Disney (and others) at the Box Office - Current State of Affairs

[erasure fan1]

Just saw frozen empire…it was goofy, but enjoyable. Just a popcorn flick…nothing wrong with that.

The question is this. Is everytime something new Ghostbusters related comes out, do we have see the idiots come out and try to convince us Ghostbusters 2016 wasn't a absolute abomination of a film? I saw it when afterlife came out. And now Gamespot has an article, it's time to give Ghostbusters 2016 another chance. Uhhh no, it was bad then and it's worse now. Lol

 

[TP2000]

I'm always in the mood for a horror movie, but that's just me.

But I'm sure they probably do better in October.

I read an article that said The First Omen was supposed to just be a streaming TV movie on Hulu. But after Disney had to scrap Snow White and send it back for rewrites and reshoots and Media Training 101 courses for Miss Zegler, moving Snow White to "2025" instead of March 22nd, 2024, they had nothing planned for theaters this spring. So Disney moved The First Omen into theaters instead of Hulu just to have something, anything.

My question is, if this was so graphically gory that it first received an NC-17 rating from the MPAA, how on earth was it going to be on Hulu? My streaming choices trend to the PG and PG-13 only, much like my movie choices, so I guess I had no idea that there were graphically NC-17 type choices on a mainstream service like Hulu. Who knew?! But... yikes.

The First Omen May Be The Most Violent, Transgressive Horror Movie Ever Produced By The Walt Disney Company - SlashFilm

The horror prequel The First Omen is technically a Disney movie, and that's pretty shocking.

www.slashfilm.com

 

[Miss Rori]

Why not wait until October when the audience mood is ready for dark tales, instead of releasing this at the start of happy, shiny Spring Break Fun-Fun-Fun! season?

Likely because starting in September there are a whole bunch of horror and horror-adjacent films hitting the market, including Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, Saw XI, a sequel to Smile, Speak No Evil, and Terrifier 3. Even the third Venom movie could be seen as horror-adjacent.

Still, Disney/Fox Searchlight opening a film like this in April, and just as another Catholic-themed horror movie came onto the market, seems like a weird, last-minute choice. (And a waste of surprisingly positive reviews.) I do wonder if stuff like this and the halfhearted Pixar reissue program is an effort by Disney to have something on screens for exhibitors when they had to move so much out of 2024 in the wake of the strikes and whatnot, once they realized that Wish wasn't going to play into the spring Frozen-style.

 

[brideck]

Still, Disney/Fox Searchlight opening a film like this in April, and just as another Catholic-themed horror movie came onto the market, seems like a weird, last-minute choice.

The First Omen had its release date set on Nov 16th, and that press release doesn't say anything about it being intended for streaming, so I don't know that any of these decisions were made last minute. [Compare with The Young Woman and the Sea's announcement.]

Neon didn't even acquire Immaculate until December and set the release date on Jan 25th, so that's good preemptive counterprogramming on their part.

 

[Disney Irish]

I read an article that said The First Omen was supposed to just be a streaming TV movie on Hulu. But after Disney had to scrap Snow White and send it back for rewrites and reshoots and Media Training 101 courses for Miss Zegler, moving Snow White to "2025" instead of March 22nd, 2024, they had nothing planned for theaters this spring. So Disney moved The First Omen into theaters instead of Hulu just to have something, anything.

My question is, if this was so graphically gory that it first received an NC-17 rating from the MPAA, how on earth was it going to be on Hulu? My streaming choices trend to the PG and PG-13 only, much like my movie choices, so I guess I had no idea that there were graphically NC-17 type choices on a mainstream service like Hulu. Who knew?! But... yikes.

The First Omen May Be The Most Violent, Transgressive Horror Movie Ever Produced By The Walt Disney Company - SlashFilm

The horror prequel The First Omen is technically a Disney movie, and that's pretty shocking.

www.slashfilm.com

As far as I'm aware First Omen was always meant to be a theatrical release not a streaming movie. I think some have confused that with the fact that its written and directed by a former TV director, Arkasha Stevenson, making their feature film directorial debut with First Omen.

 

[Wendy Pleakley]

The question is this. Is everytime something new Ghostbusters related comes out, do we have see the idiots come out and try to convince us Ghostbusters 2016 wasn't a absolute abomination of a film? I saw it when afterlife came out. And now Gamespot has an article, it's time to give Ghostbusters 2016 another chance. Uhhh no, it was bad then and it's worse now. Lol

Not to be confused with the people from the opposite side of the coin who take any opportunity to remind us they hated a movie that came out in 2016.

 

[Disney Irish]

I really think we need to get out of this idea (which has been said MANY times in this and other movie threads) that horror/thriller themed movies only should release during the "spooky season". These type of films have always come out at various times of the year, never just in the "spooky season". For example the original Friday the 13th came out on May 9th in 1980. So this idea really needs to go to the graveyard and die, pun intended.

 

[DKampy]

Because no one watched it…

Try to keep up here. People
Go to see good movies. They don’t spend the time and money to see crap.

Except fast and the furious…those defy common sense

Are you sure about that….I see great movies all the time that no one else watches (The Nice Guys)at the same time I see movies that are not good at all that become blockbusters…looking at you Transformers

 

[Disney Irish]

Are you sure about that….I see great movies all the time that no one else watches (The Nice Guys)at the same time I see movies that are not good at all that become blockbusters…looking at you Transformers

Agreed, just because something became "popular" at the box office doesn't mean it was actually good. And likewise just because something didn't do well at the box office doesn't mean it was bad. Movies are subjective, there is a long list of movies that became popular long after the box office.

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

Are you sure about that….I see great movies all the time that no one else watches (The Nice Guys)at the same time I see movies that are not good at all that become blockbusters…looking at you Transformers

There is a bit of difference between “indie stories” and wide release, clear the schedule type tentpoles

 

[Farerb]

When I was looking into this First Omen movie, I mistakenly read an article about it and how horrifically gory and disgusting it was in a few nude scenes. It apparently got an NC-17 rating for its horrific gore and nudity content, and they dialed it back ever so slightly to get an R rating.

I've never liked horror movies much, but graphic nudity gore is just a bridge too far for me. I simply won't do it.

Why does every 20th Century or Searchlight movie have to be disgusting nowadays?

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

Why does every 20th Century or Searchlight movie have to be disgusting nowadays?

Most of Fox has been trash for decades

 

[DKampy]

There is a bit of difference between “indie stories” and wide release, clear the schedule type tentpoles

My example The Nice Guys was not ”indie”…. it was distributed by Warner Brothers… but then again maybe you also consider Lethal Weapon, The Last Boy Scout, and Iron Man indie

 

[TP2000]

The First Omen had its release date set on Nov 16th, and that press release doesn't say anything about it being intended for streaming, so I don't know that any of these decisions were made last minute. [Compare with The Young Woman and the Sea's announcement.]

The news that The First Omen was originally meant for a Hulu debut as a TV streaming movie came from Variety's article on the weekend box office that was released yesterday.

The reporter and their sources could be wrong obviously, but if you can't trust Variety who can you trust?

"Of course, 20th Century Studios didn’t spend $400 million on “The Omen” rights and tout plans for a new trilogy, like how Universal did with “The Exorcist.” Instead, “First Omen” is modestly budgeted at $30 million (though that’s still somewhat steep for horror — oftentimes a low-risk, high-reward gamble for studios). The film also pivoted from an intended Hulu debut to theatrical after last year’s strikes created a scarcity in features for exhibitors." - Variety, April 6th 2024

Box Office: ‘Godzilla x Kong’ Staying on Top, ‘Monkey Man’ Swings Into Second and ‘The First Omen’ Gets Crossed Up

"Godzilla x Kong" is facing a sharp drop in its second weekend at the box office, but will stay ahead of the openings of "Monkey Man" and "The First Omen."

variety.com

 

[TP2000]

Why does every 20th Century or Searchlight movie have to be disgusting nowadays?

The more I read about The First Omen this weekend, the more I realized it's certainly not my scene, that's for sure. Apparently they think there's an audience for that sort of stuff, but this weekend's underwhelming box office seems to prove otherwise in this case.

I saw The Exorcist in a theater, and remember thinking poor Linda Blair doing that pea soup routine in her bed was tragic. I can't even imagine staying seated in the theater through what was described as happening in The First Omen. Just come find me in the lobby gabbing with the snack bar clerk when it's all over and we're ready to go to Farrell's, please.

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

My example The Nice Guys was not ”indie”…. it was distributed by Warner Brothers… but then again maybe you also consider Lethal Weapon, The Last Boy Scout, and Iron Man indie

…I gotta give you points for the last boyscout reference

Anyway…different target/audience..no matter the distributor.

Let’s not do this thing where we infer that somehow Disney making garbage nobody is paying to see less of a foul. It is

 

[erasure fan1]

Not to be confused with the people from the opposite side of the coin who take any opportunity to remind us they hated a movie that came out in 2016.

Ghostbusters 2016 was extremely bad. There's always going to be lists and talks of the worst movies ever, biggest flops... This is unique because I don't see other unanimously panned movies get the, everyone was wrong, it was actually not bad, treatment all the time. And I'm not talking about the YouTube vloggers, it's major sites.

 

[DKampy]

…I gotta give you points for the last boyscout reference

Anyway…different target/audience..no matter the distributor.

Let’s not do this thing where we infer that somehow Disney making garbage nobody is paying to see less of a foul. It is

As @Disney Irish pointed out all film is subjective… Even critics are just giving their opinion which is why I still like Rotten Tomatoes…it gives a consensus… as well as having a few critics I give more weight too than others as our opinions tend to gel better… but you tend to state that your opinion is fact and if others opinions differ than you… they must be wrong

Even if we take out my The Nice Guys example… as it is also an example of why studios are nervous about taking chances on original stories… I still disagree with your original comment that only good movies will do well… we do live in a universe where Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland film made over a billion dollars

 

[DKampy]

Ghostbusters 2016 was extremely bad. There's always going to be lists and talks of the worst movies ever, biggest flops... This is unique because I don't see other unanimously panned movies get the, everyone was wrong, it was actually not bad, treatment all the time. And I'm not talking about the YouTube vloggers, it's major sites.

I agree the 2016 Ghostbusters was bad…it’s the reasoning that some people complain that film was bad that I have issues with… at it’s core…the original Ghostbusters was a comedy before anything else…it is the direction I wish they would go in… just smarter and not so juvenile… at least the 2016 version tried to be a comedy… it just unfortunately was not funny… but they did try to follow the template of the original just with SNL females instead of SNL males

 

[Casper Gutman]

Robert Downey Jr. Would ‘Happily’ Return to Marvel After Oscar Win; Gwyneth Paltrow Says He’d Throw Out ‘Iron Man’ Lines and Go: ‘I’m Not F—ing Saying These’

Robert Downey Jr. would "happily" return to the Marvel Cinematic Universe because "it's too integral a part of my DNA."

variety.com