Sony's future film slate highlights family's value

The studio most identified as the home of high-testosterone action flicks aimed at young male audiences -- think "Spider-Man," "Men in Black" and most recently, James Bond -- has aggressive plans to tap into one of the few rising segments of the filmgoing public.

As part of a new strategy quietly underway at the Culver City-based studio, Sony is committing substantial financial and creative resources to build what it hopes will be a lucrative business around family-friendly movies. Among the many decidedly softer-edge projects the studio is developing are adaptations of "Goosebumps" and "Smurfs" and remakes of "The Karate Kid," "Ghostbusters" and the 1968 musical "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang."

The shift comes as Sony grapples with the need to embrace one of the few bright spots in the slow-to-no-growth movie business. In recent years, family pictures have dominated the box office.

Executives say they don't plan to abandon their strategy of producing franchises such as "Spider-Man," adult-oriented comedies and low-cost horror pictures, all signature products of the studio. But they believe adding movies that appeal to parents and their kids could help counter the long-term trend of declining theater attendance.

"We definitely have a strategy to break into the family market and have those films complement our slate," said Sony's movie chief and co-chairperson, Amy Pascal. "Obviously, it's a huge market that's growing and one that we have not had enormous success in so far."

Like other Hollywood studios, Sony has cut back on the number of films it makes. This year it will release about 20, compared with more than 30 in recent years. Among the genres audiences will see less of, Sony executives say, are adult dramas such as "Memoirs of a Geisha" and "Marie Antionette," which tend to draw too narrow an audience to justify their costs.

Sony's game plan for the family addition is a response to shifts in the market that have rewarded films that draw parents and their kids into theaters while a large segment of the moviegoing audience -- young males -- would sometimes rather stay at home glued to the Internet, video game consoles and big-screen TVs. An economy in free fall is also making it harder to lure consumers out of their homes to spend their hard-earned dollars on movie tickets, pricey popcorn and baby-sitters.