The Box Office Buzz and Tracking Thread (December 2021 - July 2023)

[AJG]

11 hours ago, grim22 said:

Smile had a weird marketing stunt last week where they paid a guy to sit at a baseball game right behind the catcher and just smile and stare into the camera the entire time. Felt sorry for that guy. It didn't even catch on in the media as a big stunt.

It’s 2022. That era of fake viral advertising is done and finished. Prime Video tried to do a stunt where they claimed the ball for Thursday Night Football would be redesigned. It attracted only 83k views

 

 

The “reveal” only got 33k

 

 

[LonePirate]

The non-IMAX Regal near me has sold over 80 tickets so far for tonight’s $5 Mystery Movie. The IMAX Regal complex a little further away has sold about 75 tickets for its showing. Regardless if it is Beer Run or Smile or something else, it will probably come close to if not exceed $500K today nationally.

 

The same non-IMAX theater has sold 5 tickets for Bros and 0 tickets for Smile on Friday. Both movies have four showtimes for each available for purchase. However, the showings for both films up for pre-sale are in the 21+ section of the theater. At the IMAX complex, both have regular screenings for pre-sale and Bros has sold about the same number of tickets while Smile has sold around 30 tickets.

[Derpity]

Bought 2 tickets for the mystery screening, but likely just going to skip it given those are the options. Took a gamble on Amsterdam and lost.

[Tinalera]

1 hour ago, AJG said:

It’s 2022. That era of fake viral advertising is done and finished. Prime Video tried to do a stunt where they claimed the ball for Thursday Night Football would be redesigned. It attracted only 83k views

 

 

The “reveal” only got 33k

 

 

There definitely is a (take your pick educated and/or cynical lol) take from viewers now in regard to social media now. So much clickbait/bait and switch type of marketing that trying to do anything that maybe 10 years ago would get "oh that's interesting" is now replied to with "fake" or "is there a link to this/is this legit?" type of responses. Social media absolutely now relies on how many clicks/how many views (whether accurate or not), that for a movie like Smile to try that, the cynicism is very real. Movie studio marketing have to think of creative ways to market their movie now. A marketing campaign like Blair Witch had would absolutely flop imo in todays world because of that cynical nature. 

 

[GOGODanca]

On 9/24/2022 at 4:25 PM, GOGODanca said:

Thursday Previews from local AMCs

 

Bros: 21 tickets sold across 21 showtimes

 

Smile: 72 tickets sold across 22 showtimes

Bros: 24 tickets sold across 21 showtimes

 

Smile: 89 tickets sold across 22 showtimes

[AJG]

28 minutes ago, Tinalera said:

There definitely is a (take your pick educated and/or cynical lol) take from viewers now in regard to social media now. So much clickbait/bait and switch type of marketing that trying to do anything that maybe 10 years ago would get "oh that's interesting" is now replied to with "fake" or "is there a link to this/is this legit?" type of responses. Social media absolutely now relies on how many clicks/how many views (whether accurate or not), that for a movie like Smile to try that, the cynicism is very real. Movie studio marketing have to think of creative ways to market their movie now. A marketing campaign like Blair Witch had would absolutely flop imo in todays world because of that cynical nature. 

 

I wouldn’t call it cynicism but more of a “we know how the sausage gets made” situation. We know enough to know those old viral jump scare pranks they used to do would always be scripted or somewhat scripted, so why bother?
We also have news media far less willing to report on these things at face value after a couple of high profile misfires that inadvertently put their reporting into question (remember the VoltsWagen prank debacle?)

[Tinalera]

53 minutes ago, AJG said:

I wouldn’t call it cynicism but more of a “we know how the sausage gets made” situation. We know enough to know those old viral jump scare pranks they used to do would always be scripted or somewhat scripted, so why bother?
We also have news media far less willing to report on these things at face value after a couple of high profile misfires that inadvertently put their reporting into question (remember the VoltsWagen prank debacle?)

"We know how the sausage is made" is much more an apt description, thank you totally agree

[Eric Prime]

Quorum Updates

The Good House T-3: 19.13% Awareness, 4.52 Interest

Tar T-25: 9.71%, 4.03

The Whale T-74: 23.03%, 5.05

Babylon T-102: 17.71%, 5.12

Knock at the Cabin T-130: 19.56%, 5.59

 

Bros T-3: 31.38% Awareness, 4.74 Interest

Comps (All Final): Dear Evan Hansen w/ 31.52% Awareness & 4.92 Interest, The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent w/ 33% & 5.04, Where the Crawdads Sing w/ 32.67% & 5.42, Easter Sunday w/ 26.34% & 4.64, Don't Worry Darling w/ 32.02% & 5.17

*Note the Final number for Bros is subject to change in the coming days*

 

Final General Awareness: 28% chance of double-digit opening

General Interest: 26% chance of double-digit opening

Original - Low Awareness: 82% chance of over 5M, 45% over 10M

Original - Low Interest: 28% chance of over 5M

 

Smile T-3: 37.09% Awareness, 5.66 Interest

Comps (All Final): Old w/ 34.26% Awareness & 5.62 Interest, Candyman 38.61% & 4.67, The Black Phone w/ 40% & 5.94, Nope w/ 44.26% & 6.08

 *Note the Final number for Smile is subject to change in the coming days*

 

Final General Awareness: 28% chance of double-digit opening

General Interest: 88% chance of double-digit opening, 76% over 20M

Horror Awareness: 78% chance of double-digit opening, 55% over 20M

Horror Interest: 100% chance of double-digit opening, 75% over 20M

[Krissykins]

15 hours ago, grim22 said:

Smile had a weird marketing stunt last week where they paid a guy to sit at a baseball game right behind the catcher and just smile and stare into the camera the entire time. Felt sorry for that guy. It didn't even catch on in the media as a big stunt.

 

Yankees, Mets, Dodgers and Cardinals games apparently. I think it’s fun. I like marketing like this, we don’t see it anymore. 
 

All we get now are the social media posts and junkets. 
 

Also: fully disagree with Smile never having breakout potential. Easy hook, effective trailer, good reviews, eye catching poster, trailer with Top Gun Maverick. But alas, it isn’t. 

Edited September 26, 2022 by Krissykins

[el sid]

Bros, counted today at 11am EST for today:

NY (AMC Fresh Meadows 7): 4 (3 showtimes)
Miami (AMC Sunset Place 24): 3 (2 showtimes)
Grand Rapids (AMC Grand Rapids 18): 3 (2 showtimes)
Austin (AMC Lakeline 9): 0 (2 showtimes)
Tempe/Phoenix (AMC Centerpoint 11): 0 (1 showtimes)
San Francisco (AMC Metreon 16): 81 (2 showtimes)
LA (AMC Universal): 83 (3 showtimes)

Total tickets sold in 7 theaters: 174.
Love, Simon would be a great comp now. I hesitate to use In the Heights because that film had pretty good presales but must have had poor walk-ups. It would make it look (way) worse than it is.

 

Bros, counted today at 11am EST for tomorrow:

NY (AMC Fresh Meadows 7): 15 (4 showtimes)
Miami (AMC Sunset Place 24): 2 (4 showtimes)
Grand Rapids (AMC Grand Rapids 18): 0 (3 showtimes)
Austin (AMC Lakeline 9): 0 (2 showtimes)
Tempe/Phoenix (AMC Centerpoint 11): 0 (3 showtimes)
San Francisco (AMC Metreon 16): 63 (4 showtimes)
LA (AMC Universal): 86 (4 showtimes)

Total tickets sold in 7 theaters: 166.
Comps (both counted on Monday for Friday): Massive Talent had 165 sold tickets

and The Green Knight 159 sold tickets.

At least the presales in the AMC Metreon in San Francisco clearly improved since last week. And the presales in other AMCs in NY (Empire, Lincoln Square) still look better than in the AMC Fresh Meadows.
The total number of presales is really acceptable for a release Monday but it seems to be a coasts-only film.

 

 

Smile, counted today at 11am EST for today:

NY (AMC Fresh Meadows 7): 51 (2 showtimes)
Miami (AMC Sunset Place 24): 27 (2 showtimes)
Grand Rapids (AMC Grand Rapids 18): 6 (1 showtime)
Austin (AMC Lakeline 9): 0 (1 showtime)
Tempe/Phoenix (AMC Centerpoint 11): 17 (2 showtimes)
San Francisco (AMC Metreon 16): 49 (2 showtimes)
LA (AMC Universal): 63 (2 showtimes)

Total tickets sold in 7 theaters: 213.

Comps (all counted on Monday for Thursday): The Forever Purge had 104 sold tickets,

Beast 147,

The Invitation 96,

Barbarian 156,

Scream 1.004

and Halloween Kills 591 sold tickets.

 

Smile, counted today at 11am EST for tomorrow:

NY (AMC Fresh Meadows 7): 70 (5 showtimes)
Miami (AMC Sunset Place 24): 70 (7 showtimes)
Grand Rapids (AMC Grand Rapids 18): 6 (3 showtimes)
Austin (AMC Lakeline 9): 2 (2 showtimes)
Tempe/Phoenix (AMC Centerpoint 11): 5 (3 showtimes)
San Francisco (AMC Metreon 16): 44 (8 showtimes)
LA (AMC Universal): 32 (4 showtimes)

Total tickets sold in 7 theaters: 229.

Comps (all counted on Monday for Friday): Old had 150 sold tickets,

The Invitation 87,

Beast 111,

Malignant 100,

The Invisible Man 323,

HK 750,

and Scream had 588 sold tickets.

 

I expected a better Thursday jump (it had 100 sold tickets in only 5 theaters last Wednesday) but its Friday number is pretty good. But it needs the (usually happening) big jumps of horror films in the next few days to reach 20M+, at least judging from my theaters.

[DAJK]

I genuinely think Smile could pull a Happy Death Day run at this point.

[Anarchoreneage]

Apparently the Regal mystery movie is actually Smile 

[misterpepp]

.

Edited September 26, 2022 by datpepper
No longer relevant methinks

[ringedmortality]

Just now, datpepper said:

I love when I have not one, not two, but three separate Regal managers and employees tell me it’s gonna be Beer Run only for it to be Smile.

 

So cool.

 

Wait, is it smile?

[misterpepp]

.

Edited September 26, 2022 by datpepper
Again, also irrelevant now

[misterpepp]

I just got told by someone seated on the east coast that it’s playing Beer Run.

 

Phew, my street cred remains untainted!

Edited September 26, 2022 by datpepper

[ringedmortality]

Seems like some twitter users confirmed it as well. To all of their disappointment.

[Porthos]

10 minutes ago, datpepper said:

I’m starting to suspect different locations got different movies. I’m still hearing Beer Run for some and now I’ve got another employee telling me it’s Smile.

 

8 minutes ago, datpepper said:

I just got told by someone seated on the east coast that it’s playing Beer Run.

 

Phew, my street cred remains untainted!

Regal Mystery Movie truly living up to its name! 

[misterpepp]

30 minutes ago, Porthos said:

 

Regal Mystery Movie truly living up to its name! 

I need to stick to my guns more often, but luckily I have the proof my original sources were right to begin with! Think a couple employees got confused since Regal was sent a file for Smile today for an early screening tomorrow, so it’s possible that they might’ve accidentally thought that was the movie for tonight.

 

As an added note, since Union Square was already playing Greatest Beer Run as a general release, only that location is playing a different movie, something called The Storied Life of AJ Fikry.

Edited September 26, 2022 by datpepper

[krla]

10 hours ago, AJG said:

I wouldn’t call it cynicism but more of a “we know how the sausage gets made” situation. We know enough to know those old viral jump scare pranks they used to do would always be scripted or somewhat scripted, so why bother?
We also have news media far less willing to report on these things at face value after a couple of high profile misfires that inadvertently put their reporting into question (remember the VoltsWagen prank debacle?)

The viral marketing that might work great is showing how the sausage is made. Like with the Minions suit meme, have someone "secretly" recording and leak a meeting of executives as they try and figure out what the meme means and how to leverage that into a viral campaign of their own, but all their ideas are crap. But then actually follow through with the crap ideas and watch as they do go viral. lol