Enlarge By Barry Wetcher, 20th Century Fox Star power: Young Wall Street trader Jake Moore (Shia LaBeouf) has a fateful confrontation with Gordon Gekko (Michael Douglas) in Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps.

Get ready for five (count 'em, five) films in the next month — some major motion pictures and others pointed documentaries — that focus on the economy: Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps; Freakonomics; Inside Job; I Want Your Money; and The Company Men.

But how to market these films? And, more important, can any of them score at the box office? Movie ticket revenue is up this year, but that's thanks to increased ticket prices: Attendance actually has slumped. This slew of financially focused films comes at that time of year when most films — particularly those with Oscar hopes — are typically more serious.

Even then, capturing audience may be tougher than sneaking a bag of homemade popcorn into the multiplex.

"I don't think people go to the movies for lessons on the economy," offers Gregg Kilday, film editor at Hollywood Reporter. Perhaps more than appealing to the general public, he says, "It reflects the interest of a handful of filmmakers."

While the economy is very much on the public's mind, says film-marketing guru Sheri Candler, "I don't imagine a lot of people who lost their jobs want to see a film about people losing their jobs."

That said, it would be hard to be more topical than to focus on the economy. Being topical, in fact, is what folks in films, TV and advertising try most urgently to do. But it rarely pays off. Witness the slew of films and documentaries about 9/11 that quickly followed the terrorist attack — only to mostly flop at the box office.

Another possible pothole: Most of the upcoming films about the economy are targeted at older filmgoers, Candler says. "More typically, Hollywood makes films for the younger generation."

What's on tap today through Oct. 22:

•Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps (opens today): This Oliver Stone film is a sequel to the 1987 film Wall Street. Michael Douglas returns as bad guy Gordon Gekko, a role for which he won an Oscar. Gekko emerges from prison to find a very different Wall Street. Interest has been heightened by Douglas' very public battle with cancer.

•Freakonomics (opens Oct. 1): This documentary film version of the best-selling book by Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner examines how people respond to incentives-based thinking. A pre-theatrical release of the film has been made available through iTunes.

•Inside Job (opens Oct. 8): This documentary film takes a look at the culture of Wall Street though the eyes of those on the inside. It attempts to explain what really caused the near-collapse of the nation's economy. "A film that can tell the story about how the economic crisis happens is something people will want to see," says Tom Bernard, co-president at Sony Pictures Classics.

•I Want Your Money (opens Oct. 15): The documentary is a Tea Party-esque take on the state of the economy. "The economy is a topic on everyone's mind," says director and producer Ray Griggs. "We're living in a real situation with real cause and effect."

•The Company Men (opens Oct. 22): The Weinstein Co. film, starring Ben Affleck, is about the emotional and ethical struggles of a high-powered sales executive after becoming a victim of corporate downsizing. "I hope there's not an economic overload for filmgoers," says director John Wells. "There's a need for the county to collectively deal with how painful this has been."