That’s all folks!
Done. With the announcement this
past week from Universal Pictures Home Entertainment the cupboard is now
empty.
When writer/director Leigh Whannell’s The
Invisible Man, starring Elisabeth Moss (as
June in The Handmaid's Tale, plus
such series as The West Wing and Mad Men) hits
the street on May 26 — as a three-SKU product offering — there will be no more
films left to release that have grossed at least $25 million in their
respective theatrical runs.
Why $25 million?
That is the threshold for “hit” status and it has nothing to do with
profit or loss on a production — you can find plenty of examples where a film
grossed in excess of $25 million and lost money. No, it is more about consumer awareness and
that takes a nationwide break, backed by a significant advertising and
promotional campaign and the film has to stick around long enough (weeks in
release) to get to that level (a weak Friday opening and screens are lost or
downsized and even a wide break can get truncated very quickly).
Theatres nationwide shutdown on Mar. 20 and this is
the last film with the $25million plus profile from the pre-shelter-in-place
period to get a street date.
For the record, the ARR is 88 days and the box
office take, which abruptly ended with the shuttering of some 40,000 screens
nationwide, finished off at $64.3 million.
Way, way back in 1997, we waited and waited for the
first “new” theatrical film, with that profile (a minimum of $25 million in box
office receipts), to materialize on the new DVD format. DVDs had started to be released in March of
that year, but it wasn’t until July 8 that the first two “new” theatrical
releases arrived … Absolute Power
($50.0 million) and Vegas Vacation
($36.4 million), both from Warner Bros. and both with ARR profiles of 144 days.
In the years that have followed, over 24 years (plus
a few extra weeks), it became a given that films would open in theatres, fall
into certain box office categories ($100 million plus, $25 million, $10
million, etc.), and then march out in their own good time to the home
entertainment packaged media marketplace.
That run ends on May 26.
Sure, there are films with lesser ticket sales still
in inventory, even some from the launch year of the format (1997) that have
never been released on DVD, but all of the high profile entries are gone … gone
… gone.
It won’t be until theatres reopen and new films start
generating ticket sales that we will have new films with this profile. Theatres could open by the July 4th
weekend … maybe Labor Day. Best case,
sometime in September as the earliest window for new DVD, Blu-ray and 4K Ultra
HD product offerings from the start-up crop of new theatrical productions that
finish the cycle from theatres-to-home entertainment.
The various Hollywood studios will have to get very
creative during June, July and August with catalog and anniversary promotions
to fill in this gap.
As for The Invisible Man,
Universal Pictures Home Entertainment will be releasing Combo Pack editions for
both the 4K Ultra HD (with Blu-ray) and Blu-ray (with DVD) formats, plus a
stand-alone DVD selection.
Bonus features include commentary from actor-turned-filmmaker
Leigh Whannell — Insidious: Chapter 3),
deleted scenes, and four featurettes — “Moss Manifested,” “Director's Journey
with Leigh Whannell,” “The Players” and “Timeless Terror.”
