| Title | Weekend Gross | Total Gross | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Tenet | $2,700,000 | $45,100,000 |
| 2 | Hocus Pocus | $1,925,000 | $1,925,000 |
| 3 | The New Mutants | $1,000,000 | $20,914,061 |
| 4 | Unhinged | $870,000 | $18,402,654 |
| 5 | Infidel | $455,000 | $3,426,965 |
| 6 | Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back |
$335,000 | $2,258,000 |
| 7 | Possessor Uncut | $227,500 | $227,500 |
| 8 | Shortcut | $210,000 | $652,975 |
| 9 | Save Yourselves! | $141,631 | $141,631 |
| 10 | The Call | $140,567 | $140,567 |
Just last night it was revealed that Cineworld (the company that owns Regal theaters) is thinking about closing a whole lot — if not all — of its theaters in the UK and US. There is a lot of rumor about Cineworld’s decision and we will know more in the days ahead.
What we do know is that the latest James Bond film, No Time to Die, has been delayed again, this time until April 2021. That puts theater companies in yet another horrible bind. They require large, new movies on their screens to fill theaters. But movie studios require full theaters to release large, new movies. It’s a catch-22, with both exhibitors and studios needing each other but both of them also needing the other to provide something before they can move forward. Studios aren’t going to release new movies without open theaters but theaters aren’t going to remain open without new movies. Things are a mess.
You can’t blame studios for pumping the brakes on the latest 007 movie and many others. Just look at this weekend. Once again Tenet topped the box office chart but this time it did so with an abysmal $2,700,000. After six weeks in release, the film has only garnered $45 million in the states. So, yeah, if I was a major distributor, I wouldn’t want to release any new films right now either. It just doesn’t make any financial sense.
Movie theaters, on the other hand, are trying their hardest to drum up business. They are showing old favorites constantly and some of them are bringing in audiences. Take a look at the number two movie this week: Hocus Pocus. This is a movie that’s decades old but managed to rake in just shy of $2 million, a decent haul for this day and age. The Empire Strikes Back is still generating some business (just $335,000 but, hey, that’s something) and other old classics have been on the charts since the re-opening slowly began. Theater chains are also showcasing a lot more indie fare lately. Movies like Save Yourselves! and The Call and Possessor Uncut are getting more limelight than they usually would. But these types of movies aren’t going to save cinemas. Theaters needed Tenet to be a bigger hit than it was. They then needed quite a few movies like Tenet to keep the lights on. It’s just not happening for theater chains and so you can’t blame them for wanting to shut things down for awhile.
Let’s say Regal closes up a ton of their theaters (their alleged plan involves shutting down select locations that are near other Regals and leaving some others open only on weekends) in order to save business. What happens next? There is a good chance that AMC and other chains will follow the lead and scale back operations as well. Again, you can’t blame them. But what does that mean for the future of theater-going? Can these companies survive a shutdown that lasts until 2021? The studios will survive but there is a good chance that certain theaters we have visited for generations may close forever.
It’s getting to the point that theaters and studios need to come together and build a coalition. They need to flex their power and demand that Congress do something to save the movie-going experience. The industry is going to need a lot more than Christopher Nolan to save it.