Disney Survived Summer Slowdown At Movie Box Office
On September 1, CNN Business’ headline on Friday is the story of the season: “Hollywood’s summer fizzled…except for Disney.” The movie box-office was a bit slower this summer, but Disney thrived!
Summer Slowdown
Image: CNN
The summer movie season has done little to help ease a bumpy year at the box office.
Revenue from the summer, which stretches from the first Friday in May to Labor Day, is roughly 2% behind last year. The drop is not disastrous (it was down 14% two summers ago), but it does burden a domestic box office that is already down 6% overall.
That’s not to say there weren’t any bright spots. “Spider-Man: Far From Home” was the first film in the series to make more than $1 billion worldwide. “John Wick: Chapter 3 — Parabellum” and Quentin Tarantino’s “Once Upon a Time In Hollywood, two R-rated films, both found an audience. But this summer’s slate of films mostly didn’t “live up to the hype,” according to Paul Dergarabedian, senior media analyst at Comscore.
The Mouse Wears The Crown
But Disney did its darndest to buck the trend.
What Does The Future Of Cinema Look Like?
Avengers: Endgame (which opened on April 26), leaving a slew of lower-to-mid-sized budgeted films gasping.
As Netflix gets ready to launch a premium awards season lineup that includes Martin Scorsese’s near-$200M The Irishman, Eddie Murphy’s Dolemite Is My Name, and Steven Soderbergh’s The Laundromat, studios executives left for Labor Day weekend wondering: Just what is theatrical nowadays?
