Eric the Marxist

Great film. Love the whole nonlinear structure and how brutal it got at points.

https://www.metacritic.com/movie/babygirl-2024/ https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/babygirl_2024 82 on MC, 83% on RT

So...how have y'all been this past week? Enjoying yourselves?

HUSBAND

https://deadline.com/2024/08/box-office-summer-labor-day-deadpool-wolverine-afraid-1236073792/

Will say that this is a very concerting and disheartening aspect that I do think is hurting indie releases. My local arthouse never was against showing wide releases, but they were almost always stuff like Orient Express or Downton Abbey or James Bond. And I mean these are wide releases that skew towards the olds and have a PBS/BBC style prestige, so I guess it isn’t the worst thing ever. But post-COVID, they’ve been dipping way more into tentpoles or stuff that really skirts the line. For something like the Dune movies or even Barbie, you could maybe argue they are auteur, artistically-driven products, so…sure. And even Crawdads and It Ends With Us are based on popular books that likely have a lot of older/senior viewership. But now my arthouse has shown stuff like The Batman and Twisters and Beetlejuice 2, and it’s like…y’all have no excuse other than you have nothing else to show. And that’s just bad for the smaller movies if even what should be a safe haven for them is rejecting their presence. I can already picture stuff like Conclave or Nightbitch getting rejected in favor of Gladiator 2 or Wicked or Mufasa, and like…I guess it would sell more tickets, but I still don’t like it.

Quorum Updates Never Let Go T-22: 26.81% Awareness, 48.45% Interest Saturday Night T-43: 17.62% Awareness, 43.39% Interest Red One T-78: 25.07% Awareness, 45.24% Interest Gladiator II T-85: 42.83% Awareness, 48.15% Interest 1992 T-1: 27.75% Awareness, 45.41% Interest Final Awareness: 18% chance of 10M Low Awareness: 13% chance of 10M Final Interest: 47% chance of 10M Low Interest: 33% chance of 10M Afraid T-1: 25.44% Awareness, 46% Interest Final Awareness: 18% chance of 10M Horror Awareness: 33% chance of 10M Final Interest: 47% chance of 10M Horror Interest: 43% chance of 10M Beetlejuice Beetlejuice T-8: 72.75% Awareness, 67.15% Interest Final Awareness: 100% chance of 90M, 83% chance of 100M, 33% chance of 200M Tentpole Awareness: 100% chance of 100M Final Interest: 100% chance of 30M, 89% chance of 70M, 78% chance of 100M, 11% chance of 200M Tentpole Interest: 100% chance of 30M, 50% chance of 100M The Front Room T-8: 27.1% Awareness, 44.11% Interest Final Awareness: 18% chance of 10M Horror Awareness: 33% chance of 10M Final Interest: 47% chance of 10M Horror Interest: 43% chance of 10M White Bird T-36: 17.6% Awareness, 39% Interest T-30 Awareness: 15% chance of 10M Low Awareness: 11% chance of 10M T-30 Interest: 30% chance of 10M Low Interest: 24% chance of 10M Here T-64: 15.12% Awareness, 40.64% Interest T-60 Awareness: 29% chance of 10M Medium Awareness: 40% chance of 10M T-60 Interest: 61% chance of 10M Medium Interest: 65% chance of 10M

I always cook. You should try my spaghetti carbonara. It's a banger!

https://thequorum.com/weekly-unaided-awareness-chart-where-are-gladiator-ii-and-venom-the-last-dance/

Will say I do think @Ryan C is onto something that maybe we need to retire the platform/limited theater rollout. Or at least deemphasize them apart from the occasional Licorice Pizza or Asteroid City. All the indie movies I listed were in at least 1,000 theaters on their opening weekend, which made it a lot easier for their target audiences to seek them out, and make it easier and faster for WOM to spread. Plus these types of NY/LA releases really only worked when you could get some big PTAs you could make headlines over. And that was only possible thanks to specialty/boutique theaters like Arclight/Cinerama Dome. In 2018, something like The Fabelmans would have gotten the biggest auditorium, maybe even two auditoriums, in places like the Dome and other theaters specifically designed for arthouse fans/cinephiles. But in 2022, it had to play in some AMC/Regal locations, where Wakanda Forever had all the big auditoriums, and it had to also share space with stuff like Black Adam or Ticket to Paradise or The Menu. That's a problem. And nowadays, those giant 60K+ PTAs are more and more elusive post-COVID, unless you're an auteur darling like PTA or Yorgos or Wes Anderson. And even then, if Spielberg can only barely get to 40K, then what does that mean for newcomers who don't have such luxuries or popularity? I doubt Sing Sing or Didi would have been Big Sick-style winners, but maybe just having them open in 1,800 theaters would have helped them get at least close enough to the 10M threshold.

It's not all bad indie/specialty-wise. Thelma and Late Night with the Devil are the biggest hits for their respective studios in ages. Longlegs has become the biggest hit for Neon period. Big enough where it has crossed over to the mainstream, and that's not even including Immaculate making a big chunk of cash. And if you want to be that guy, you can argue Civil War was set up and financed like an indie production, even if it costs a pretty penny more than all the other movies listed. I'm still very much in the "nostalgic toy commercials are the only things making money" mindset, but there have been minor improvements, and it could have been much, much, much worse. Like two years ago, I was scared Focus/Searchlight were going to be streaming content farms for all eternity.

Genuinely baffling they named one of the characters Dr. Loomis. Like how lazy do you have to be to literally rip off the name of a character from a totally different movie franchise and think people won't notice?

https://deadline.com/2024/08/jurassic-world-film-unveils-title-first-look-photos-1236072709/

Yeah, it’s kind of like Nightmare Before Christmas, albeit with nowhere near as much merchandise. You could probably point to one or two other Burton or Burton-adjacent movies with that kind of paradox.

Quorum Updates Bagman T-23: 18.33% Awareness, 42.61% Interest Transformers One T-23: 41.45% Awareness, 48.89% Interest Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim T-107: 20.22% Awareness, 43.94% Interest A Complete Unknown T-119: 17.33% Awareness, 37.33% Interest The Fire Inside T-119: 10.4% Awareness, 34.04% Interest 1992 T-2: 26.11% Awareness, 44.78% Interest Final Awareness: 18% chance of 10M Low Awareness: 13% chance of 10M Final Interest: 47% chance of 10M Low Interest: 33% chance of 10M Afraid T-2: 24.78% Awareness, 46.44% Interest Final Awareness: 18% chance of 10M Horror Awareness: 33% chance of 10M Final Interest: 47% chance of 10M Horror Interest: 43% chance of 10M The Wild Robot T-30: 27.34% Awareness, 40.54% Interest T-30 Awareness: 53% chance of 10M, 17% chance of 20M Animation/Family Awareness: 67% chance of 10M, 33% chance of 20M T-30 Interest: 58% chance of 10M, 35% chance of 10M, 20% chance of 30M Animation/Family Interest: 87% chance of 10M, 75% chance of 20M, 37% chance of 30M Joker: Folie a Deux T-37: 64.11% Awareness, 64.22% Interest T-30 Awareness: 100% chance of 50M, 86% chance of 90M, 71% chance of 100M, 14% chance of 200M Tentpole Awareness: 100% chance of 50M, 67% chance of 100M T-30 Interest: 100% chance of 50M, 86% chance of 70M, 71% chance of 100M, 14% chance of 200M Tentpole Interest: 100% chance of 100M Smile 2 T-51: 38.19% Awareness, 47.08% Interest T-60 Awareness: 89% chance of 10M, 71% chance of 20M, 46% chance of 30M Horror Awareness: 100% chance of 10M, 71% chance of 20M, 43% chance of 30M T-60 Interest: 61% chance of 10M, 34% chance of 20M, 19% chance of 30M Horror Interest: 69% chance of 10M, 34% chance of 20M, 14% chance of 30M

Beetlejuice ranked in the domestic top 10 for 1988. It made almost five times its budget. It was not, nor has it ever been a flop or cult hit.

This was conducted prior to Wolf’s being streaming only. I’ve never even heard of those last two. Like at this point, why not just go up to November?

Now who could have seen that coming?