review: the $11 billion year by anne thompson

In the $11 Billion Year, Anne Thompson goes in depth into the movies made in 2012. As she states in the introduction, that $11 billion sounds good, but the movie business is actually on the decline with more people watching at home rather than the theatre. Thompson addresses changes like 3D movies and the switch to digital (which has caused some small theatres to struggle) and video on demand. She also delves into some of the popular festivals like Sundance and SXSW. Those topics were fascinating, but my interest waned when Thompson detailed some of 2012’s popular movies—it seemed unnecessary to describe movies like Life of Pi and Django Unchained. Another detriment to the book was Thompson’s use of false present tense. Instead of making the writing active, the use of present tense for events that happened in 2012 was awkward and distracting.
3/5
Review copy provided by the publisher, It Books.