An early Valentine present for The Oscar® Nominated Short Films 2012, which opened on 120 screens across the United States and Canada last Friday, February 10th, 2012 when the release beat expectations and broke its previous record from the year before.
Press Release from ShortsHD:
Los Angeles, CA - An early Valentine present for The Oscar® Nominated Short Films 2012, which opened on 120 screens across the United States and Canada last Friday, February 10th, 2012 when the release beat expectations and broke its previous record from the year before. Ever since the programs started playing in theaters leading up to the Academy Awards seven years ago, they have been consistently outpacing expectations.
The box office grosses for the weekend of 2/10 - 2/12 totaled $412,304 with a per-screen average of $3,436. Besting last year's previous record of $300,706 with a per-screen average of $3,165. This represents a 37% increase over last year and a consistent, significant increase in gross income every year since the program's inception in 2006.
"We had a great opening weekend-our best ever." said Carter Pilcher, ShortsHD's Chief Executive. "This just shows the enduring popularity of first-rate short movies while increasing the odds of winning Oscar pools."
The program will roll out to additional markets in the coming weeks and will eventually be in over 200 screens nationwide and Canada prior to the 84th Academy Awards® ceremony on February 26th. The Oscar® Nominated Short Films 2012 is comprised of three programs, Animated, Live Action and Documentary.
The Oscar® Nominated Short Films has become a key fixture of the awards season. Last year, the theatrical release broke all records, grossing over $1,350,000 nationwide and playing in significantly more theaters than in previous years. Since the inception of the program in 2005, attendance has grown by 800%.
Nominations for the 84th Academy Awards® were announced on January 24th. For more information, visit www.shorts.tv/theoscarshorts or find us on Facebook: facebook.com/shortshd and twitter: twitter.com/shortshd.
ABOUT SHORTSHD
ShortsHD™ is the first high definition channel dedicated to short movies and is available on DIRECTV (Channel 568), and AT&T U-Verse (Channel 1789). ShortsHD™ is operated by Shorts International, the world's leading short movie entertainment company with the world's largest movie catalogue dedicated to short movies. Shorts International also operates ShortsTV™, which is available in France, Belgium, Luxembourg on Numericable (Channels 134 and 52) and in Turkey via TTNET's Tivibu service. Shorts™ is the short movie on-demand service available on iTunes movie stores in the US, Canada, Mexico, Japan, Taiwan and throughout Europe. The company is headquartered in London, England with additional offices in Paris and Los Angeles and is led by Carter Pilcher, Chief Executive. Shorts International is owned by Shorts Entertainment Holdings and Liberty Global Ventures.
ABOUT MAGNOLIA
Magnolia Pictures (www.magpictures.com) is the theatrical and home entertainment distribution arm of the Wagner/Cuban Companies, a vertically-integrated group of media properties co-owned by Todd Wagner and Mark Cuban that also includes the Landmark Theatres chain, and the high definition cable network HDNet. Recent and upcoming releases include Lars Von Trier's MELANCHOLIA, TIM & ERIC'S BILLION DOLLAR MOVIE, and Sarah Polley's TAKE THIS WALTZ.
