Paramount (incl. DreamWorks)

Summary of 2010 Films

Metascore Breakdown Good / So-So / Bad:
4,8,1
Quality:	Performance:
B–	A–

If we had to pick an overall top studio last year, Paramount would get our vote. Sure, the studio finished in fourth place in global market share among the major studios, but it also placed second domestically -- and its foreign revenues were up nearly 50% versus 2009. But Paramount's biggest achievement in 2010 was in churning out hit after hit.

An impressive eight Paramount releases earned over $100 million in the U.S. last year, and six of those films grossed over $250 million worldwide. Leading the way were sequels Shrek Forever After and Iron Man 2 and newcomer How to Train Your Dragon. Each of those films finished 2010 in among the 10 highest-grossing movies in the U.S., leaving Paramount tied with Disney for most top 10 films last year. And no studio could match Paramount's domestic per-film average of $116 million in 2010. Of course, for each of these films, Paramount can't take all the credit; Shrek, Dragon, and fellow animated hit Megamind were all distributed by Paramount but made by DreamWorks Animation, and the Iron Man sequel was co-produced by Marvel, a Disney subsidiary.

Paramount was also able to balance commercial success with quality last year, leading all major studios in average Metascore. Only one poorly-reviewed film went out under the Paramount banner, and even that turned out to be an international hit: M. Night Shyamalan's The Last Airbender. The studio also earned an impressive 21 Academy Award nominations, and was responsible for two best picture nominees: True Grit and The Fighter.

In the Score Distribution chart, half of all scores (from the 25th percentile to the 75th percentile) fall within the shaded box, with the vertical line in the middle of the box representing the median. The Metascore is a weighted average of scores from top professional critics, on a scale from 0 (bad) to 100 (good). The User Score is an average of scores submitted by Metacritic users, on a scale from 0 (bad) to 10 (good).

* Worldwide Gross includes box office receipts through January 30, 2010 for films still in theaters. Source for grosses: Box Office Mojo.