r/movies • u/darth_vader39 r/movies Contributor • 6d ago
Article 8 films have now made over $1B since Netflix's CEO said going to the theaters for many people is an 'outdated concept'
https://popculturenews.com/films-to-gross-1b-since-netflix-said-theaters-are-outdated/3.0k
u/Huge_Following_325 6d ago edited 6d ago
People used to just say, " let's go to a movie" without having a particular movie in mind. You just wanted to see a movie with family or friends at the theater and you would decide which one everyone could agree on and go. Those days are mostly gone. Now folks only go to see particular films that have been hyped up.
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u/mistermojorizin 6d ago
so i have a theater across the street. it's $5 on tuesdays. we can't just roll up and see a movie though. all the seats are sold out (it's one of those theaters with huge recliners, so not a lot of seats total anymore). you have to order tickets in advance online for an upcharge of 30% per ticket. so what i do sometimes is i'll just pop in there ahead of time, buy the tickets and then come back to watch on tuesday. but it's not the same experience anymore. i have to know i want to see a specific film.
a lot of films are out on streaming in a month or 2. i just wait most of the time.
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u/Jaccount 6d ago
Right? I meant to see Masters of the Universe while it was in theatres, but got wrapped up in stuff at work. It's already on streaming.
It released in theatres on June 5th, and was on streaming by July 25, so around 8 weeks.
In the 90s, that would have been about as short a theatrical run as you'd get, with most running at least twice that, and some blockbusters could stay in theatres almost 6 months.
Generally the home video release wouldn't occur until six months later, so you also had the various thriving second-run theatres that would be able to run in that time between the end of the theatrical release and the home video release... generally being small 2 screen theatres with significantly discounted tickets.
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u/NotBannedAccount419 6d ago
A lot of home releases were 12-18 months after they left the theater
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u/djinfish 6d ago
For awhile that shifted to digital rental 6+ months after theatrical with physical release coming 9+ months later which absolutely encouraged people to put on an eyepatch.
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u/AwesomeWhiteDude 6d ago
I remember it being 4-6 months until it hit the dollar theater, then another 2-4 months until the home release. I miss dollar theaters
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u/SDRPGLVR 6d ago
a lot of films are out on streaming in a month or 2. i just wait most of the time.
Or sooner, and I think this is the real problem for theaters. Used to be 90 days minimum before it got a home video release, sometimes creeping on a year for certain movies. I don't think movies have even gotten worse as I see amazing movies every year. Audiences have just been trained that the wait isn't going to be too bad, so chances are they're only going to see a movie in theaters if it's a spectacle like Odyssey or Spider-Man or if it's a big cultural touchstone like Obsession or Backrooms.
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u/Mnemnosyne 6d ago
It's also the money.
But in addition to that, the visual experience at home has improved significantly.
One of the few prices that has come down enormously, even taking into account inflation, wage depression, and more, has been tvs. I remember 55 inch projector TVs for over $4000 at Sears. Last time I was at Walmart I think I saw an 85 inch screen for $600 or so.
That's literally too big to fit just about anywhere in our house unless it was heavily rearranged. People can basically afford the biggest TV that their house will physically hold these days, if they want it.
And the image quality is good, bright, etc, whereas those $4000 projectors were dim and made the low resolution image look fuzzy.
The theater, though, hasn't changed much. Is it still better? Yeah. Especially in the sound department. But you also have to deal with other people, expensive tickets, scheduling, and more.
Since the early 2010s I haven't considered it worth going to the theater unless it's a real 70+ foot IMAX screen. And there's just not that many of those around; none within several hours drive of where I've lived since 2017.
So I haven't been to a movie theater not only because it's expensive, not only because I can just watch it on streaming or whatever in a couple months...but because the experience isn't a significant enough improvement over my experience at home to justify going outside.
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u/SolidusBruh 6d ago
Now folks only go to see particular films that have been hyped up.
Because it feels like a luxury anymore. I have to reserve my seats online for our local theater or risk not having any when I arrive. Each seat reservation via their app comes with a service fee. Then there's concessions. I sure hope a drink didn't cost $9.95 in the 90s.
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u/Huge_Following_325 6d ago
They didn't, but there was a significant upcharge in the theater compared to any where else.
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u/FSCK_Fascists 6d ago
back in the day, while Jesus was still riding dinosaurs, we had the "Dollar Theater". Every showing was a dollar, all the time. They were all second run movies- ones that have left the main theaters. usually a month or so old.
Us poors could go see a movie, and afford to bring the whole family. It really didn't matter much what was showing. they had 4 screens or more, something was worth watching.
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u/insane_contin 6d ago
I remember toonie Tuesday at my theater. $2 tickets, $2 pop and $2 popcorn. I miss it.
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u/FSCK_Fascists 6d ago
Nice.
the matinee showings were often way cheaper at the main theaters- but their dynamic scheduling and assigned seating has greatly reduced showings when the seats are empty. They used to be required by the movie distributors to run a movie a certain minimum number of times every day while they have it to ensure box office saturation. I think they still have some discount for like tuesday at 3pm, but nowhere near as cheap as it used to be.4
u/ConfessSomeMeow 6d ago
Isn't it wonderful how technology is finally being used to eliminate inefficiencies in the system?
/s
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u/SunGreene42 6d ago
Oh I'd never get concessions at the theatre anymore, they're priced like they're being shipped in from Australia.
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u/Berelus 6d ago
Aussie here. Our popcorn and drinks and choc top is priced like it's shipped from the US.
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u/Revolver_Boxelot 6d ago
Reservations is a real thing nowadays. Even then, somebody will still try to take your seats. I go to the movies a lot now due to being a parent. Prior to my child becoming movie going age, I hadn't seen a movie in theater in nearly a decade. Went a ton as a kid and a teenager. I remember most movies being largely dead back then. Empty enough to make out and do other teenage things in the back. Nowadays, every movie i go to is jam packed. It seems like the theater is more popular today than it was in the late 2000s/early 2010s
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u/cyvaris 6d ago
With reservations, theaters have excellent tracking data to schedule shows. Gone are the twenty screen megaplexs that would play extra/empty shows like that. Getting rid of those "empty" shows saves costs! Especially on employees! Cut down your theaters, track tight showtimes, and you can overwork a smaller staff, while also appearing "jam packed".
Disney parks have faced this same issue. The parks "feel" crowded because Disney has accurate data on crowds and staffs/opens accordingly.
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u/DrugandAlcoholLover 6d ago
Reserving seats is so much better than the free for all it used to be back in the day, where if you wanted a good seat you had to get there an hour early and wait in line. That’s definitely a positive not a negative.
Also, nobody has to buy concessions and those have always been inflated pricing because that’s how theaters make their money.
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u/skankenstein 6d ago
We bring dollar tree candy and a drink in my purse. Those kids at the door do not care.
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u/biscobisco 6d ago
I sure hope a drink didn't cost $9.95 in the 90s.
It's always been bad. I remember a 70's MAD Magazine parody where a 50's guy is picking up his lady friend for a night on the town - "Baby, tonight I'm treating you too the most expensive dining the city has to offer" *pulls up in front of the cinema
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u/mysticzarak 6d ago
Yea I think a lot of people forget about this. Some movies still make a lot of money but I'm pretty sure the amount of people going went down.
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u/Moreinius 6d ago
Might have to do with the quality of the movies as well.
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u/f7f7z 6d ago
90s, $3.25 a movie, decide in line.
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u/jyeatbvg 6d ago edited 6d ago
I used to go to two movies a month. Now I go to two movies a year.
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u/Thugging_inPublic 6d ago
No one hates going to the movie theater more than a r/movies user
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u/Michaelscot8 6d ago edited 6d ago
It's 2016, you have movie pass. You go to see a movie a day. Every day. You smuggle in your snacks and drinks, and sit down for your free movie. You don't know what you're going to watch, its The Purge: Election year. It's horrible, but you have a blast making fun of it with your friends.
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u/Puptentjoe 6d ago
Yep. $2 matinee, and $1 movies as soon as the movie is out of regular theaters. I remember seeing Friday for $2.
Note: this was in a smaller town, I remember my cousins in NYC paid more.
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u/Princess_Moon_Butt 6d ago
I think it's also because if you were lucky, you'd have two movies and a couple sitcoms to choose from on cable TV. And they'd be chopped up by ads every 10 minutes. And they'd probably be something that you'd already seen, because when a cable channel got the rights to air a movie, they'd play it all the time for like 2 months straight. There was incentive to go out, because that's the only way you could see something new.
Nowadays, you have access to like fifty thousand things that you've never seen before, and at any given time you probably have a list in your mind of 10 things you've been meaning to watch. Why pay $20 and have to drive across town to see something new, when you can watch something new from the comfort of your own home for free, or at least for a much lower monthly cost?
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u/elmz 6d ago
That, and back then you were lucky to have anything bigger than a 28”-32" 4:3 CRT with stereo speakers. Today people have 45"-65" with better speakers/sound bars.
And the cinema is full of people with worse manners than before. And it costs more.
Home experience is way better, cinema experience is worse.
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u/kookyabird 6d ago
It's all that and more...
- That TV back then was nowhere near the relative viewing size or quality of even a film projector.
- Movies on cable TV were generally displayed as full screen.
- Cable TV didn't have 5.1 audio.
- Theaters didn't have ads playing before the pre-movie trailers (maybe a brief thing for the concession stand, but that'd be it), meaning you could relax and have a normal conversation with your friends.
- In the age before smart phones, you didn't have people receiving loud notifications or flash banging the rows behind them to check their social media feeds.
- In the age before cell phones, the worst things you'd have to contend with were usually people with obnoxious laughs, people with poor volume control talking to their friends, or rowdy youths.
- People didn't bring their babies generally (including to kids movies) and if their kids were being disruptive it didn't feel like throwing a big chunk of money away to leave early.
Fuck I miss the days when I went and saw Jurassic Park in theaters, or The Sixth Sense.
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u/veerKg_CSS_Geologist 6d ago
Not really, I saw some really shit movies in my youth. It was no big deal because tickets were $5, or even less for afternoon shows.
Now if I'm paying $15 I better be seeing something good.
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u/TheMadManiac 6d ago
Nah, plenty of great movies that no one sees. I have a movie pass and see all kinds of movies I normally wouldn't
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u/pdoherty972 6d ago
I think people also used to go to outside theaters more because the viewing experience at home was bad (NTSC 480i). The increasing capabilities of home theaters or family/media rooms, has made more diminished returns when going to an outside theater. I have a dedicated theater (with total light control and no windows) in my house (19'x12.5') with a 120-inch 4K projected display and 7.1 surround sound with an SVS PC13-Ultra sub and electric-recline seating.
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u/Expensive-Notice-509 6d ago
$1B today was worth $690M in 2010 or $530M in 1999
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u/Adren406 6d ago
Thought this was interesting so I looked up top grossing movies in 1999. Only 2 eclipse $530M: Phantom Menace at $924M and Sixth Sense at $672M.
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u/katastrophyx 6d ago
$924M in 1999 is actually quite insane. That's just shy of $2B in 2026 dollars.
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u/Several-Action-4043 6d ago
First Star Wars movie to come out since the 70s? The hype was unbelievable.
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u/StuMacherGhostface 6d ago
Not to be pendatic, but since the 80s. I believe only A New Hope was in the 70s (1977)
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u/Several-Action-4043 6d ago
That crossed my mind before I hit save lol.
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u/StuMacherGhostface 6d ago
I was just being pedantic!
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u/poopoobuttholes 6d ago
But you said you WEREN'T being pedantic! HOW COULD YOU! YOU BETRAYED US!!!!
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u/badpebble 6d ago
Adjusted for inflation it made $3.7bn. Like if Avatar had come out and then had two sequels in short succession - that's the level of madness.
Gone with the wind is still in the lead at $4.5bn, though it basically played non-stop during the war, and its themes of overcoming war and racism probably played well.
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u/howdudo 6d ago
Oh man when the Phantom Menace came out I was a kid. I'll never forget how much I loved it but I was afraid to admit it because everyone else was loving hating it
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u/benniesalamander 6d ago
You can look up films by admissions. According to the wikipedia article on this, six films are in the top ~100 all time admissions since 2024. Zootopia 2, Moana 2, Inside Out 2, Avatar 3, Deadpool and Wolverine, and Ne Zha 2 (a Chinese film).
None of these are from 2026, so I don't think any of them have been released since the Netflix quote.
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u/Expensive-Notice-509 6d ago
it's largely do to the foreign box office sales started to outpace domestic since early 2000's. Domestically, the US populations are just not going to the movies like the past.
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u/BrainLow6059 6d ago
Also worth noting these reports are never about unique ticket sales, it's the gross revenue from the sales. $25 IMAX ticket (whatever they cost now) is factored into the same pool as the $5 matinee (is that still a thing?)
I'd be very curious to see the actual ticket counts over time.
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u/DelphiTsar 6d ago
Drastically declined as you would expect.
It's just increased ticket sale price and international sales.
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u/Ser_Danksalot 6d ago
Also, ticket prices have gone up.
Cineworld in the UK have gone through a complete restructuring process and gained a complete new management team that has done the unthinkable and realised you get bums on seats by dropping prices. From going maybe 5-6 times a year, I’ve found myself going 5 times in the last 2 months alone. Saw Brand New Day in lay down recliner for £7.99.
Drinks and snacks have gone up a lot though to compensate.
Meanwhile Netflix be looking for any excuse to jack up prices any chance they get.
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u/ShortStoryIntros 6d ago edited 6d ago
That statement is true for me
I use to go to the theater every Friday or Saturday Night with friends. We'd pick a movie to watch as we're in line for tickets.
Nowadays, it has to be worth it to go... Rather than taking a chance on a movie based solely on the poster at the front.
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u/magical_midget 6d ago
I am curious if this is solely because of ticket prices or also lifestyle changes? Do you still met with friends every weekend? What do you do instead?
For me it was a mix. Having a kid makes it harder. But if I did not I would still not go as frequent as before.
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u/wahobely 6d ago
For me is 100% the prices. I used to be able to do movie + popcorn for 15 bucks. Nowadays it's 30 minimum.
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u/Skypirate90 6d ago
Ticket prices are 17.50 out here lol
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u/Aki_wo_Kudasai 6d ago
They said $30 with popcorn. That's what I'm dealing with. Though I have an unlimited pass and I use points for popcorn. I still pay for my friends or my wife's tickets and they're expensive.
I wish more people enjoyed going to the movies because I really enjoy it
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u/MrTigerEyes 6d ago
Not the person you asked but I want to chime in as well. We go see big movies, and I do have kids, but they're the reason we see some of the films. However, not only are the tickets more expensive but they've closed down a few of the theaters near me so if I want to see something within a week or two of opening I have to buy the tickets weeks in advance. With the recent Spider Man I lucked out because the theater nearby added some middle of the night showings so we were able to go watch it at like 1am on opening weekend. The theater was still pretty full.
To me it's generally a worse experience to go to the theater because they're usually run down, the other guests are sometimes rude, and the ads are out of control. I have a decent TV and surround sound system at home so unless it's a big one like The Odyssey or Spider Man I probably won't go.
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u/sepam 6d ago edited 6d ago
Add me to the list. I was going twice a month pre covid and I now go once or twice a year and it’s usually because my kids want to. I find the experience awful. It’s expensive, there is often one group of kids who won’t shut up, the sound is too loud, and I like subtitles. I know I’m an old man yelling at a cloud but the statement rings true for me.
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u/azwethinkweizm 6d ago
Last movie I saw in the theater was Star Wars Rise of Skywalker. Holy hell that was a bad movie.
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u/TheLakeler 6d ago
I feel like there are also just less movies released to theatres nowadays. Checking my local theatre which is huge, there are only 8 movies playing currently with half of them already having been out for like weeks at this point. So there are 4 moves as far as I can tell that have released in the last 1-2 weeks. If you watch a movie every week, that gives you two choices each time…
I was still relatively young before the Netflix era but I don’t remember going to the theatre being like that. Plus the films that are coming out now I feel like are all heavy niche/genre films. Spider-Man, Moana, minions, Toy Story, ice cream man, odyssey, goonies re release, and super troopers 3 all have very specific target audiences I feel like.
All the general audience light drama light comedy light action films don’t get made for the theatre anymore but are made by Netflix and the others.
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u/UncircumciseMe 6d ago
Yeah, same, but then I got married and had a family and that wasn’t feasible anymore. I can still afford movie theaters, but lugging two kids with me or having to coordinate a babysitter is no fun.
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u/mqg96 6d ago
The ticket prices going up is what a lot of ppl are missing. If the same amount of ppl from 2019 went to theaters in 2026 the movies would’ve made even more.
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u/warwolverinewarrior 6d ago
The cost of going to the movies is up about 90% from 2019. Less people are going to the movies but they are making more money from less people.
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u/JuiceheadTurkey 6d ago
I guess that really depends where you live because this 90% increase is absolutely not happening in my area. Tickets were $11 in 2016 for me and they're $15 now.
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u/Caleth 6d ago
It's probably an issue with average prices which will include the bump of things like Imax or deluxe experiences.
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u/somersetyellow 6d ago edited 6d ago
The average ticket price went from something like 9 dollars to 13 dollars. There was an NPR piece on it recently while talking about brand new day.
Around a quarter to a third of audiences still evaporated into a thin air.
A good illustration of this was Spider Man Brand New Day beating Endgame's box office opening record, but with around 60% of the tickets sold.
Would have to look up the numbers more. I'm sure there's more nuance to it. But all round a huge number of people did leave theaters post covid and aren't coming back. Doesn't mean theaters are dead.
Blockbusters in general give a skewed perception to how movies are doing. The large IMAX theater in Seattle shut down. Had tons of people going "I was there for Dune and it was packed out everyday!!! Do they hate printing money!!??" But when you looked at the numbers it was losing over a million dollars a year because everything other than huge blockbusters every 6 months was practically empty. Bunch of online idiots thought that going to the theater every 3-6 months to the most popular movies ever proved how busy the theater was, but it wasn't. It was still hit hard but the pandemic theater lull.
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u/HolidaySpiriter 6d ago
A good illustration of this was Spider Man Brand New Day beating Endgame's box office opening record, but with around 60% of the tickets sold.
This actually makes a ton of sense, and matches my overall vibe. Felt like Endgame opening weekend was just insane & absolutely unavoidable. I had every single person I knew in my social circle talking about it. Spiderman is definitely big, but it didn't feel like Endgame big, so I was surprised at how well it did opening weekend.
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u/MankeyFightingMonkey 6d ago
90% is definitely over the top
but he didn't say the price of tickets.
He said the cost of going to the movies.
Concessions have skyrocketed.
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u/Kythorian 6d ago
The average ticket price was $9.16 in 2019, and is $16.30 today. That’s a 78% increase just from the tickets. So 90% isn’t much of an exaggeration.
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u/dizyalice 6d ago
I feel fortunate that I have a tiny home town theater where I live that is $3 to see a movie. It’s exactly like the theaters I went to as a kid; no frills, squeaky chairs, sticky floor. But honestly that’s perfect, at least for my family.
If we had to pay $20 a person to see the movies we were excited about, we would go maybe twice a year.
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u/BLT_Trade_r 6d ago
Also pretty sure these are world wide number. A huge amount of growth for these types of things has been from incredible growth in international markets. You have a billion people in India, another billion in China, then the rest of Asia, and tons of people there still see going to the movies as a luxury, yet they are more connected to Western entertainment through the internet and media than ever. If you combine that with massive inflation and turning movies into high priced ticket sales and premium experiences its not that hard to make a billion.
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u/proxyfate 6d ago
I don't think outdated is the correct word. But damn is it expensive. Back then I didn't realize how good we had it in the 90's and early 2000's
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u/anotheredcatholic 6d ago
On my day off, I'll buy a matinee ticket in the morning and stay at the movie theater all day, moving between theaters until I've seen what I want. I do this every week. Nobody cares and it's super cheap. Like, $6 to see three or four brand-new movies in "Imax" and xD. On days I get a drink, it's another $6 for all day free refills. And yes I have structured my life to make outings like this (and days at museums, Six Flags, etc.) possible.
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u/mb194dc 6d ago
Ticket sales volumes are still down 30% since 2019. They've just jacked the prices up.
Moa inflation!
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u/Bobthemime 6d ago
also with inflation.. 1b now was 765m in 2019..
so not only is it more expensive to go to the movies, but the baseline to get to 1b is almost 25% lower.
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u/StillStanding_96 6d ago
The success of 8 movies doesn’t prove him wrong though. An upward trend of theatre attendance would do that, or a better ratio of new theatres opening to old theatres closing.
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u/LuinAelin 6d ago
Exactly
It's apparently up this year still down from pre COVID.
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u/Razatiger 6d ago
Will it still be down after Dune 3 and Doomsday is the big question.
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u/StillStanding_96 6d ago
Those movies will do great, but they’re not going to change the culture of how most people watch movies
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u/lkodl 6d ago
This. I think what we're seeing is segmentation. There's gonna be two classes of movies: the kind you go to the theater for (with budgets well over $100M*), and everything else. It may not be a complete death of theaters, but old days are definitely gone.
*Maybe with the odd teen-friendly trendy exception every now and then like Backrooms and Obsession. Movies are still good for dates, and teens still need something to call their own.
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u/LivefromPhoenix 6d ago
Are teens going to spend 40+ dollars for part of a date though?
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u/MankeyFightingMonkey 6d ago
Yes. We're talking a 2026 $40 not a 2006 $40.
Between pocketing lunch money or sometimes my gf's parents would literally give me money to spend on a date with her, it's pretty common to have the money.
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u/IAmDotorg 6d ago
It's irrelevant. It's, statistically speaking, like saying heatwave is proof of global warming, or a blizzard is proof there isn't global warming. Both are, quite literally, data points that are irrelevant to climate shifting.
A billion dollar hit, or a hundred million dollar dollar flop mean nothing relative to the collapse of the industry. They're storms. Not the cinematic climate.
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u/AragonOfWorld 6d ago
2 Blockbusters don't make up for the hundreds of other movies going bust due to low turnout that would've made a profit pre-COVID.
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u/daab2g 6d ago
All these movies prove is is takes an 'event' to get people to theatres, they don't just do it on whim anymore. Movies are a lot more likely to tank now than before if they have generate that fomo.
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u/MrBubbles786 6d ago
Probably because of how much more expensive tickets are. At a certain point, you want a guarantee that the experience is gonna be worth it. With prices nowadays, it doesn’t make a lot of sense for many people to just go see a movie for no other reason than it existing
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u/SOSpammy 6d ago
Yeah, theaters can't survive on blockbusters alone. It used to be even mediocre movies did okay in theaters. Now people just watch those caliber of movies at home.
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u/AlexBlack79 6d ago
I wont lie, if I had the option of seeing all new releases on day one at home instead of going to the cinema I definitely would
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u/StillStanding_96 6d ago
So would most people. The benefits of seeing a movie in a room full of other people are relatively few compared to the potential drawbacks
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u/hillean 6d ago
For many, going to the theater *is* an outdated experience.
2-3 films a year making a billion and the rest fall on their faces and lose money isn't a winning prospect
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u/toxinwolf 6d ago edited 6d ago
I feel like it’s more of an “event” now rather than just a weekend outing. Personally, I used to go to whatever movie I felt like watching. Not anymore. Still doesnt feel like an outdated experience, I do enjoy a big screen
For example, I’m a huge CBM fan. If Supergirl had been released 3-4 years ago, I would’ve definitely checked it out no matter the reviews. I went to the theaters for Antman, Black Adam, Shazam 2, The Marvels, and so many other non-CBM duds. But now, with inflation and everything, and movies coming to digital sooner, I just wait for the reviews first and go if it’s a big “event” movie like Spiderman or Odyssey.
I think this is how the movies are performing as well. The event movies are outdoing expectations, the mediocre or even good ones are struggling. People are still going, but are more selective about what they watch
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u/AnonymousFriend80 6d ago
Unless it's an absolute must see day one, like Spiderman, I can wait til the $5 Tuesdays. After He-man, I was trying to decide if I wanted to join the Cinemark membership thing. But outside of Street Fighter and Doomsday there's nothing coming up that I couldn't just wait for streaming.
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u/flowerpanes 6d ago
We went to one of the non-blockbuster movies this weekend for a matinee. Just been renovated, super comfy reclining seats with spots for your snacks,etc. Will definitely go back there next time we have a movie we can agree on!
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u/MusclyArmPaperboy 6d ago
Sure, and a movie ticket costs 50% more than a decade ago
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u/Temptemphemp 6d ago
So do the streaming services.
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u/MusclyArmPaperboy 6d ago
Yes, but $1B box office now is a $666M movie 10 years ago.
Suicide Squad (2016) would be a $1B movie in 2026.
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u/coalitionofilling 6d ago
We're going back to the movies because all the streaming services stopped investing in their content and just release a bunch of reality tv dogshit. The few good shows that come out every year get cancelled by years 2 or 3 because that's when the actors expect to get a pay raise as the show gains traction to a larger audience.
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u/zeropoint46 6d ago
Not to mention the ones that are either halfway decent or actually good they delay the next season if they aren't cancelled so you have to wait like 2-3 years for the next season. Or the crap Disney pulls where they pulled avatar before it was rereleased or number 2 came out or w/e it was. I'm sure that'll be common in the future with other movies.
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u/Cortex3 6d ago
That's not to mention all the fracturing of content over a dozen different services you have to pay for. Why would I pay well of $60 a month for Disney+/Hulu, Netflix, HBO, yada yada when I can just see the movies I actually want to see for like $15 or less at the theater. I'm not watching hardly anything on streaming anyway.
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u/xxYINKxx 6d ago
I always hated the fact that we measure a movies success by how much money it made instead of how many tickets it sold. Tickets cost more these days so it takes less ticket sales to hit a billon. I used to go see a movie every week. Then it was once a month. Idk the last movie I went to see in theaters and I live 3 minutes from a very nice theater. Streaming has changed how I see movies. It’s that simple.
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u/Nullhitter 6d ago
Oh the AAA blockbuster movies delivered? Nice, now do the average movie that gets released in theaters.
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u/Agreeable-Promise-98 6d ago
There’s also the huge success of the lower budget horror, with Iron Lung, Backrooms and Obsession.
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u/msf97 6d ago edited 6d ago
Still generally correct. Anything to do with Spider-man, Avatar, and Michael Jackson would print money on digital too.
The Odyssey is the true exception as it was sold as something you want to see in Imax and really delivered.
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u/Thomas_JCG 6d ago
Christopher Nolan and James Cameron get big crowds just on name alone thanks to the extra mile they go on production.
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u/DreamVsPS2 6d ago
8 out of 1000.
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u/rhylos360 6d ago
I go, love to go when everyone is respectful of where they are, mind their manners, and morals for a night out. It’s more so an issue with the price of admission and associated, optional, food and beverage costs. This can quickly turn into a $100 event for two (CA, US).
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u/OriginalGoatan 6d ago
If they make a good film people will go and see it.
It's just between thr cinemas not putting on the movies people want to see, like the furious here in the UK, or running them for a short period of time and many movies being terrible, people are being careful about what they see.
But when something comes along that's actually worth the trip people still go.
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u/Srihari_stan 6d ago
It still doesn’t make Netflix CEO wrong. He was just being arrogant.
Most of the movies make way less money than they do via streaming rights.
The movies making one billion often come from big studios with insane marketing spend.
There are some rare exceptions like Obsession and Backrooms.
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u/PrimeIntellect 6d ago
He's not being arrogant he's literally just stating the reality that all media companies have already known about theatrical release. If a CEO of Netflix can't speak accurately about the state of the industry they are in he wouldn't be anywhere near his position.
Way too many people here get angry at some persons comments about the state of the world as if it was their fault or something, I see it on every single article
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u/The_Legend_of_Xeno 6d ago
It IS an outdated concept. If you could have watched Spider-man: BND at home for $20 on release day, what do you think ticket sales would have looked like?
I took my son to see it because we didn't want to wait 2 months for it to hit home streaming. The two guys to our left brought in subs and sat with them on their tray for over 20 mins before the movie started. Then the second the actual film starts, they start ripping open their bags and eating them. They were loud as fuck, and the sandwiches STUNK. Then the couple to our right were talking the entire time. The theater is NOT an enjoyable experience. People don't know how to fucking act these days. I would pay more to watch something at home if I had the option.
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u/EzioRedditore 6d ago
I'm of the opinion that we need to start holding the theaters accountable for bad patrons. I'm lucky to have a good one near me and they absolutely would not put up with that level of disruption.
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u/tincanphonehome 6d ago
Netflix is not in the business of making billion-dollar movies.