NEW YORK (CNN/Money) -
What is likely to be Hollywood's biggest money maker of the year comes out this week, but you won't find it at the multiplex.
Instead, the "Finding Nemo" DVD will be at a video store, general retailer or Web site near you starting Tuesday.
The Pixar Animation Studios hit already was the top movie of the year in domestic box office at $338 million. But Pixar (PIXR: Research, Estimates) and partner Walt Disney Co. (DIS: Research, Estimates) actually will see even more money hit their bottom line when the DVD and video hit shelves.
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| "Finding Nemo" is expected to top its U.S. box office with DVD sales when it hits stores Tuesday. |
"It probably almost for sure will top its U.S. box office. It'll probably be closer to $400 million by the time it's done," said Scott Hettrick, editor in chief of Video Business magazine. "Even if retailers are discounting it as a way to bring in customers, Disney isn't discounting the wholesale price."
And "Nemo" isn't alone in driving strong DVD sales this holiday season. A number of other recent box office hits are due in stores soon, such as Disney's "Pirates of the Caribbean," which is due out Dec. 2 but already is the No. 4 DVD on Amazon.com. In addition to the new movies, hot holiday DVD offerings include new releases of classics as well as box sets of a season's worth of popular television shows.
While overall U.S. box office is slightly off this year compared with 2002, DVD sales growth continues at breakneck speed. DVD sales are expected to come in at $12.3 billion, up about 40 percent from 2002, according to projections from Video Store Magazine. That would mean DVD sales would top U.S. box office, expected to be closer to $9 billion, for the first time.
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| The Indiana Jones DVD set did $50 million in sales its first week. |
And DVD sales are expected to continue growing for years to come, as the number of homes with DVD players grows from the current 50 percent.
"We won't see this level of growth continue too long, but we'll stay above double-digit growth for the foreseeable future," Hettrick said.
This holiday's older film offerings range from R-rated movies like "Scarface" to family fare like the Indiana Jones trilogy and "The Lion King," the first DVD version of the movie with the best video sales of all time.
Hettrick said he expects the "Lion King" DVD to sell about 7 million units, even though there already are 30 million copies of the video in homes.
"It's the same scenario when people replaced their vinyl with CDs -- people want the better version of their favorites," Hettrick said.
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| "The Sopranos" 4th season DVD is one of the new TV box sets available this fall. |
The Indiana Jones DVD collection had $50 million in sales its first week in stores. Overall, Hettrick estimates that about 30 percent of DVD movie sales this year will be older movies with new DVD releases.
Hettrick said box sets of television shows still are a relatively small part of the DVD market, but one of the hotter segments. Collections out this fall range from animated offerings like "The Simpsons" to adult fare like the fourth season HBO mob drama "The Sopranos" to classics like the first two seasons of the "Dick Van Dyke Show." The fifth season of the show "Friends," also due out Tuesday, is the No. 5 seller on Amazon.com Monday.
"The TV DVD has hit a sweet spot with consumers," said Judith McCourt, head of research at Video Store Magazine. "There's directors' commentary, and it's neatly packaged, and it's not going to take up a whole shelf." She said TV on DVD sales should nearly double this year to $1.5 billion from only $880 million a year ago.
The bells and whistles such as directors' commentary, behind the scenes documentaries and in some cases interactive games, especially on children's DVDs, have become an expected staple, and a way for some studios to get two bites at the market with the same movie.
For example, the "The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers" came out on a relatively bare-bones release in August. But new extended versions of the DVD with extra footage and numerous documentaries is due in stores Nov. 18, just weeks before the final edition of the film trilogy hits theaters. Even though the more stripped down version is available in stores now, the premium edition is the No. 2 DVD on Amazon.com, behind only "Nemo." The film is from New Line Cinema, which like CNN/Money is a unit of Time Warner Inc.
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