Do American Critic Reviews Affect Film Consumption Abroad? The Brazilian Case

Abstract

The Brazilian film market consists mainly of American films; most of these films are released after their release in the United States, while a few are released before or simultaneously. The recent rapid developments in information and communication technology (ICT) changed film-showing technology to a digital model, improving the possibility of simultaneous worldwide releases. ICT evolution also allowed Brazilian moviegoers to access American critic reviews in real time. We explore this scenario to study whether American critic reviews influence film consumption at theaters in Brazil. We employ regression analysis using data from 1,600 films exhibited in the country between 2007 and 2018 collected from Box Office Mojo and Rotten Tomatoes websites. Controlling for endogeneity problems, we documented a prediction effect of expert reviews on gapped film releases but not an influence effect on simultaneous releases, which correspond to the wide film releases in the United States.