The Importance of Worldwide Audiences...

I've been noticing an encouraging trend in a lot of Hollywood movies lately. Lately, a lot of Hollywood producers have been making movies--and by movies I mean big-budget action-adventure extravaganzas as opposed to quiet little Woody-Allenesque art house affairs--knowing fully well that their content might not necessarily be appealing to mainstream American audiences.

A good example is the third installment of The Chronicles of Narnia, namely The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, which was shot and released despite disappointing box-office take of the second installment, Prince Caspian, in the United States. The global haul of Caspian, however, was significantly bigger than the U.S. grosses, so putting two and two together it seems that whatever they might lose in the U.S., the Narnia producers were confident they could make it back in the rest of the world. Sure the original studio of the film, Disney, dropped it, but Fox picked it up and managed to make a little money in the bargain.

Another example is Tintin, which for years has been one of the world's most beloved comic-book properties but remains relatively obscure to American readers. That fact that Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson gambling over a Hundred and Thirty Million dollars (about fifty million more if one includes marketing costs) to see if Tintin will take off tells me they aren't just after American audiences, who have been largely indifferent to the character for years; they're eyeing the wallets of everyone else around the world who has been devouring Tintin's adventures for nearly six decades.

They're looking at the people who paid $1.9 billion to watch James Cameron's Avatar, and who paid three-quarters of a billion dollars to see the last Pirates of the Caribbean movie which, if one goes strictly by its earnings in the United States and Canada alone, was actually a box-office failure. In short, they're looking at the rest of the world.

So are the people who made the recent Captain America, judging by the addition of the phrase "The First Avenger" to the title. It makes good business sense, too; these days most blockbusters make the majority of their worldwide grosses outside the United States, and in fact all three of the latest movies bearing the Marvel logo, Thor, X-Men: First Class and Captain America: The First Avenger, made most of their total grosses outside of the United States.

The nice thing about this trend, and the reason I find it worth writing about, is that down the line it could open the door for more cultural diversity in Hollywood products. The thought that Hollywood execs may one day make movies while bearing in mind how well they may sell in Asia, or Latin America could mean we could see less of the blatant white-washing painfully evident in recent movies like The Last Airbender and 21. Heck, considering how many Asian films are being plundered by Hollywood for remakes, it's not too far-fetched to imagine Hollywood using actual Asian stars for Asian-themed movies down the line, who knows? Sure, it seems fanciful now, but I'm sure there was a time when idea of an African-American actor like Will Smith being the biggest box-office star in the world was unthinkable too.

The world is getting smaller and smaller, even to Hollywood's accountants...