Thanksgiving 5-days Weekend thread | BOSS: 42.2m, Napoleon: 32.75m, Wish: 31.6m, Trolls: 25.6m, Thanksgiving: 10.9m

[MovieMan89]

1 minute ago, 4815162342 said:

Saw Napoleon in IMAX this evening. Theater I would say was 60-70% full.

 

Movie was definitely stripped down a lot in the editing room and plays more as a greatest hits compilation of a career than a meaningful narrative. The film randomly skips ahead years at a time to pay lip service to various points in his generalship or rule before occasionally lingering in certain periods. Some characters who have a solid presence in the first half utterly stop talking in the second even though the camera still shows them prominently now and then in the background of some scenes.

 

Battle scenes are visceral and exciting even though there's some basic unforced errors made history wise which have zero effect on its quality as a film but which bugged me to no end because they were simple things depicted completely wrong.

This is the most Ridley Scott thing I have ever read. Stop making movies dude, go to television. 

[Cmasterclay]

Thanksgiving weekend is generally weird and kind of hard to predict! I remember Knives Out having that amazing opening day, which was followed by a slightly disappointing weekend, which was then followed by insanely amazing legs. Creed had a disappointing opening day, then rebounded for an amazing weekend, then had good but not great legs. I'm not ready to make any declarations on Napoleon either way. Wish clearly going to undershoot other WDAS openers on this weekend, but given the D+ factors, the post COVID animation hangover, the discrepancy between reviews and audience reception, I'm also not willing to declare if that looks more like 35m or 50m either. 

[Eric the Minion]

WISH (2023)

 

Nothing for Nappy yet.

[Torontofan]

Ridley Scott should just make a high-budget tv show...

 

His films and stories are way better in the longer cuts.

 

Kingdom of Heaven is the best example of that. 

[Eric the Minion]

Just now, Cmasterclay said:

Thanksgiving weekend is generally weird and kind of hard to predict! I remember Knives Out having that amazing opening day, which was followed by a slightly disappointing weekend, which was then followed by insanely amazing legs. Creed had a disappointing opening day, then rebounded for an amazing weekend, then had good but not great legs. I'm not ready to make any declarations on Napoleon either way. Wish clearly going to undershoot other WDAS openers on this weekend, but given the D+ factors, the post COVID animation hangover, the discrepancy between reviews and audience reception, I'm also not willing to declare if that looks more like 35m or 50m either. 

The one thing I am very curious about is Black Friday. I think this is the first time ever football is scheduled for that day, and while it's just the one game, that will probably distract a lot of potential moviegoers and diminish those usual big Friday bumps. Especially when it's not like this weekend's offerings have the sexiest review scores.

[Cmasterclay]

Just now, Eric Bonaparte said:

The one thing I am very curious about is Black Friday. I think this is the first time ever football is scheduled for that day, and while it's just the one game, that will probably distract a lot of potential moviegoers and diminish those usual big Friday bumps. Especially when it's not like this weekend's offerings have the sexiest review scores.

I'm more worried about the insane ratings for the Michigan-Ohio State game on Satuday than the Black Friday game on Amazon featuring Tim Boyle. Obviously The Game always has high ratings, but the ratings are possibly going to be 20m+ with the Harbaugh drama and how important and heated it all feels.

[Eric the Minion]

2 minutes ago, Cmasterclay said:

I'm more worried about the insane ratings for the Michigan-Ohio State game on Satuday than the Black Friday game on Amazon featuring Tim Boyle. Obviously The Game always has high ratings, but the ratings are possibly going to be 20m+ with the Harbaugh drama and how important and heated it all feels.

I only care about football when the Eagles play, so I'll just take your word on all this lol

[titanic2187]

Black Friday jump in post-covid has been weaker. In fact, every holiday jump are no longer as intense in post-covid, including Christmas-new year window. Sometime I even doubt if releasing a movie during long weekend means anything better.

[Cmasterclay]

Yeah, I mean, it all sucks. To be clear. It's a better weekend than the last two years, and overall a bit healthier box office than the last two years, but it still stinks. Is it a matter of audiences abandoning theaters, COVID hangover, inflation, or bad product? Maybe a little bit of every column. But yeah, it sucks. This year's Thanksgiving is an improvement just like the year 2023 overall, but it's all like going from 3-14 to 5-12. The question is if we are stuck at 5-12 forever or if the improvement is a step towards building back to .500.

[Mojoguy]

21 minutes ago, Cmasterclay said:

Yeah, I mean, it all sucks. To be clear. It's a better weekend than the last two years, and overall a bit healthier box office than the last two years, but it still stinks. Is it a matter of audiences abandoning theaters, COVID hangover, inflation, or bad product? Maybe a little bit of every column. But yeah, it sucks. This year's Thanksgiving is an improvement just like the year 2023 overall, but it's all like going from 3-14 to 5-12. The question is if we are stuck at 5-12 forever or if the improvement is a step towards building back to .500.

The GA abandoned superhero movies, there are no sure fire winners anymore. That's going to be terrifying for studios and theaters.

Edited November 23, 2023 by Mojoguy

[Cmasterclay]

2 minutes ago, Mojoguy said:

With the GA abandoned superhero movies, there are no sure fire winners anymore. That's going to be terrifying for studios and theaters.

As much as I tout "original" movies, the success of theaters has always been based on IP in some shape or form, from best sellers like Gone With The Wind and Wizard Oz, to the Bond series, to the Exorcist and Godfather and Doctor Zhivago, to TV adaptations like the Fugitive and Mission Impossible, even historical events like Lawrence of Arabia and the Ten Commandments (your definition of historical may vary on the latter). There used to be much more room for original breakouts, but theaters have thrived based on existing properties since the beginning. The problem is that we are in a major deficit of marketable IP now. Virtually every big movie that could have a sequel has one at this point, and now they're tapping into the Beetlejuices and Gladiators of the world. There is no huge book series out there that I can think of that screams mega hit - certainly not Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings, and not even a John Grisham or Girl On The Train level one. Most TV adaptations or remakes would fall flat because of the spreading out of TV viewers across thousands of shows. Most musicals outside of Hamilton and Wicked (coming next year!) have been adapted. Studios have to find new IP somewhere because things feel very tapped out, especially the superhero vein. This year, the biggest live action movies were toy, video game, and historical event. Studios are going to have to get creative. Video games seem obvious. Maybe they should bring back sports movies. Maybe it's live action adaptations of anime stuff I don't know about. Maybe it's the revitilization of a genre through a big original hit, like how one Star Wars once begat 1000 successful clones. Shit, maybe they'll start making movies out of Twitter threads and memes. I truly don't believe that people want to abanon movie theaters altogether. But we live in a world where everyone is in their own media silos - books, TV shows, Broadway shows, and every other cultural entity are all less famous now because of the lack of a "water cooler" our culture collectively shares. So studios are going to have to get creative. After the past year, color me skeptical. 

[Torontofan]

23 minutes ago, titanic2187 said:

Black Friday jump in post-covid has been weaker. In fact, every holiday jump are no longer as intense in post-covid, including Christmas-new year window. Sometime I even doubt if releasing a movie during long weekend means anything better.

No way Home and A2 showed realeasing a mega blockbuster during the holidays has a big benefit.

 

Issue we havent had many mega blockbusters release on holidays much.

Edited November 23, 2023 by Torontofan

[keysersoze123]

One weird thing to me has been @Shawn optimistic projections for the Wish. It made sense early on as it is part of Disney 100 and that should technically have projected wish to good OW. But his final projections this week looked optimistic after not so great reviews/reactions to the movie. May be he thought audience would still go as nostalgic of it being Disney 100 but I guess audience have been tuned to wait for these movies on streaming unless its a must watch and Wish failed in that perspective. 

[rehpyc]

1 hour ago, Danhjpn said:

Can you check The Boy and The Heron...

Maybe because it's a too limited release so it is hard to check?

 

1 hour ago, keysersoze123 said:

I dont have anything. May be @rehpyc can provide any insight if he has any. Otherwise you have to wait for studio numbers tomorrow. 

Not sure if Comscore will be reporting these now vs. waiting for its formal release.

[grim22]

19 minutes ago, Cmasterclay said:

. Shit, maybe they'll start making movies out of Twitter threads and memes. 

 

Zola released last year. Netflix had decided to greenlight a movie based on the Rihanna and Lupita meme directed by Ava Duvernay but that died in development hell.

[TheDude391]

36 minutes ago, Cmasterclay said:

Is it a matter of audiences abandoning theaters, COVID hangover, inflation, or bad product? Maybe a little bit of every column.

People getting sick of same old same old, culminating with worse products AND inflation means people take less chances now. We're in a very rocky transitionary period right now but I don't think theatres will ever die out, people still wanna get out and have experiences...it just has to be worth the cost.

[MovieMan89]

How on earth is this year an improvement? Trolls and THG will squeak by to ok status with their low budgets but everything else is losing money 

[lorddemaxus]

I can't tell of Disney or WB is having a worse 100 year anniversary. At least the latter got the biggest film in their history this year I guess. But absolutely terrible years for both. This did get me to look at other companies 100 year anniversaries at the boxoffice too. Paramount had a bad one. 20th Century had an ok one (although it was also the year they released Fan4stic). But neither company had a domestic grosser over $250 mil. Really wondering how Columbia's anniversary goes next year. Their 2024 slate doesn't look good though

[Cmasterclay]

10 minutes ago, TheDude391 said:

People getting sick of same old same old, culminating with worse products AND inflation means people take less chances now. We're in a very rocky transitionary period right now but I don't think theatres will ever die out, people still wanna get out and have experiences...it just has to be worth the cost.

As negative as I've been, I agree with this. Studios have just run out of ideas, but there's potential out there. Sports movies - the Pitt F1 would do 120m if it dropped next Christmas. Biopics - a Michael Jackson biopic next Christmas would be an easy 200m grosser. There is thousands of brilliant, best selling books in the world across all genres to adapt. There's tons of video games and cartoons and toys and historical events, and still a few classics like Beetlejuice that haven't been sequelized. I don't know how they came up with a 2024 blockbuster slate consisting almost entirely of fourth and fifth sequels in diminishing returns franchises, Z-list spinoffs, and a handful of prequels. Just a mostly shocking slate next year, honestly.  But my hope is that we are at a nadir, not an ending.

Edited November 23, 2023 by Cmasterclay

[PNF2187]

2 hours ago, keysersoze123 said:

Just Wish and it seem to finish almost on par with Encanto opening wednesday. Actually fewer tickets but ATP is higher 2 years later and so its almost on par. So seeing 6m true wednesday and 8.3m with previews. Just meh considering where the presales were. Way worse walkups than Trolls last week. I think meh reviews had definite impact for sure. 

That's like, really bad right? I don't expect this to hold nearly as well as Encanto's pure Wed-Thu drop, so say Thursday drops to like $4.5M (-25% from pure Wed - Strange World was -26% from pure Wed), then we're potentially looking at sub-$40M for the 5-day... which with this kind of reception, would probably throw $100M DOM out the window.

Edited November 23, 2023 by PNF2187