Weekend Thread | The Boy and The Heron $12.97M, Godzilla -1.0 $8.59M

[Cmasterclay]

December may be saved by sheer volume instead of any real hits - we had three solid openers in the two weeks that usually never get any, and a whopping seven wide releases (plus one or two major expansions) coming next. The sheer amount of product making various degrees of money, from hits like Wonka and Color Purple to 15m here and there for stuff like Iron Claw and Ferrari, is enough to at least sustain theaters a bit by volume. It's why 2023 is up so much over 2022. That said, 2024 has some red alert signs with the strike delays and a return to normal output post-COVID.

[WorkingonaName]

Japan is dominating the US this December. 

[RyneOh1040]

so stoked for waitress. was shot incredibly well and added a new dimension to an already emotional ride.

[M37]

4 minutes ago, titanic2187 said:

It is pathetic to see a movie running to capacity limit when the whole weekend is aggregating to just 60-65m. No movie should face any capacity constraint when the market is doing sub-100m over the weekend.

One issue is the proliferation of advance sales with reserved seating, where it becomes a PITA to change auditorium placement after tickets have been sold, particularly at the busier and usually pre-sale heavy locations. The result is new releases & special events put on sale weeks ago, plus Beyoncé and HG:Boss (and Trolls for some reason?) clogging up the bigger room auditoriums. 
 

So you end up with supply & demand mismatches like this 

 

There’s enough seats in aggregate for G-1, people may just have to check around and travel a bit, but definitely some friction, even in medium-sized markets (as pictured above)

[MysteryMovieMogul]

47 minutes ago, M37 said:

One issue is the proliferation of advance sales with reserved seating, where it becomes a PITA to change auditorium placement after tickets have been sold, particularly at the busier and usually pre-sale heavy locations. The result is new releases & special events put on sale weeks ago, plus Beyoncé and HG:Boss (and Trolls for some reason?) clogging up the bigger room auditoriums. 
 

So you end up with supply & demand mismatches like this 

 

There’s enough seats in aggregate for G-1, people may just have to check around and travel a bit, but definitely some friction, even in medium-sized markets (as pictured above)

To be fair, Renaissance is being distributed by AMC, so if you're taking those examples from an AMC theater, it's a bit skewed.

[MysteryMovieMogul]

1 hour ago, Eric Wonka said:

 

Oh no, we're in the "I don't care if they're not paying attention. Just as long as they're paying" (EDIT: Yes, I know they were paying attention, but they're not giving the film their full attention!) era.

 

I don't like this one bit.

Edited December 9, 2023 by MysteryMovieMogul

[Brainbug]

1 hour ago, Eric Wonka said:

 

 

I have a special, intense and boiling hatred for anyone who watches their phone/plays on their iPad or whatever during a movie.

[JustWatching]

Very happy about the updated number on Godzilla. 

[MovieMan89]

Much better hold for -1 than initial estimate, and it’s a great debut for Heron. Easily gonna smoke the opening anime record not based on a TV show. As someone inexplicably drawn to Japanese pop culture since I was a very little kid, I’m so damn proud. Go Japan, go! 

[Brainbug]

50 minutes ago, MovieMan89 said:

Much better hold for -1 than initial estimate, and it’s a great debut for Heron. Easily gonna smoke the opening anime record not based on a TV show. As someone inexplicably drawn to Japanese pop culture since I was a very little kid, I’m so damn proud. Go Japan, go! 

 

I just hope that Minus One and Heron (which seems to get much better audience WOM than expected) can hold onto enough screens and theaters during the holidays to actually have a chance to get long legs. I fear that they maybe loose them before the holidays really kick into gear because of all the other movies that will get released.

[MovieMan89]

2 minutes ago, Brainbug said:

 

I just hope that Minus One and Heron (which seems to get much better audience WOM than expected) can hold onto enough screens and theaters during the holidays to actually have a chance to get long legs. I fear that they maybe loose them before the holidays really kick into gear because of all the other movies that will get released.

It’s prob gonna be rough for Heron since I’d expect a sizable drop next weekend. -1 is holding well enough though that I think it’s gonna be fine through holidays. The upside for Heron as well is if it gets real awards momentum, it would be stupid to not go for major re-expansion in the new year. 

Edited December 9, 2023 by MovieMan89

[Pinacolada]

I'm most curious about Saltburn after last week's amazing drops. No numbers for it yet. I hope it didn't get shafted out of theaters. Wanted it to have a nice small leggy run

[MovieMan89]

Not sure Wish gets to 60 DOM. It is now only ahead of Strange World by 300k same day, and that movie had 11m left heading into its 3rd weekend. And Wish faces far stiffer direct comp. Feel like +15m would be on the higher end heading into this weekend, which would be 59m. 

[The Panda]

Glad to see The Boy and the Heron win the weekend. A beautiful triumph of a movie.

[grim22]

4 hours ago, MovieMan89 said:

Not sure Wish gets to 60 DOM. It is now only ahead of Strange World by 300k same day, and that movie had 11m left heading into its 3rd weekend. And Wish faces far stiffer direct comp. Feel like +15m would be on the higher end heading into this weekend, which would be 59m. 

Hard to explain what went wrong with Wish. Disney pushed it very very hard compared to Strange World which they left out to die. It just didn't look appealing enough and the songs felt like a retread of Encanto. Didn't help that the reviews were awful as well. The dagger was Trolls 3 being right there as a family alternative.

[Eric Burnett]

16 minutes ago, grim22 said:

Hard to explain what went wrong with Wish. Disney pushed it very very hard compared to Strange World which they left out to die. It just didn't look appealing enough and the songs felt like a retread of Encanto. Didn't help that the reviews were awful as well. The dagger was Trolls 3 being right there as a family alternative.

Also not an NTC. 👀 

[ZeroHour]

12 minutes ago, grim22 said:

Hard to explain what went wrong with Wish. Disney pushed it very very hard compared to Strange World which they left out to die. It just didn't look appealing enough and the songs felt like a retread of Encanto. Didn't help that the reviews were awful as well. The dagger was Trolls 3 being right there as a family alternative.

The one thing a Disney musical can’t afford is bad songs. The music just wasn’t good enough. That’s not to say the other elements worked but at least one catchy song that hits the zeitgeist can make up for a lot of sins.
 

Add in how easy it is for audiences to wait for Disney+ and you have a doomed film. 

[Bob Train]

3 minutes ago, Eric Wonka said:

Also not an NTC. 👀 

wdym there are plenty of Wish toys. It's very existence is nostalgic, I'd argue, as it's meant to pay homage to Disney's 100 year history

[MovieMan89]

6 minutes ago, Eric Wonka said:

Also not an NTC. 👀 

??? Very clearly evoking nostalgic Disney musicals and an entire marketing campaign centered around “your childhood!!!” nostalgia AND literal characters that looked like they existed solely to be merch… 

 

Anyways the only silver lining for them, if you can call it that, is that Strange World exists and it was just last year. Otherwise this would have pretty much been the all time commercial low for WDAS. 

[Eric Burnett]

4 minutes ago, Bob Train said:

wdym there are plenty of Wish toys. It's very existence is nostalgic, I'd argue, as it's meant to pay homage to Disney's 100 year history

 

3 minutes ago, MovieMan89 said:

??? Very clearly evoking nostalgic Disney musicals and an entire marketing campaign centered around “your childhood!!!” nostalgia AND literal characters that looked like they existed solely to be merch… 

 

Anyways the only silver lining for them, if you can call it that, is that Strange World exists and it was just last year. Otherwise this would have pretty much been the all time commercial low for WDAS. 

Movies can be toy commercials, but not be nostalgic toy commercials. It’s not a sequel or based off an already existing and nostalgic property. The line is pretty blurry for this film than most, yeah, but there’s arguments for and against. I feel you could go against.