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

[DCLcruiser]

If it’s not a “cinematic experience” requiring a massive screen and outstanding sound system, then it is a hard sell these days.

We finally watched Snow White (Live Action). Besides any polarizing topics, it was an ok movie, but certainly not worth the $50 or so to see it in Dolby Cinema for two people. For “free” on D+ it was easier to accept.

 

[FrontierSpirit]

Ties into your point from upthread.

Entertainment as exemplified by a trip to WDW?

100% non-essential.

Add in all the other factors let alone Hollywood and the stars themselves it should come as no surprise when people look at the ticket price and go “meh” and you know….dont go.

Separate thought - the real competition isn’t cinema vs streaming in my opinion it’s competition vs all other forms of entertainment that have exploded over the last few decades.

While streaming is the future and will eventually replace cinema I don’t think that solves the problems for Hollywood long term.

My girls watch YouTube, Crunchyroll for anime, play Roblox.

Don’t watch tv except event shows like Wednesday.
I watch a ton of Tv with my husband. The one moment that’s our time at the house after dinner.

 

[FrontierSpirit]

If it’s not a “cinematic experience” requiring a massive screen and outstanding sound system, then it is a hard sell these days.

We finally watched Snow White (Live Action). Besides any polarizing topics, it was an ok movie, but certainly not worth the $50 or so to see it in Dolby Cinema for two people. For “free” on D+ it was easier to accept.

when Harry Met Sally wouldn’t play in the theater these days. It would be a 6 part mini series on Netflix.

 

[LSLS]

Streaming is more costly than cable now.
Pay for the internet, need the high speed for work at home. Pay for Disney, Netflix, Apple, Amazon unless one of those comes as part of a phone package.

Definitely not for us. $30 for internet, then random packages are around $35-40. But also, eliminating streaming will not eliminate your need for internet, so that's not a truly fair comparison.

 

[DCLcruiser]

when Harry Met Sally wouldn’t play in the theater these days. It would be a 6 part mini series on Netflix.

Sometimes I think those limited series are better. Instead of cramming a movie into 2 hours, they can release six hour long episodes. That gives them more time to develop characters, etc. Of course, I like watching End Game as a movie, as well.

 

[Phroobar]

when Harry Met Sally wouldn’t play in the theater these days. It would be a 6 part mini series on Netflix.

Weird that you mentioned When Harry Met Sally. My theater is playing that in three weeks. They play old movies every tuesday. I believe Men in Black is tomorrow.

 

[Disney Irish]

I'm going to point to money again. We went this weekend to F4. Twice (kind of). Due to scheduling, my wife went with one kid Saturday, I took the other Sunday. Between the 4 of us, that's 4 tickets, 2 things of popcorn, 2 drinks, 2 slushies, and one box of candy total. Grand total for the weekend was $130. If someone spent that on Superman 2 weeks ago, they aren't spending that again this weekend. You have to LOVE something about a movie to afford to go at this point (and not just wait the 3 months to see it for "free" on streaming). It's just too expensive to go "Eh, lets give it a try." And certainly too expensive for "we really liked that, lets go back 3 more times."

Yep completely agree, don't know why some insist it being "one" thing specifically about the MCU. Its a whole bunch of things wrapped up into a package with price being the bow on top that ends up preventing many from opening that package. Its why we've seen a bunch of movies under perform this year. Sure there have been a couple successes, but not as many as in previous years, especially pre-pandemic. But glad to see so many finally acknowledging what some including myself have said, this is a long term trend of issues at the box office not isolated to any specific studio, with price being the primary issue.

And to paraphrase, as someone once said in the 90s and its true right now more than ever (not directed at anyone here), "Its the Economy, stupid".

So for all "its the quality" talk about the MCU, price is always going to be the first hurdle that any audience has to jump over before they even decide if its worth checking out. Once that hurdle is crossed then you can have all the talk about quality you want as then it becomes a factor, but not before.

 

[LSLS]

Yep completely agree, don't know why some insist it being "one" thing specifically about the MCU. Its a whole bunch of things wrapped up into a package with price being the bow on top that ends up preventing many from opening that package. Its why we've seen a bunch of movies under perform this year. Sure there have been a couple successes, but not as many as in previous years, especially pre-pandemic. But glad to see so many finally acknowledging what some including myself have said, this is a long term trend of issues at the box office not isolated to any specific studio, with price being the primary issue.

And to paraphrase, as someone once said in the 90s and its true right now more than ever (not directed at anyone here), "Its the Economy, stupid".

So for all "its the quality" talk about the MCU, price is always going to be the first hurdle that any audience has to jump over before they even decide if its worth checking out. Once that hurdle is crossed then you can have all the talk about quality you want as then it becomes a factor, but not before.

It honestly bodes very badly for the MCU too, because I think people are much less inclined to take chances on movies with characters they don't know. I honestly think GotG totally flop out if they are introduced at this point (as pretty much total unknowns like they were). I also will be curious if studios start learning to be cautious of each other. Would the three big movies that have come out within like a month of each other done better if they were 4 months apart? Were people just choosing the one they cared for the most and saying they would stream the others when available, or did that not make a difference? If theaters dropped pricing back down to say $7-$10 and scaled back the drink/popcorns to more like $5 each, would that change things? Or if the $1 movie theaters (or say $5 now) came back to show movies at the end of runs, could you up your repeated watching? If you took the free streaming away for say a year, does that change things (so, F4 comes out on D+ NEXT summer)? There is an insane amount of data analytics that need to be performed, and they need to be done across multiple aspects of the industry.

 

[Disney Irish]

It honestly bodes very badly for the MCU too, because I think people are much less inclined to take chances on movies with characters they don't know. I honestly think GotG totally flop out if they are introduced at this point (as pretty much total unknowns like they were). I also will be curious if studios start learning to be cautious of each other. Would the three big movies that have come out within like a month of each other done better if they were 4 months apart? Were people just choosing the one they cared for the most and saying they would stream the others when available, or did that not make a difference? If theaters dropped pricing back down to say $7-$10 and scaled back the drink/popcorns to more like $5 each, would that change things? Or if the $1 movie theaters (or say $5 now) came back to show movies at the end of runs, could you up your repeated watching? If you took the free streaming away for say a year, does that change things (so, F4 comes out on D+ NEXT summer)? There is an insane amount of data analytics that need to be performed, and they need to be done across multiple aspects of the industry.

As I mentioned up thread, I think if you drop the price back to what it was 10-15 years ago you get back to pre-pandemic levels almost immediately. The return of the budget theater idea is a good one, but the question is would that work now in the streaming era. So it would have to go hand-in-hand with a longer theatrical window, as someone would just say why spend money on a "cheap" theater when I can just wait another couple weeks to see it at home, so would require buy-in from studios. And I don't see that happening at this point.

As for data analytics, that is happening right now I can guarantee it. Its why you have studios making decisions like putting a movie on digital while its still "hot" in theaters making money. What seems counter to what many of us here would do actually makes sense to a studio looking to get the most out of a movie. They have metrics for everything, even if it doesn't seem smart in the short term. They see the trends, the same trends that those like myself have been talking about for a long time now.

 

[Tha Realest]

when Harry Met Sally wouldn’t play in the theater these days. It would be a 6 part mini series on Netflix.

A quarter the laughs and three times the run time.

 

[Joel]

Reading about how much people pay to go to the movies always makes me incredibly thankful for our small town historic theater, where a couple can see a matinee with snacks and a drink for $20. It sure makes it a lot easier to take a flyer on a movie we would otherwise wait to watch at home, but even then, the place is often a lot less packed than you would think it should be.

Theaters are going the way of arcades for probably half a dozen major reasons, and there's no stopping it short of Dr. Strange finding the one alternate future where they somehow continue to thrive.

 

[Tony the Tigger]

I don’t really feel a strong affinity to most franchises. My favorite movie is in black and white lol But I enjoyed a fair number of the MCU movies and the overall story seemed to be building to something interesting so I stuck with it.

But I never felt a connection to it like one of my favorite movies. So that’s why it doesn’t feel like cutting off a friend or never watching Citizen Kane again. I appreciate the work that went into crafting the “original” MCU series. But I’ve also never thought about owning any of the movies, which is something I do for my favorite movies.

It’s all been hit or miss for me. I picked the ones that seemed interesting, skipped the rest.

It wasn’t even until after Endgame that I went back and watched any billed-as-Avengers films on D+ and then went back and filled in the holes of what I’d missed (when TV was late coming back one year.) No huge expectations. No huge disappointments.

Owning physical copies is a good idea so you aren’t at the mercy of streaming services, revisions, etc.

 

[Tony the Tigger]

More people should get AMC A-list. For about $25 a month, I can see up to four movies a week in theaters, even in premium screens like IMAX and Dolby. Last year I saw about 60 movies in theaters.

Been considering this lately. My belly is against it.

Theaters are going the way of arcades

This is ok. Arcades are fine. They just had to adapt. So did record stores.

 

[Animaniac93-98]

Weekend actuals in, F4 dropped 67% to $38.7 million in weekend 2

 

[Ayla]

I’ve been to the theater once this year and there’s a lot of movies I really want to see. Cost is the number one reason

I'm just the opposite. I honestly couldn't tell you the last time I was in a movie theater (pre covid? ) and the only movie I am willing to shell out any money to see this year is Downton Abbey in September.

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

Yikes…where’s the endpoint for this one?

Domestic is hideous…international is meh…

Like $475? At most?

 

[Ayla]

Streaming is more costly than cable now.
Pay for the internet, need the high speed for work at home. Pay for Disney, Netflix, Apple, Amazon unless one of those comes as part of a phone package.

We're dinosaurs in that we still have cable ~ and watch it every single day. We also have most of the streaming apps (with the exception of Apple tv and Netflix), included with our cable subscription. lol

 

[CoastalElite64]

Yikes…where’s the endpoint for this one?

Domestic is hideous…international is meh…

Like $475? At most?

It needs to make more than 500M for Disney to save face. Global right now is 370M.

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

It needs to make more than 500M for Disney to save face. Global right now is 370M.

It’s possible…it is a “known”
Marvel property…

Just weird

It’s lagging $65 mil behind domestically at this same point than both Jurassic world and Superman and the buzz all but disappeared…


It’s strange…If Superman ends at $600 DC will claim a huge victory…even though it’s $200 mil less than that awful Batman

And if FF ends at $500…$250 mil less than Thor love and thunder…Disney may deny the movie ever existed at all.

 

[CoastalElite64]

It’s possible…it is a “known”
Marvel property…

Just weird

It’s lagging $65 mil behind domestically at this same point than both Jurassic world and Superman and the buzz all but disappeared…


It’s strange…If Superman ends at $600 DC will claim a huge victory…even though it’s $200 mil less than that awful Batman

And if FF ends at $500…$250 mil less than Thor love and thunder…Disney may deny the movie ever existed at all.

If it clears 500M it will be a success. Remember MCU is in repair mode.