Saturday morning update: Even with three major new box office releases this weekend, and New York City finally reopening, the numbers are not yet at pre-pandemic levels, but there is a lot of drama going on.
Let’s start with Disney’s theatrical day and Disney date + animated photo release Raya and the Last Dragon who seems to lead the weekend with a studio report $ 2.5M Friday and a weekend estimate from the industry $ 8.3M in 2,045 cinemas. These numbers are slightly lower than Friday’s $ 3 million and $ 9 million to $ 10 million we heard about, and are definitely less than the $ 14.1 million from the launch of the Warner Bros. HBO Max on the same day Tom Jerry posted last weekend. Rayathe opening weekend is also less than Croods: a new erathe 3-day opening during the Thanksgiving period, which registered $ 9.7 million. And this is definitely because Disney has not reached an agreement with the No. 3 Cinemark chain, as we said first (losing about 250 bookings), Harkins and Cineplex from Canada. Even with New York City open, Raya it is not the type of film that would succeed in the city, as I would say a Marvel film would do.
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Even though these numbers in Raya they are not as robust (for the pandemic) as we saw yesterday, the launch is causing a lot of fear for rival distributors and for display; particularly after the recent comments by Disney CEO Bob Chapek on Monday at a virtual investment conference hosted by Morgan Stanley, in which he said things like “The consumer is probably more impatient than ever” and this given as the pandemic brought a series of films at home, he is not sure of “going back” to the way business was done before. Although Chapek said, “We certainly don’t want to do anything like cut off the legs of a theatrical show,” many are concerned that all of this is a code for Disney to move forward with its model of day and date at the Disney + theater; and this Black Widow can emulate the same distribution path as Raya on May 7th. Keep in mind that even if Los Angeles reopens there and the capacity restrictions for the auditorium decrease, Disney still needs the rest of the world to move forward with Black Widow and making the $ 1 billion box office movie that everyone wants to see, meaning the title will remain a purely theatrical release.
What’s scaring many about Raya is that Disney manages to keep 100% of everything it is earning with the purchase of $ 30 from Disney + PVOD Raya. Disney does not need to share this PVOD revenue with any exhibitor. It was explained to me that RayaThe $ 30 Disney + price is roughly equivalent to the rent Disney would receive for five or six movie tickets. Wow. Although I have heard that Warner Bros. was a partner in the exhibition and made a deal under the same day’s HBO Max titles, Disney didn’t move.
I was told that Disney’s terms for Raya were a minimum two-week play with a scale that starts at 50% rent if the film ultimately grosses between $ 0 and $ 37.5 million, and then 51% if the gross domestic finals between $ 37.5 million and $ 50 million. Although these terms are not strict in a normal market, we are still in a pandemic and people are still not going to the cinema in large numbers, moreover, cinemas need to compete with all of the Disney + PVOD of it all. Is this fair for exhibition?
Marvel Studios
Let’s see what happens to Black Widow, and if Disney emulates a Raya Disney + theatrical distribution pattern for that title. I would like to give Chapek the benefit of the doubt. Back on December Disney Investor Day, he clearly emphasized that a robust Disney + slate wouldn’t be possible without the power of the big screen and the franchises he created. He’s also the guy who destroyed the DVD window in theaters, starting with Alice in Wonderland in 2010; and the studio still came out with an overall gross revenue of $ 1.025 billion for that film. Disney didn’t burn the house down to get warm at that time, and I still don’t think they will now. Currently, the studio says that Black Widow is still going to the cinema on May 7, and the exhibit has heard nothing else, they are just very suspicious, as there was no trailer for the Marvel movie going on Raya last weekend, only those for the release of Disney in theaters on May 28 Cruella.
From the point of view of the box office point of view, it can be argued that Disney left money on the table with Raya boxing Cinemark and Canada’s Cineplex. Why would you do that with a movie like Raya who owns A CinemaScore, is 95% certified as new on Rotten Tomatoes and fantastic outings from PostTrak by 93% with an 80% recommendation from the general crowd?
Only Disney knows the answer to that question. When it comes to potential non-reporting from Disney + Raya PVOD numbers, no news is good news. Anything bigger would take the film distribution model off its axis.
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On the positive side, the feature film directed by Don Hall and Carlos Lopez Estrada, Raya it attracted a predominantly female crowd of 57%, with a third of the people who bought tickets under the age of 17. The diversity divide was 37% Caucasian, 22% black, 21% Asian and 20% Hispanic. Raya played better in Salt Lake City, from what I heard, but had very good numbers for the pandemic in New York, Chicago, Dallas, Washington DC, Houston, Seattle, Phoenix; The list goes on.
Warners is not reporting figures on Tom Jerry today, but we hear that he is heading for second place on his second weekend at 2,563 locations (+88), with an industry estimated at $ 1.6 million, -60% from the previous week and 3 days $ 6.75M, -52% for a total of $ 23.1 million in ten days. There were conversations between rivals over the weekend that Tom Jerry could steal No. 1 from Raya given that this film did not have Cinemark. This does not seem to be the case, and the drop in the second weekend of these HBO Max theatrical titles is more pronounced than expected. To remember, Wonder Woman 1984 it dropped 67% on weekend 2, and that was during the new year weekend, usually a great time to go to the movies.
Murray Close
Lionsgate’s $ 100 million long overdue bet on YA Chaos Walking starring Daisy Ridley and Tom Holland is about to lose money, as is any major release during the pandemic, where 50% of all 5,800 cinemas in the United States and Canada are still closed. Industry estimates show the film with a $ 1.3 million Friday and 3 days of $ 3.7M. The film’s diagnostics with a CinemaScore B, horrible 24% rotten analysis and a 67% PostTrak and a 41% recommendation indicate that the film would never recover, even in a healthy market, so the studio decided to go and not keep this feature for longer. The opening weekend of the photo is in sync with what the box office sources were projecting for the weekend. The science fiction feature directed by Doug Liman attracted 54% of the guys, 65% over 25, with the 25-34 demo representing 30% of ticket buyers. The distribution of diversity was 56% white, 20% Hispanic, 15% black and 11% Asian. The main markets were New York, Salt Lake City, Phoenix, Dallas, Chicago, Houston and Denver.
Fourth is Eddie Huang’s Focus Features film Boogie what did $ 430K in 1,252 locations yesterday en route to a day 3 of $ 1.26M. Pic got a C + CinemaScore. The Rotten Tomatoes score was low here at 44% and PostTrak OK at 70% and 55% recommended. The guys bought tickets at 53% with more than 60% between 18-34, and the 18-24 demo representing over 40%. The diversity mix was 44% black, 20% Hispanic, 18% Asian and 18% Caucasian. Boogie it was the best on the East Coast, with New York, Philadelphia, Boston, Chicago and Miami among its main markets.
Universal / DreamWorks Animation’s Croods: a new era over the weekend 15 scored at 1,604 locations and won a $ 200K Friday, -28% and 3 days of $ 890K, -29% for a total of $ 53.7 million.
Overall, how is the New York box office?
Fandango is not reporting results this weekend on tickets sold out at the auditorium, and Comscore may have more information about the five districts as soon as the weekend ends. Sources tell us that 49 New York cinemas are active this weekend of 133. Eighty-four cinemas in the five neighborhoods remain inactive, with 24 of that count being Regal locations.
The weekend’s general box office is estimated at $ 25.1 million last weekend, up 14% from the previous week. This is probably the combination of broader theatrical releases and New York back in business, however, it could have been more if Raya it was a pure theatrical release.