Progress! After being stuck in limbo for a solid month at a projected 501 or 502 new theatrical releases for 2023, the needle moved — at last — to the 510 level this past week.
The projection for the top two boxes ($25 million plus; $100 million plus) inched up one to 64 for the year. Still nowhere near the pre-2020 averages, but progress just the same.
The numbers play out in a somewhat predictable pattern. So many weeks, so many theatres, so many seats available on Friday and Saturday nights … and so many films released from all sources.
When you remove large-budget film productions from the mix and take them direct to streaming — bypassing a theatrical release — the result is a depression in the new theatrical release counts, which have a ripple effect.
There is double-whammy at work that has upset the applecart. The pandemic, which went on way too long, coupled with the focus on studio streaming platforms (at the cost of both money and reason), have deeply impacted the new theatrical release trends. Recovery has been slow.
Add to this the delivery of pristine masters to studio “helpers” (remember, we no longer refer to them as pirates) and you end up with skewed release results in the DVD and Blu-ray marketplace.
This past week, the Super Mario Bros. Movie stormed onto the scene with a first-week box office haul of $203.6 million. That’s wonderful news.
Meanwhile, the “helpers” and “void-fillers” began taking pre-orders for Creed 3 (Warner Bros. Discovery) and Shazam! Fury of the Gods (also Warner Bros. Discovery), plus Ant-Man and Wasp: Quantumania (Walt Disney) and Jesus Revolution (Lionsgate) got home entertainment packaged media product-offerings from alternative sources.
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