! Junior & Dot Together At Last Two Concession Classics - Junior Mint^ and Mason Dot^ - are appearing together at theatres around the country. Dots' super assortment of five of movie goer's for years. Make sure your conce: sion features the double selling power of these two favorites - Junior and Dot together at last! fruit flavors and Junior Mints' creamy combination of cool mint and dark milk chocolate have been the choice o^
lune. 1997 3 OPENING CREDITS to the delightful but very Thanks busy period ushered in by the ShoWest convention, a bit of business we meant to share with you last month fell by the wayside. Those of you who've been reading us regularly since June of 1994 already know all about our website BOXOFFICE ONLINE. The very first and, to our minds, still the most complete website launched by any film trade publication, revamped and BOXOFFICE ONLINE was dramatically "relaunched" in March 1996. The "new and improved" BOXOFFICE Online is an astonishing success story. In its first year of operations, it has already reached well over 500,000 discrete, individual users, logging many millions of "hits" and receiving multiple awards in the process. The big surprise, though, came a few months back, when, right in the middle of the ShoWest editorial crunch, we were informed by our website design team at Marlin Software that THE NET, a leading, nationally distributed print magazine dedicated to trends on the internet, had analyzed thousands of websites in order to compile a list of "THE TOP 100 WEBSITES OF ALL TIME." Despite the proliferation of movie-themed info sites on the web, only four film-related websites made the final, 100 Website cut. And guess who came in at number one. We point this out to you partly to crow about something we're proud of, but also for a more important reason. Unlike many of the other awards BOXOFFICE ONLINE has grabbed in the past year, THE NET's considered opinion of our editorial content demonstrated not only a shrewd and intelligent analysis of BOXOFFICE ONLINE' s underlying aesthetic, but an outsider's appreciation of a sampling of the kinds of materials we struggle to bring to our readership each and every month. We know from the letters and calls we receive from our readers how much BOXOFFICE means to you, and we're deeply grateful. It was nice to get some between BOXOFFICE additional validation from a prestigious and impartial third party—one which nevertheless seems to have recognized some important points about the relationship and its loyal audience. So here, in full and verbatim, is what THE NET had to say in the review which accompanied its naming of BOXOFFICE ONLINE as the single best film content provider on the World Wide Web: the most What's we can hope for from most film sites? A few tired reviews as impartial as a press kit, a couple of hackneyed 'star' profiles, maybe some sound bites or a few stills. Well, BOXOFFICE, the online version of a magazine that's been around for 75-plus years, goes well beyond those expectations. It delivers the densest collection of intelligent film writing on the Web, with readable interviews of film personalities and timely scoops on soon-to-be-released movies. Surfers who spend some time here will no doubt come away with a long list for the comer video rental. "The site has three searchable indexes. This Just In is updated every Friday, and offers previews of upcoming films, as well as reviews of all current releases (and I do mean all). The Classic Review Archive includes reviews dating back to 1 93 1 . Finally, there's an archive for just the last year. The range is impressive; scrolling the list of 400 reviews in the '95-'96 archive can overwhelm even the most avid moviegoer. "A trip to the BOXOFFICE Classic Archives is a study in film history. Reviewing 'Frankenstein' (1931), a correspondent wrote, 'It is one of those weird and gruesome stories that brings shrieks and ejaculations from the feminine fans.' In those days, BOXOFFICE included a 'Selling Seats' footnote to reviews, providing helpful promoting tips to theatre owners: 'Use large cut-outs of "The Monster" in the lobby. Arouse public curiosity by stating: "To have seen 'Frankenstein' is to wear a badge of courage.'" "An industry guide as much as a filmgoer's resource, BOXOFFICE ONLINE keeps the sensationalism to a minimum. Features run the gamut from actor profiles to regional updates of filmmaking internationally, from analyses of key directors to industry insider production notes. Also worth browsing are the extensive industry links to everything from popcorn popper distributors to the big Hollywood studios. It' s a great read and a great resource for film buffs: intelligent, useful and on top of things, all at the same time." s A' "BOXOFFICE ONLINE keeps the sensationalism to a minimum, delivering the densest collection of intelligentfilm writing on the Web. It's a great read and a great resource forfilm buffs: intelligent, useful and on top of things, all at the same time.'*'' —from "The 100 Best Websites of All Time," The NET Magazine you can imagine, we were pretty excited about a write-up like that. We disagree only with that reference to "the comer video rental," for an important reason: Though it might increase consumer traffic, we have intentionally organized the materials BOXOFFICE ONLINE contains without the slightest reference to video release dates. BOXOFFICE ONLINE, like BOXOFFICE itself, is dedicated to the art of the theatrically exhibited feature film, and nothing else. One last piece of unfinished business has to do with the 1997 Academy Awards. As you may have figured out from our May '97 Oscar coverage, BOXOFFICE was once again backstage at the ceremony this year. You may also remember that we had a few choice words in these pages for the Academy's 1996 decision to deny BOXOFFICE Academy credentials for the first time in this magazine's long history. For the record, the Academy treated BOXOFFICE with great promptness and courtesy in 1997, and so we now consider the issue closed. We couldn't let that sought-for outcome pass, however, without remarking on the great outpouring of love and affection so many of you demonstrated by contacting the Academy on our behalf after last year's misunderstanding. As we said in our June '96 Oscar editorial, we feel it's our job to be there because we are fortunate enough to act as exhibition' sjoumalistic voice to the powers that be. Your actions on our behalf proved that point in the most powerful way possible. And not incidentally, touched all of us deeply in the process. Until next time, ^Sjum^ Ray Greene Editor-in-Chief BOXOFFICE
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