SANTA MONICA, Calif., July 2 — Three teenagers loitered last week outside the ticket booth of an AMC Theater at the upscale pedestrian mall here, skateboards underfoot, the marquee beckoning overhead.

They were weighing whether to see "Superman Returns," the latest big-budget, Hollywood extravaganza to come hurtling out of the gate.

Siegfried Bodolai, 16, called Siggy, had already seen the film once and found it old-fashioned, though he is enough of a movie buff to consider seeing it again. "We're more the 'Spider-Man' 'X-Men' generation," he said. His friend Daniel Andres, 17, was in no great hurry to see "Superman." "The movies are repetitive," he said. "It seems like there's about eight stories. It's like I'm seeing the same movie, almost."

After abandoning theaters in worrying numbers last summer, American moviegoers are returning to the multiplex, steadily if slowly. Through the first 25 weeks of the year, domestic box-office revenue — helped by a boost in ticket prices — was up nearly 5 percent, to $4.6 billion, though it still trailed 2004, according to the tracking company Exhibitor Relations. Movie attendance was up about 1.65 percent to 699 million for the first 25 weeks, after a sharp decline the year before.