The private equity that has become available for making films has become so large that even with complaints by Hollywood, there seems to be a continuing explosion of new releases. The result has been there are now more new releases coming out than in over a decade.
One of the problems arising from this is that there aren't enough of them being marketed across various demographics. For example, there are six new movies being released this weekend, with four being rated R.
John Fithian, the president of the National Assn. of Theater Owners, said concerning this: "Six releases is a lot. And we have had several weekends so far 
this year with a release number higher than the norm.
"I understand why distributors would be concerned, as it is difficult to break through the marketing clutter, acquire the most appropriate screens and get a shot at the broadest possible audience base when there are so many releases. But for theaters, breadth of product typically produces great overall results."
Fithian quotes a statistic of movies released between 1995 and 2006, where 46 percent of them released were rated R, but only they accounted for only 31 percent of the box office.
It's not necessarily the number of movies being released that could become a problem, but the lack of market diversity that is served.
That's the problem that comes with this type of anomaly of having so much cash on hand. It can create situations that aren't part of the norm. That's what's happening now.
The problem with this type of poor planning is that investors will take a good look at what they're getting in return, and if the competition is for too small a niche, then the returns will reflect that reality. The result could be a huge pulling back by investors.
A lot of people are getting money at this time that normally wouldn't have it available to them. It could cause some disruption that could not only hurt those getting the opportunity to take their films to the big screen, but if a few of them do better than expected, it could cut into the profits of the larger studios who are counting heavily on enjoying a potentially record-breaking year.
What a lot of this tells me though is those making these movies aren't thinking economically in any way, but are doing their "creative" thing. Evidently their lack of experience or simply not caring is bringing part of this problem about. It will really be interesting and fun to watch how this year plays out and the jockeying for positions on the screens goes.
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