MisterLibby

Deadline says (not just says, but leads with): “In a weekend without any studio wide entries — all due to the strikes– the overall theatrical marketplace is bound to reach some sort of low” Was something moved that was supposed to open this weekend? I think all the interested parties are going to continue blaming the strikes for things that aren’t related to the strikes because it’s more optimistic spin than the truth.

If it loses to Spider-Verse: Part Two: Part One we riot

Did anything notable get moved out of January? Maybe, but it’s not coming to mind. The calendar was already weak before the strikes. The strikes will exacerbate the lack-of-quantity problem going forward, but it was on a terrible trajectory even before the strikes.

GKIDS lacks leverage

Screw that, YOLO

It’s weirdly something of a crowd pleaser (for those crowds who can get past all the, you know)

On Demand culture. It’s ridiculous. Some scarcity is good, actually! People discovering or anticipating things is a nice feeling, but now we’re all demanding instant gratification all the time. I’m old enough to remember when patience was a virtue!

My thought on this is that people outside of Japan are less bothered by Heron’s abstract approach because we are used to being confused by Miyazaki’s films. The movies are steeped in Japanese culture and tradition, and that stuff always flies over our heads. When we buy our ticket, we expect to be confused!

Anyone But You a great illustration of the power of TikTok. If you want to sell your movie to young people you gotta get it rolling on there. See also Burn, Salt

How much do we think the huge loss of holiday screens actually hurt the total? I was upset about it too, but given how good the per theater average holds have been, I suspect a lot of the people that wanted to see it still found a way. Breezing past $40 million despite losing most of its screens when it did is pretty remarkable That said, feel free to re-expand in the winter dead zone!

“There’s no such thing as bad publicity” is one adage that died a swift, merciless death in the internet era

re: Anyone But You Audiences are clearly still there for these things, the Conglomerates just have to … and I know they hate this … try. Put the effort in. No Hard Feelings got to $50 million despite lacking positive buzz and ultimately being pretty awful. If that movie had the goods, it probably would have been a smash. Even in boom times, the biggest comedies were rarely hits just by virtue of being comedies, they were hits because people loved them. All it takes is one filmmaker to tap into something like Wedding Crashers or The Hangover and the oh-so-convenient “actually audiences only want the pre-sold IP that we control, please refer to our existing menu” narrative will start to change.

Its a huge bummer that Heron is about to get its theater count slashed right at the start of the holiday corridor despite still pulling million dollar weekdays!

There’s just too many mouths to feed. Heron’s screens will mostly be gone by Xmas.

Great opening for Heron, can’t wait to see it tonight, but don’t kid yourselves, it’ll drop like a rock

Now that the radioactive smoke has cleared, I’m just taking one last moment to marvel (natch) at the “TV’s Frasier Crane is coming to boost the box office, look out” crowd. They really believed it, man

It means it sets a dangerous precedent when we stop treating films as special and start treating them like television (or worse)

The stans overreacting and declaring victory based on the first flood of reactions from the Funko accounts was the climax this thread needed and deserved.

Especially because of the sheer amount of stuff coming out of the Disney content fire hose, there’s a lot of people dropping out of these things and they aren’t coming back. You skip one, then you skip another, before you know it you’re out completely. Not everyone, but this describes a lot of people. I’ve watched one of these things since Endgame. I’m not going back. Marvel successfully upended the traditional Hollywood wisdom that you should try to make sequels approachable for new viewers. And it worked like gangbusters, but at a certain point you cross a line …

Copesgiving has arrived early this year if anybody thinks THAT alleged cameo is going to move the needle. Come. On.

The “no promotion” thing was cool and righteous in theory but I’m pretty sure it ultimately hurt the film, right? It didn’t impact opening weekend but it was a self-defeating notion and the movie never sustained momentum. I’ve seen mixed word of mouth proposed as the culprit, but the bigger issue is that a media blackout like that — the effect of which was that well-meaning people don’t even want to talk about the movie’s details because they don’t want to spoil it — kind of prevents word of mouth at all. People online were essentially discouraged from even talking about it, which is just not compatible with how folks consume media in 2023. I love the alleged* principle behind it but i don’t think it was ever gonna work. But I’m not in Japan so what do I know? Nothing! *I think the real reason was just they didn’t want to spend the money and effort on behalf of a mostly-shuttered studio with no promotional infrastructure.

This is such a cool development. I have zero interest in watching it, but we all thought we were settling in for a long, dark box office winter post-Barbenheimer, and out of nowhere comes this overwhelming shot of box office adrenaline courtesy of Taylor Swift. Awesome. We all woke up to like, a lovely gift. And imagine what a terrible morning this was for Universal and the Exorcist team. Good!