Another World!

One reason why me and many other people love movies is because of the places you can be transported to. I've enjoyed many alternate worlds that I've explored but one has always had a special place in my heart. "The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe" has given me a strong admiration for CS Lewis and the world that he created. Most of the film was shot in New Zealand and Czech Rebublic to film the Ice Queen's snowy lair and mountains surrounding it. While it was lovely to watch the lush greenary of the camp in the movie the frozen landscapes really speak to me! The White Witch is one of my favorite villians put on film and I think Tilda Swinton's preformance is brilliant. If a viewer of your movie wants to explore the world you have shown them, you know you've done a good job. http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&frm=1&source=web&cd=6&cad=rja&ved=0CFUQFjAF&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.rottentomatoes.com%2Fm%2Fchronicles_of_narnia_lion_witch_wardrobe%2Ftrailers%2F11139265%2F&ei=tTC0UtmNCabH7AaHxoE4&usg=AFQjCNFNbGlUunF1TymRY4hbgMD5iF8Yvw&sig2=2Wb-NsxEchIj0WqPYSeFdw

Winter Wonderland

Winter truly is the biggest time for the movie industry. Next to summer, winter is an extremely important time for movies. From blockbusters to Oscar contenders it truly is a crowded competition. The big contendors are The Hobbit 2, Frozen and surprisingly, Catching Fire is still dominating the Box Office despite coming out late November. That is surely the clear winner but Frozen, Disney's newest fairytale princess story has been breaking records with an amazing $22.3 Million box office recorde. The Hobbit 2 dethroned the Disney flick pulling in $73.6 Million. That may sound good but it failed to match the first film's debut of 85 Million in it's first weekend. Frozen's worldwide box office generated to about $165 Million. Of course the teen action film of The Hunger Games has topped that with a gross of $357 Million! Thats not even mentioning the Oscar contender that was released, American Hustle which saw a very good limited release with $150000 per theatre average. Not all the movies from the year are out yet which means Hollywood will be seeing some more healthy income before the year's over. Now you know why Hollywood truly does look forward to Christmas!

There and Back Again

The part of Movies that Geography has a strong presence in is the matter of shooting on locations. Many film teams fly to other parts of the world to shoot scenes in an area that could benefit the scene. Examples of this would be Peter Jackson, director of the Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings movies regulary films scenes in New Zealand. The lush forests and mountain ranges really give off the feel of Middle Earth. While shooting on location can benefit the look of the movie it can also be a great help to box office. Shooting in somewhere like Ireland will the movie gain intrest there, so come opening night more people will go see it. Unfortuantly with the growing use of CGI less and less film makers feel the need to spend money on these trips when they can just make the same scene, on a green screen. But I think most will agree, it's not the same.

From Hollywood, to China

First lets talk about Hollywood. They say it's the home of the movie industry but that appears to be changing right before our eyes! It's true, and what country is riveling the late and great Hollywood? China! China's movie industry is growing everyday along with the growing audience. The biggest problem movies face today is the way things are changing in the way you and me watch movies. Only a couple of years ago when we wanted to watch a movie we would go to the cinema. Now we just log on to Netflix. The thing is people don't go to the movies that much anymore, but apparently the Chinese do. Films like "Pacific Rim" and "Iron Man 3", while doing well in the states, were absolutely huge in China. More and more movies are getting filmed in China to appeal to Chinese audiences. Even the upcoming "Transformers 4" takes place almost entirely in Hong Kong. So it begs the question, what will become of this? Some say Hollywood is moving to China. With the way it's looking now that might not be such a crazy idea.

Welcome to the Geography of Movies!

Hi my name is Conor and this blog is all about the geography of movies. How exactly does geography tie in to movies? Well first of all theres always to parts of a movie. The first is the production of the movie and the second is the finished product (the movie itself). I'm going to talk about how geography can be a big part of the movie making business and also when geography takes a big role on screen