THB Headlines: July 17
THB Headlines: July 17
Q1 - Down $1.67 billion (44%, 302 releases vs 71)
Q2 - Down $961 million (29%, 368 releases vs 167)
July - With half the month to go and $765m in the bank, July 2022 is behind the July 2019 total by $523 million. (190 releases in July 2019… 71 so far in 2022)
US did $128 million in its first 10 days in 2019.
The Secret Life of Pets 2 opened to $48m in its first weekend in 2019.
Maybe $115 million in holdover business in the next 2 weekends.
So July 2022 could get within $250 million (19%) of the July 2019 business.
Then we hit a wall again in August. How/Why?
Going back to 2010, $800 is kind of what is expected from August. There were 2 years with just over $1 billion and 1 year with just $660 million. 2019 business was $828 million.
So this year, maybe $50m each in Nope and DC Superpets holdover. Another $50 million in other holdover. So stake the month to $150m.
New wide releases are Bullet Train, Easter Sunday, Bodies Bodies Bodies, and Beast.
$200 million domestic between them? $250 million would see wildly generous.
January has been the only 2022 month under 50% of 2019 domestic grosses. And that is based on total grosses. If you look only at the new movies that month, 2019 more than tripled this year’s numbers.
We’re heading back there.
Why? Only one real reason. Lack of product in the market. And it’s not just the big titles… it’s a middle class issue as well. Has July had slightly stronger holdovers (not shortened June release windows) and another half dozen solid, not spectacular, mid-range releases and July 2022 could have beat July 2019, still with one hand behind its back.
In August, we go back to have 2 hands tied behind out backs.
Claims to be a multi-hour interview, but reading the resulting interview (which is valuable) the ratio would be 2.5 hours talking about splitting from Mark and 30 minutes on everything else.
Jay Duplass Doesn’t Want to Be a Coen Brother Anymore
Mr. Saturday Night Closing in September… unless maybe Beanie Feldstein could step in for Billy Crystal?
Netflix, Still Reeling, Bets Big on ‘The Gray Man’
Facts Not In Evidence, But In This Story:
1. “the directing brothers shocked fans when they erased half the global population and allowed their Marvel superheroes to fail. The next year, they raised the stakes.”
No… they are not the auteurs of Marvel, Kevin Feige is. He let them do what they did. This is not to take away credit for their work on those films… but high degree of B.S.
2. “The Gray Man” is coming out in 450 theaters. That’s a far cry from the 2,000 or so that a typical big-budget release would appear in on its opening weekend.”
No… The Gray Man will be on 450 screens. The typical movie of this scale opens in over 4000 theaters, which actually means more than 12,000 actual screens. That is the actual scale variation.
3. “It would have been a dramatically different film,” Joe Russo said. The brothers said going elsewhere would have required them to shave off a third of their budget and downgrade the action of the film.”
Yes… the film might have been much better had they shaved a third off their budget and forced them to be more creative.
4. “We haven’t really been in this genre yet,” Mr. Stuber said in an interview.
Uh, Bright, Triple Frontier, 6 Underground, and Red Notice were all action movies with stars that cost a load of money. It’s true that only 2 of the 4 involved people in tuxedos. And 1 of the 4 did get over 40% positive reviews on Rotten Tomatoes. The Gray Man is hovering at 52%. That’s 5 whole % points better than Eternals!!!
5. (Netflix)’s marketing budget has essentially stayed the same for three years, despite a significant rise in competition from services like Disney+ and HBO Max.
But… Completely misses the point. Its not just your overall annual budget. It is what you spend to launch a new product. Netflix does not spend anything close to the amount of even small studio theatrical releases (or movies released last year on HBO Max and theatrical, day-n-date). And indications are that there is a clear cultural impact on that choice, even with many hit streaming series.
6. For “The Gray Man,” Netflix has sent the Russos and their cast to Berlin, London and Mumbai, India. Other promotional efforts have included national television ads during National Basketball Association games and the Indianapolis 500 and 3-D billboards in disparate locations like Las Vegas and Krakow, Poland.
CHEAP! Relatively. The big expense of releasing movies is ad buying. Not a mystery. Everyone gets it. Is Netflix spending as much releasing The Gray Man as Warners is spending on ads for DC League of Super-Pets? Nope. Half? Not clear. 20%? Probably close to the real answer.
7. For the smaller-scale theatrical release, Netflix will put “The Gray Man” at some of the handful of theaters it owns — like the Paris Theater in New York and the Bay Theater in Los Angeles — and with chains like Cinemark and Marcus Theaters.
In Los Angeles, in the 5-screen The Bay, Netflix is playing 4 other Netflix movies each. The 2 screens with The Gray Man total 500 seats aka 2000 max seats to sell daily. The Paris in NYC holds 571 and has 3 screenings a day aka 1713 possible tickets sold daily. So complete sell-outs in those premium theaters can generate $44,556 a day. The NY site is the only theater in the city playing the film and in L.A., there are 9 more screens within 20 miles. 450 screens nationally. At $12 a ticket, 4x a day, with 200 seats per screen, that’s a max daily gross of $4.3 million.
Potential weekend gross of $13 million, let’s say. Where The Crawdads Sing opened to about $17 million this weekend. And if we are honest with ourselves, the likely outcome for The Gray Man is somewhere more like $5 million for the week before Netflix release… if they are lucky.
8. “Knowing that you have, ultimately, a distribution platform which can pull in 100 million viewers like it did on ‘Extraction,’ but also the potential for a large theatrical window with a commensurate promotional campaign behind it,” Joe Russo said, “you have a very powerful studio.”
Yes… it would be if that was not a fantasy. The author of the piece acknowledges this to some degree. 100 million people watching at least 2 minutes of something for “free” is still great. But will Netflix ever do what is needed to have a large theatrical window with a commensurate marketing campaign behind it? Not yet.
A VERY Flattering portrait of The Great Rocky/ Creed Producer, IRWIN WINKLER, from one of the country‘s greatest artist … ALSO after IRWIN controlling ROCKY for over 47 years, and now CREED, , I really would like have at least a little WHAT’s LEFT of my RIGHTS back, before passing it on to ONLY YOUR CHILDREN - I believe That would be a FAIR gesture from this 93 year old gentleman ? … This is a painful subject That eats at my soul , because I wanted to leave something of Rocky for my children, but it’s always great hearing from the loyal fans… Keep Punching
Kind of gross, really. Rocky was the key to everything Stallone. It has become a billion dollar franchise.
The Expendables are close in revenue and may pass the Rocky franchise this year on Stallone’s C.V. Rambo is next.
I guess it would be a nice for Winkler to give Stallone a piece of his rights to the character and concept to which Stallone has no legal right. But picturing Winkler as a snake isn’t very nice.
Janeane Garofalo Never Sold Out. What a Relief.