The Indicator from Planet Money - Are you not entertained ... by our movie-related indicators?

Episode Date: July 18, 2025

The movies come to Indicators of the Week. We dig into why one film is letting you reserve tickets a whole year in advance, what ticket prices might tell us about tariffs and inflation, and how Los Angeles might be cutting back on the red tape when it comes to making movies there. Related episodes: Why aren't filmmakers shooting in LA? (Apple / Spotify) The story of China and Hollywood's big-screen romance (Apple / Spotify) When is cosplay a crime? (Apple / Spotify) Before La La Land, there was Fort Lee, New Jersey (Apple / Spotify) For sponsor-free episodes of The Indicator from Planet Money, subscribe to Planet Money+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org. Fact-checking by Julia Ritchey. Music by Drop Electric. Find us: TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, Newsletter. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

NPR. This is the indicator from Planet Money. I'm Daryan Woods. And I'm Whalen Wong. Waylon, I've got a story for you. Ooh, story time. Okay. Once upon a time, there was a producer who loved movies very much.

Hmm. He decided to make a whole week-long podcast series about it. Wait a second. That sounds familiar. His name, simply Angel Carreras. We have not received. any hate letters. I have not been publicly crucified.

So I think we have succeeded with flying colors. Yay! We said hate letters to Indicator and NPR do dog. Please don't do that. No, no. It was so fragile. Angel Corona says, Enter the chat.

Welcome to the show, Angel. So nice to see you guys and be here. And you are here just in time for Indicators of the Week. Consider me a Mexican Charlie Chaplin with a tiny little bowler cap. I'm tipping it to you because we are capping off movie week

with a film-related indicators of the week. Today on the show, why one film is letting you reserve tickets one year in advance, why entertainment costs are going down, and how L.A. might be cutting back on the red tape when it comes to making movies there. All that coming up after 30 minutes of trailers. We're back from the break. Darian, what is your indicator? My movie indicator is negative 0.3%. And that's how much the price of movie tickets plus concert.

and theatre tickets went down between May and June. Whoa, deflation in the fun industry. Yeah, this is a happier number for moviegoers. And it was in this week's Consumer Price Index release, the Big Inflation Report. It's part of a wider trend of discretionary spending dropping in price. If you watch movies at home, streaming prices were flat, and in travel, hotel and motel rooms cost less. Airline fares for cheaper.

It's like a 21 airworn salute, but positive, right? This is good? Not so fast, Angel. It's early days. Overall, this month's inflation report showed prices are up in other areas. So you've got food prices rising, appliances costing more, toys are getting costlier. Overall, the year's inflation grew to 2.7%, and that is higher than the Fed would like it at 2%. And all those things you talked about food, appliances, toys, I mean, they're all affected by terrorists, right? Is that the common thread? Yeah, the long-anticipated price increases because of tariffs are emerging.

It's still not earth-shattering at this point, but, you know, the snake's head has turned. We've gone from disinflation to rising inflation again. Well, at least we have cheap movies to comfort us. They're not affected by tariffs, right? Right. Well, no tariffs yet, but remember President Trump was threatening terrorists on foreign-made movies back in May? Nothing's really happened there yet, but anything is. as possible.

But to your point, Angel, tariffs may be playing a role in this, but kind of in the opposite way, as tariffs jack up the price of barbecues or tomatoes from overseas, we find other things to cut back on. And so one theory is perhaps at the box office, that means that cinema owners might be lowering their ticket prices to lure in more customers. Well, congratulations, Darien. You've turned movie ticket joy into a ha-ha-ha-ha-horror film. I like an emotional act in my plotlines.

Oh, boy. Speaking of plot lines, someone who usually has positive plot lines, Wayne Lin-Wong, what is your indicator of the week? My indicator is five. That's the number of members on the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors. And this week, these five board members unanimously passed a motion aimed at cutting red tape for film and TV production in L.A. It's the latest move by government officials in California

to revive Hollywood's flagship business. So people shooting away from Hollywood was an episode that we did as part of our film series. And we talked about how filmmakers are getting tax credits to shoot in other states and other countries. That's right. And so there's been a big push by folks in Hollywood to make Los Angeles a more hospitable place for film and TV production. And these LA County supervisors are tackling one issue that filmmakers have complained about. And that's red tape and permitting. So we interviewed a director named Aaron Moorhead for our film series. and he talked about how frustrating all of the permitting stuff can be.

It is an absolute headache to permit in Los Angeles. All right, let's say, you want to shoot in your house for five days, it's $800 just to apply and they might say no. And that's just your house. Like if you need parking, you know, if you need to take over another little area, and then if you apply for a sixth day, that starts a new week, and it's another $800. And I think it's more than $800. The permit application fee is actually over $900 right now.

Wait, where do I need a permit to buy? shoot in my own house. You'd have to pay for just the application to shoot in your own house, and they might say no, you can't shoot in your own house. And so how is this process changing in LA? Well, nothing's changing quite yet. This is government after all. They have passed a motion to review the permitting process. So we're still, I think, a few steps away from some concrete changes. The wheels of governments, they turn so slowly. I know. It's not very cinematic, right? Like the scene of the supervisor sitting. around saying we should have a review.

At least a meeting about meetings. But you know, these moves are important to filmmakers like Aaron. He told us that this recent conversation around permitting is actually the first time he's ever heard it discussed publicly since he got into the business. It all gets revealed on the indicator. Now, speaking of revelations, Angel, tell me about your indicator. Oh, no, I fear another immortal weaves a snare to trap me. urging me to abandon ship.

I won't. Not yet. That's really good, Angel. That's a quote from Odysseus from Homer's the Odyssey. I thought it was a sea captain from the Simpsons. I mean, listen, we were talking about Homer's The Odyssey. Anyways. Oh.

But anyways, yesterday I tried to defy the reservation gods. I tried to grapple them and put them in a headlock, but get a ticket to Christopher Nolan's cinematic take on the Odyssey. but they did not get a ticket. Wait a minute, but that's not coming out for a whole year. Yes, it is coming out a year from now, and that is my indicator, 365. That is the amount of days in advance. You could have reserved a big format ticket to this movie, The Odyssey,

featuring Tom Holland and various handsome men. Honestly, I'm so excited. Okay, so, I mean, is this just a publicity stunt to have reservations so far in advance? Well, I mean, it's not a publicity stunt. The demand was there. And yeah, it's bizarre to have reservations a year in advance, but I mean, most films have you queuing up much closer to release. Warner Brothers, for instance,

their quarter billion dollar high flyer Superman, for example, had reservations only a month out. And that's Superman, dude. What is it about Nolan? Well, I mean, like these movies, specifically Christopher Nolan's movies, are like an event. You could put anything on IMAX these days, like Marvel's Thunderbolts or Joker Foilidoo.

But, I know, do these have audiences trust? Not as much as Christopher Nolan. Hashtag Cinefiles, the letterboxed bros, they just respond to his work. Some have crossed state lines just to see his stuff in IMAX 70mm IMX as well. Right. He's the guy that reignited the Batman franchise that brought in a couple of billion dollars. Yeah, it's kind of crazy that just like a name alone can make nearly a billion dollars on a movie that has nothing to do with anything with any preexisting IP. Like, you know, Inception, that hovered around $800 million worldwide. Oh, wow.

one of my favorite movies ever. Yes, yes. When it comes to Christopher Nolan, he's always dreaming bigger, darling. That's my... No, Hardy. Is that you? You know, while theaters are doing

so many things to bring people back, whether it's kind of weird popcorn vessels, dune bucket, 50% off days. Maybe that's part of the ticket deflationarium. Theater owners and audiences will always want to go to an Odyssey

with one, Christopher Nolan. If we're going to do an indicator Odyssey Week of movie-related episodes. I will trust you, Angel Carrez. Oh, brother, where are at that? I'm trying to think of other Odyssey. You know they call him the Mexican Charlie Chaplin?

You are the hero we deserve, Angel. Thank you. And we also need to thank the producer of this episode, Cooper Katz McKim, with engineers Debbie Daughtry and Catherine Silver. This episode was fact-checked by Julia Ritchie. Cake and Cannon is our editor. The Indicator is a production of NPR.

Hey, you listener, we've got another episode for the movie series, a special treat on Sunday when Darian, Adrian, and I are going to battle it out on business movie trivia. So stay alert, that's coming in your feed on Sunday.