After how many weeks does a movie begin to rely sole on Word of Mouth...?

[Guts/Batman]

Just a thought that came to mind, about how many weeks or days does it take for a movie that comes out in the theatres for the main source of drawing power?

[The Zapper]

In this day of age I'd say about 3 weeks. I've spen a lot of time being a manager at a movie theatre, and let me tell you, it's all about the first few weeks. If a movie is still drawing after 3 weeks it's probably got a lot of good word of mouth going for it. If the movie is dead after 3 weeks, it's probably got some not so great word of mouth. It's hard to tell tough, because movie theatres are a dying breed, and are on the path of the drive in.

[Ontir]

Sometimes, a film starts out with word of mouth, and that's all it gets. I seem to remember that Eating Raoul had no ad budget; but it got a good review from Siskel & Ebert, and people who saw it, told their friends, and it became a sleeper hit!

[Buzz Dixon]

45 minutes; i.e., halfway through the first afternoon showing the early viewers are already PMing and text messaging their friends to say if it's good or not. Teens waiting in line to buy tickets rely on reports from friends already in the theaters. Add that to people on the East Coast posting reviews on blogs and forums.

A movie will be killed by bad word of mouth in less than 24 hours, sometimes less than 6.

As for the obverse, no matter how massive or clever an advertising campaign is, all it can do is encourage early word of mouth. Most movies stop being advertised in electronic media by the second week of their theatrical run (the DVD release is another story). The best a good advertising campaign can do is to convince the adventurous early show movie friends to try a film out and, if they like, they tell their friends, who tell their friends, and so on and so on...

[The Zapper]

I've seen plenty of BAD movies not be killed the first day by word of mouth alone. If movies really got killed so easily like that, my job would be a lot less frustrating.

[DWEarhart]

I would believe they rely on word of mouth from the start. I know at the theater I'd get instant feedback from customers, and if it was bad, I'd see an automatic decline for that flick's attendance.

Word of mouth can be effective right off the bat.

[The Zapper]

It takes about 3 weeks for positive word of mouth to really effect sales. The first weekend of a big release is always big, word of mouth effects the week day sales the first week, and the second weekend. Bad word of mouth has a faster effect than good.

[The Foreigner]

45 minutes; i.e., halfway through the first afternoon showing the early viewers are already PMing and text messaging their friends to say if it's good or not. Teens waiting in line to buy tickets rely on reports from friends already in the theaters. Add that to people on the East Coast posting reviews on blogs and forums.


Okay, this made me laugh out loud. :D

Damn cellphones.

[Superboy Prime]

Guess it kinda depends on what kind of word of mouth the film receives in it's first few days, or weeks. If opinion is fairly varried, then that may cause people to want to see the film and be the judge for themselves. This has happned in the past. But generally speaking, I would say that first opening weekend is probably the most crucial time period in if or not the film can possibly rely in any way on word of mouth in it's overall success at the box office.

[Atom_basher]

imo word of mouth starts before the movies are even released