People this summer are claiming that movie theaters are dying and that nobody’s seeing the new movies. While that may be true in some cases, it’s a little more complicated than “sales are down = doom.” There’s a bit of history and culture that makes the argument just a little dumb.
Chances are, you’ve heard this summer that movie theaters are dying. This claim keeps getting reported as opening weekends have been disappointing for some summer blockbusters, and ticket sales are going down. “The cinemas are in jeopardy,” they cry out!
Of course, never mind that opening weekends don’t determine box office whole, and ticket sales have risen since the pandemic. No, movie theaters are not dying and people need to stop making this claim. It’s not true. While overall ticket sales have decreased since 2002, people are still buying tickets. So why are people saying this?
Streaming
Let’s get to the point. The #1 reason why ticket sales are down is because of streaming. Everybody and their grandma know this. More and more people are staying home and streaming a brand new show or their childhood movie. You got Netflix, Hulu, HBOMax, Disney+, AppleTV, Tubi, Prime Video—must I go on?
It’s doubtful that studios are encouraging people to stop going to theaters and stream instead. Ticket sales are still lucrative, look at Barbie. However, the prevalence and comparative ease of streaming sites vs going to your local theater is hard to ignore.
Sometimes, studios may even cripple themselves due to streaming. Look at Disney+. Everybody knows that any Star Wars, Marvel, Disney, or Pixar movie will automatically be dumped to Disney+ after its run in theaters. Why not just wait until it’s on Disney+? You already have the subscription.
Quality of Movies
I think we can go back to Disney and their streaming site, because they make such an easy model to look at. I don’t know that many people who still want more superhero movies, reboots, or sequels. So much of the market right now for popular summer blockbusters fall into these camps.
Like, did we really ask a Toy Story 5? Did we really need Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga? Did we really need a Despicable Me 4? What about Bad Boys: Ride or Die? Was anybody really asking for the fourth movie in a film series that started in 1995—almost three decades ago?
Now, just because a movie’s based on an already existing property doesn’t mean it’s going to be bad. The same thing applies in opposite for original movies—“original ideas” don’t automatically equate to good. And of course, it’s obvious that these are not the only movies being released this summer. However, due to incessant advertising, that’s what it looks like in the market.
When all you advertise are these big continuations or callbacks to familiar property, it makes an artificial stranglehold. That’s what happened with superhero movies—too many all at once got tiring, but they were still being made. When you don’t show people they have options, then they think they don’t.
Not Hollywood’s First Rodeo
Even if theaters today are in jeopardy, which they’re not, it wouldn’t be the first time. All one has to do is to look at the rise of television in ’50s America to see Hollywood’s first struggle with people staying home. Why would people bother to see the latest picture when they could watch I Love Lucy at home?
That meant that studios had to give a reason to get people to get out of their homes and into the cinema. So, they relied on gimmicks. The reason why we see stereo sound, color, and widescreens as the norm nowadays is because of this gimmick. It was to offer something television couldn’t at the time.
However, instead of superhero movies, most of these flashy flicks were war stories, historical epics, and musicals. On top of that, a lot of these movies were conservative in theme in an increasingly liberal ’50s and ’60s. For a prime example of this disconnect, look at the most remembered movies of 1968 vs the Oscar winners.
Ultimately, these movies failed because they were expensive to make, nobody watched them, and were frequently panned by critics. Look at 1967’s Doctor Dolittle, which saw its budget balloon three times the original, and only made back half at the box office. And, it was nominated for the Best Picture Oscar alongside The Graduate and In the Heat of the Night. How embarrassing!
Why Theaters Aren’t Going Away
Even if studios keep making movies people don’t want to see, people are still going to go the cinema. I feel the largest reason is a cultural thing. Everybody was going to the theaters during the summer of Oppenheimer, because that was the thing of the culture. There is a different experience sitting in the theater watching a new movie vs watching it at home.
There’s also the aesthetics and construction of theaters. Thanks to their architecture, it’s difficult for these buildings to be renovated into anything else besides movies. That, and there’s also the interior and its beauty. If they’re not comfy and cozy with leather recliner seats, they’re probably bougie and fancy.
Also, there’s a certain tradition with having cinemas play certain films that’s lost without that cinema. Could you imagine a sudden halt to midnight screenings of The Rocky Horror Picture Show?
What is to be done?
So now it’s shown that theaters aren’t dying, and now comes the question “So what? Why does it matter that people think movie theaters are dying?” Well, the problem isn’t that people aren’t seeing new movies at theaters, it’s that they don’t want to.
I remember a conversation I had with some friends a while ago, and someone mentioned she was going to watch Despicable Me 4. Somebody else repeated the title as a question, and the other person remarked with “Yep… it’s a movie…”
Again, there are good movies being made and released. It’s just hard to find them with comparatively aggressive marketing and attention for other films. It just takes a little bit of time and research to find the movies that sound interesting, unique, and above all different.
And if nothing else, if you really want to support movie theaters, then stop watching exclusive shows on Disney+.
