Despite whatever impressions you may have garnered from the pamagat of this article, this is not about glorifying Twilight over His Dark Materials. It's about scolding the movie industry for giving New moon the green light while simultaneously giving The Subtle Knife the red light.

I know that Hollywood is a business, just as book selling is a buisness, above all else. The only time films are made for the sake of making films anymore is if they're independent. I admit that the occasional brilliantly artistic film makes it into the mainstream, and when it does, it's often recognized and lauded. It's for this reason that I expected just a little bit madami of Hollywood. I hoped that for once, they would look at quality over marketability, but of course, I was wrong.

To be fair, the success of Twilight has no influence (that I'm aware of) on the fact that The Subtle Knife has been put on hold indefinitely. I completely recognize this. The two events are completely independent of each other. But they are comparable in the sense that they are both book series with at least one film version to their name. The difference between them is, one failed in the film industry, and one didn't.

After The Golden Compass failed to meet box office expectations in the United States, the movie industry bigwigs seemed to decide that that was the end for Philip Pullman's award-winning series. But what makes The Golden Compass interesting is that while it barely grossed $70 million domestically, it raked in over $300 million internationally! I'd hardly call that a flop!

Just to give you an idea, Twilight (highly popular in the states) grossed over $190 million domestically, and about the same number overseas. So while Twilight succeeded in the US far beyond The Golden Compass's wildest dreams, Golden Compass nearly doubled Twilight's success overseas.

All in all, Twilight grossed a grand total of $383,520,177 while The Golden Compass earned $372,234,864. Comparatively? Not that bad. Especially considering Twilight's popularity in the States.

So what does this mean? Is Hollywood neglecting their international audience? Though The Golden Compass didn't make as much as Twilight, it didn't make out too badly in comparison. Why put The Subtle Knife on hold and continue production with New Moon when both pelikula did about the same at the box office overall?

To be fair, neither The Golden Compass nor Twilight grossed half as much as Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone or The Lion The Witch and the Waredrobe (974 million and 745 million respectively). Also, The Golden Compass and Twilight did have a sizable gap in their budgets (like over $100 million...). So there are other factors contributing to why New Moon is still in production and The Subtle Knife is on hold.

Basically, this was a rant on my part. I've been checking and checking to see if a release petsa has been set for The Subtle Knife and the project's still hold, and I was annoyed that they're making New Moon and not beautifully crafted story like The Subtle Knife (I think my paborito in the series).

Also, it was to point out that Pullman's movie rakes in madami dough overseas than Meyer's does, and that made me happy.