PrepTest 120, Section 4, Question 1
Big-budget movies often gross two or three times(19 more words not shown)
Which one of the following,(10 more words not shown)
- ABig-budget movies need(15 more words not shown)
- BThere are many(11 more words not shown)
- CThe movie industry's(13 more words not shown)
- DBig-budget movies, because(14 more words not shown)
- EThe more time(13 more words not shown)
Reading the argument
A big movie can bring in a lot of money without accounting for most of the industry's money. How many smaller movies are there?
Imagine 50 big-budget releases and 10,000 low-budget releases. Each smaller movie could earn far less than a blockbuster, but the smaller movies could bring in more money when we add them all together. Comparing one movie with another isn't the same as comparing the two groups.
Maybe some low-budget movies also bring in surprisingly large amounts. Either possibility would help explain the apparent mismatch. But be careful about profit: the passage asks where the industry's revenue comes from. A high return relative to a tiny budget doesn't, by itself, mean a large amount of revenue.
What we’re looking for
We're asked to resolve the discrepancy. Keep both facts: big-budget movies often bring in two or three times their costs, and low-budget movies supply most of the industry's total revenue. We don't need to turn the blockbusters into failures. We need to explain how the smaller productions could add up to so much.
Working the answers
- A
This tells us how many tickets big movies need to cover their costs. It doesn't tell us how much revenue low-budget movies bring in, either individually or together. Needing more sales to break even doesn't explain which group supplies most of the industry's revenue.
- BCorrect
There are many more low-budget movies. That gives us the volume explanation we wanted: a large number of smaller earners can collectively bring in more money than a small number of big earners. Think of comparing one highly paid doctor with millions of construction workers. The doctor might earn more than any one worker, but that doesn't mean the doctor earns more than all those workers together. Likewise, the success of individual blockbusters doesn't prevent the much larger group of low-budget movies from supplying most of the revenue.
- C
This changes the size of the whole pie. We're trying to explain the sizes of the slices: how much of the total comes from low-budget movies rather than other movies. The industry's revenue could rise or fall while either group supplied most of it.
- D
Insurance is another production expense. Knowing that big-budget movies pay more for it doesn't explain why low-budget movies supply most of the revenue. We already know the big movies often bring in substantially more than their production and marketing costs.
- E
We aren't told which movies take longer to make, and production time doesn't tell us how much revenue either group brings in. This gives us a relationship between time and expense without resolving the comparison we were asked about.
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