises at different points in time, it was not until the 1990s that the decadence, the paralysis, of their production converged almost simultaneously.<\/p>\n

\"Spending

Leo Ramos<\/span>Spending on food is now part of the consumption chain of which the ticket is only one of the linksLeo Ramos<\/span><\/p><\/div>\n

In aspects like distribution, movies have always been a globalized product, created in Hollywood and distributed all over the world by the so-called majors, the big American movie studios.\u00a0 But in Brazil, Mexico and Argentina, the exhibition function has, historically, been dominated by local companies.\u00a0 In the 1990s, however, globalization began to reach the theaters, concomitantly with the bankruptcy of several domestic corporate groups and the gradual concentration of the market in a limited number of chains funded by international capital.\u00a0 According to Simis, three exhibitor groups now control 35.9% of the cinemas in Brazil: in 2014, they owned 1,017 of the 2,833 Brazilian screens, serving 45.9% of the moviegoing public.\u00a0 These are the American Cinemark, Mexican Cin\u00e9polis, and Kinoplex, a Brazilian chain owned by the Severiano Ribeiro Group that in some of its theaters operates in a joint venture with the U.S. group UCI.<\/p>\n

Change in policy<\/strong>
\nAnita Simis writes that the backdrop of the situation described above was the same in all three countries.\u00a0 That was when neoliberal views began to influence local politics.\u00a0 Politicians came to power, advocating the reduction of the role of the State in the economy as a whole, especially its role in promoting culture.\u00a0 In Brazil, the abolition of Embrafilme (Empresa Brasileira de Filmes) in 1990, ordered by then-President Fernando Color, dealt the final blow to film production\u2014two years later, only one Brazilian product would be introduced, an English-language thriller entitled A grande arte<\/i><\/em> (U.S. title: Exposure<\/i><\/em>).\u00a0 In Mexico, the entry into force of NAFTA, the free trade agreement with the United States and Canada celebrated during the Carlos Salinas administration, lowered the trade barriers that had hampered the expansion of the U.S. presence in Mexico\u2019s exhibitor market.\u00a0 In Argentina, the National Cinema Institute survived the privatizations carried out by Carlos Menem, but had its budget cut.\u00a0 At the same time, as the 1980s became the 1990s, U.S. studios gradually began to depend more heavily on the foreign market.\u00a0 In 1986, Hollywood studios had depended on domestic theaters for 75% of their revenue but relied on foreign audiences for 25% of what they needed to make ends meet.\u00a0 By 1998, those figures had risen to 45% and 55%.<\/p>\n

\"One

Leo Ramos<\/span>One of the few examples of main street movie houses still operating in S\u00e3o Paulo, although adapted to the multi-screen modelLeo Ramos<\/span><\/p><\/div>\n

Advances by transnational film exhibitors were key to ensuring a flow of Hollywood films onto the world market.\u00a0 With that came tremendous changes in the way theaters are patronized.\u00a0 First, as Simis explains, the concept of the multiplex took root.\u00a0 This was a group of screens, usually installed in shopping centers, where the exhibition of films becomes a link in a chain of consumption that includes parking and food (a growing component within the enterprise).\u00a0 An added boost is the feeling of security and the opportunity to make the rounds of attractive shops.\u00a0 At the same time, the older theaters on Main Street were facing problems such as insufficient investment, lagging technology, and the decay of urban centers; their audience dwindled gradually and inexorably.\u00a0 There was also an increase in ticket prices, which rose to equal heights in peripheral markets like Brazil, Mexico, and Argentina without regard to the peculiarities of local purchasing power.\u00a0 Third, advances in digital exhibition made it possible to show a single film worldwide, sometimes occupying hundreds of screens in a single country.<\/p>\n

The researcher recounts some of the consequences of those changes: the number of screens and moviegoers began to grow again, following the decline of the 1990s, but movies ceased to be entertainment for the average person and became a product that served a narrower economic stratum.\u00a0 \u201cNow only one kind of moviegoer, one with higher purchasing power, can feed the entire consumption chain of a shopping mall,\u201d she says.\u00a0 \u201cThe idea of going to the movies simply to enjoy the work of a director or actor has practically disappeared from the minds of the majority of people who go out to be entertained by watching films.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Arte_Cinema<\/a>Blockbusters<\/strong>
\nAndr\u00e9 Gatti, a professor of cinema at the Armando \u00c1lvares Penteado Foundation (FAAP) and author of the thesis \u201cDistribution and exhibition in the Brazilian cinematographic industry (1993-2003)\u201d endorses Simis\u2019 analysis.\u00a0 \u201cWhen it was released in 1964, Glauber Rocha\u2019s film Deus e o diabo na terra do sol <\/i><\/em>(Black God, White Devil), reached 300,000 moviegoers,\u201d he says.\u00a0 \u201cO bandido da luz vermelha<\/i><\/em> (The Red Light Bandit), directed by Rog\u00e9rio Sganzerla, sold more than three million tickets in 1968.\u00a0 Achieving those numbers is absolutely out of the question in today\u2019s Brazilian cinema for bold format films like those.\u201d<\/p>\n

To Marcelo Ikeda, a professor at the Federal University of Cear\u00e1 (UFCE) and author of the book Cinema brasileiro a partir da retomada \u2013 Aspectos econ\u00f4micos e pol\u00edticos<\/i><\/em> (Brazilian cinema after the restart \u2013 Economic and political aspects) (Summus, 2015), the concept of multiplex theaters with dozens of screens could have helped enhance the possibility of showing more pluralistic films.\u00a0 But what happened was the opposite.\u00a0 \u201cThe big international releases, the ones that arrive in Brazil in batches of more than a thousand copies, have crushed the average films,\u201d Ikeda says.\u00a0 \u201cToday, our choice is between the blockbusters, both foreign and Brazilian, or the art films that appeal to a very small audience.\u00a0 About two-thirds of the films released in Brazil attract fewer than a thousand moviegoers.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Arte_Cinema<\/a>The main conclusions reached by Anita Simis in her study have been reported in the article Political economy of the cinema<\/i><\/em>: Argentina, Brazil, and Mexico<\/i><\/em>, published in May 2015 in the journal Versi\u00f3n \u2013 Estudios de Comunicaci\u00f3n y Pol\u00edtica<\/i><\/em> by the Metropolitan Autonomous University, of M\u00e9xico.\u00a0 Simis works in communications sociology and is a professor in the graduate studies program in social sciences at S\u00e3o Paulo State University (Unesp), Araraquara campus.\u00a0 She is the author of the book Estado e cinema no Brasil<\/i><\/em> (The State and cinema in Brazil) (Unesp, 1996), the result of her doctoral dissertation in which she investigated legislation promulgated between 1932 and 1966 in order to examine the factors that prevented a stable and permanent Brazilian film industry from flourishing.\u00a0 The research study \u201cPolicies for audiovisual: Argentina, Brazil, and Mexico\u201d took two years and was conducted in archives, libraries and Internet sites in all three countries.\u00a0 \u201cContrary to what I expected, it was extremely difficult to obtain data from primary sources,\u201d she recalls.\u00a0 \u201cMost of the time I had to resort to research published by other authors.\u201d\u00a0 This explains some of the gaps in the charts depicting film production and number of theaters that we reproduced on this page.\u00a0 \u201cOnly recently did more continuous data appear, possibly because the cinema and cultural policies are being given more respect.\u00a0 The access to more accurate data was facilitated by digitization.\u201d<\/p>\n

Project<\/strong>
\nPolicies for audiovisual: Argentina, Brazil and M\u00e9xico (n\u00ba 2012\/50951-9<\/a>); Grant Mechanism<\/b><\/strong>\u00a0Regular research grant; Principal Investigator\u00a0<\/b><\/strong>Anita Simis; Investment<\/b><\/strong>\u00a0R$39,658.30.<\/p>\n

Scientific article<\/em>
\nSIMIS, A. Political economy of the cinema: Argentina, Brazil and Mexico<\/a>.\u00a0 Versi\u00f3n – Estudios de Comunicaci\u00f3n y Pol\u00edtica<\/b><\/strong>, V. 36, pp. 54-75.\u00a0 2015.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The new model of theaters encourages moviegoers to spend more","protected":false},"author":614,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[154],"tags":[225,216],"coauthors":[1620],"class_list":["post-229058","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-arts","tag-economy","tag-film"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229058","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/614"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=229058"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229058\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=229058"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=229058"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=229058"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=229058"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}