It’s becoming increasingly evident that moviegoers are no longer content to watch movies while lounging on the couch. Not only are they returning to the movies in large numbers, but theater owners also claim they are choosing to pay extra for tickets and snacks.
In its first weekend, Thor: Love and Thunder, the newest Marvel Cinematic Universe film from Disney, brought in close to $145 million in domestic ticket sales and drew in close to 10 million viewers.
According to Comscore statistics, this is much more than the $185 million for the same weekend in 2019. In addition to Disney’s “Toy Story 4” and “Aladdin,” Universal’s “The day before,” Warner Bros.’ “Annabelle Comes Home,” and A24’s “Midsommar,” Marvel’s “Spider-Man: Far From Home” dominated the box office at the time.
Brock Bagby, executive vice president of regional Midwest theater chain B&B Theatres, which operates more than 50 sites, said, “We were jumping up and down this weekend.” The largest day since the release of “Spider-Man: No Way Home” in December was “Friday,” according to the company.
According to statistics from Comscore, the summer movie office season in the United States and Canada is down just 12% from the summer before the epidemic, thanks to new blockbusters bringing more people to the cinemas. Tickets sold at the box office cost $2.27 billion between May 1 and July 10. Comparatively, $2.58 billion was earned in the same time frame in 2019.
As of Sunday, ticket sales at the domestic box office had brought in more than $4.25 billion for the year. That is 30% below pre-pandemic levels for 2019.
According to Jeffrey Kaufman, Malco Theatres’ senior vice president of film and marketing, “the studios have heaped up one outstanding film after another since the start of the summer and the release of ‘Doctor Strange.'” This has inspired audiences, who have reacted to a run of enjoyable, thrilling, and fun films.
Both large and small movie theater chains gain. The world’s largest network of movie theaters, AMC Entertainment, announced its highest year-to-date attendance this past weekend, reaching 5.9 million moviegoers. It said on Monday that its worldwide admission income exceeded the same weekend in 2019 by 12%.
Based on the movies scheduled to release over the next several months and an anticipated slowdown between August and October, B&B Theatres forecasts that same-store sales will conclude the year down around 10%.
Even though our titles have been strong, he stated, “I wish there were more items.”
According to Paul Dergarabedian, senior media analyst at Comscore, the total number of films with broad releases in 2022 is down more than 30% from 2019.
Even so, there will be a ton of information available for viewers to choose from up to the year’s conclusion.
The year will come to a close with Disney’s “Avatar: The Way of Water,” the first anticipated sequel to the all-time highest-grossing movie.
Moviegoing is a habit, according to Kaufman. People always find movies they want to watch once they get into the habit.