The day moviegoing died?

by Nathaniel R

What is that old line. 'Some say the world will end in fire. Some say in ice?' Who would've expected that our particular world (i.e. moviegoing) would end due to an exceptionally incompetent cruel government's mishandling of a worldwide pandemic? There's no poetic ring to that!

Movie theaters have been closed here in NYC since late March. Moviegoing as we knew it might have died months ago while we were busy stupidly thinking of it as an induced coma that we would all purposefully awake from once treatment options improved. We were not expecting the movie studios themselves be the ones urging us to pull the plug and plan a funeral. As you probably heard today, Warner Bros, one of the last standing behemoth movie studios, has announced that they'll be premiering the entirety of their 2021 slate day and date on HBOMax and in movie theaters...

It was one thing to write off Wonder Woman 1984, an easy billion dollar grosser in a normal world - on the grounds that somethings gotta give with the pipeline of movie production and revenue and such when things have been closed-down for several months. But to write-off over another year's worth of event pictures and the theatrical model itself (which will now be endangered; you can't put genies back in bottles) feels like cultural and even economic suicide.

WARNER BROS BIGGEST 2020/2021 TITLES - the ones that looked like (potential) blockbusters. How many new HBOMax subscribers do they need to offset the, oh, 3-5 billion they just lost with this move?

• Wonder Woman 1984 (last title in this franchise earned $821 million globally)
• The Matrix 4 (last title in this franchise earned $427 million globally)
• Dune
• Godzilla vs. Kong (last title in this franchise earned $566 million globally)
• The Suicide Squad  (last title in this franchise earned $746 million globally)
• Space Jam: A New Legacy (last title in this franchise earned $230 million globally)
• Tom & Jerry 
• Mortal Kombat 
• The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It (last title in this franchise earned $320 million globally)
• In the Heights 
• King Richard 

 

Massive event pictures like Dune will be available at home (if you have HBOMax) they day they arrive in theaters. If theaters still exist but this news will surely not convince any theater chains to stay open long enough to find out if survival is possible Who will go see a movie for $15-20 a person in theaters when they can just share their HBO password and gather as many people as they can fit around their TV with a ticket price of $0.00 for everyone?  Why would a movie studio that regularly produced the kinds of event movies that earn 100s of millions to a billion in the theatrical model, abandon that proven money-making model so entirely when their newer models like VOD / streaming subscriptions, haven't proved as lucrative? So Warner Bros is essentially going from two unequal revenue sources -- one formerly mighty that's currently in the hospital and one less lucrative that's functioning better than usual with people trapped at home all year -- and purposefully reduce it to only the latter? All when we keep hearing that vaccines will be rolling out next year.

Do the movie studios or the execs at Warner Bros know something we don't about the psychological makeup of civilians (possible) or the ins and outs of the promised vaccines (unlikely)

At any rate Warner Bros' decision feels less strategic than self-sabotaging. In fact, it feels like Netflix's wet dream, to only have streaming competition in a field they basically invented and can play Goliath in while fighting over dozens of miniature Davids who are also fighting each other. It's a win-win for Netflix. Netflix will soon no longer have to wage the more complex two-pronged fight against other streamers AND the theatrical model and just concentrate on stepping on their comparatively puny streaming opponents. 

Does Warner Bros not have a lot of faith in the footage from their 2021 franchises, many of them long in the tooth, or are they just placing a big bet on the future (streaming only) and will attempt to figure out how to monetize later?

This probably shouldn't leave us so pessimistic or shocked but it did bring on a highly specific crushed kind of mood. We're feeling so bruised and battered. After months of being holed up in our apartment, the last thing we wanted was a notice that our future would be.... well, more of this. Sitting at home consuming 'content' can be fun but we long for film experiences outside of the couch and away from the laptop.

The movies were invented well over 100 years ago. Moviegoing was different in 1920 with regards to many specifics but at its core the experience is still the same. You left your house. You sat in a dark place with other strangers and had an entertainment experience in a communal setting. That experience has miraculously survived many massive cultural and economic shifts including the birth of television, the internet, the death of studio system, the rise of laserdisc, than vhs, than dvd then blu-rays, cable, videogames, internet, prestige tv, and piracy. To survive all that and then just throw in the towel (which is what Warner Bros announcement feels like) due to a (mostly) finite triple threat of streaming wars, a pandemic, and the incompetencies of the GOP's leadership-free reign? That feels grim. 

We've already seen how unspecial movies became during the pandemic. They've been plentiful but they've mostly been perceived and received as mere "content" rather than movies. People watch them than discard them and no conversations about them last longer than, say, a week. It's like an album of all filler without a hit single. Streaming is so beautiful as part of the entertainment landscape -- we're not knocking its convenient pleasures. But an entirely streaming future is depressing as hell. We've all been shut-ins for month. After the pandemic is over, Hollywood, or at least Warner Bros, is betting that we'll never leave our houses again. 

They might be right (for reasons that are best left to psychologists to unpack) but it's confusing to us. Unless you have a truly spectacular home or apartment, why would you want to lock yourself in for all your entertainment? But what will be left standing outside the home if all the communal spaces shut down or become too cost prohibitive to attend?

We're in a dark place around this news. Are you feeling as hopeless or do you see a light at the end of this COVID-19 'movies are now just tv pilots that weren't picked up' tunnel. 

Comments

[JJ]

It has to be said the only thing that got me back into the cinema-going swing in 2018 (after a solid decade of extremely sporadic attendance) was Moviepass, and after that, AMC A-List. And yes I'm looking forward to going back, but not without A-List. So cinemas are already a financial suck if people like me can't afford to go the way they want me to.

I don't care about phones turning on. Nobody cares about phones turning on. That's a bullshit excuse. The problem is the ticket price.

[JJ]

Nathaniel -- I absolutely understand where you're coming from, but that thinking isn't relevant if television is where the most famous and acclaimed stars are. That's what creates the cultural importance around a prize. So if the biggest names in the next 10 years focus more on television, those awards will obviously end up holding more import. If Zendaya, Saoirse Ronan, and Michael B. Jordan strive for Emmys instead of an Oscar in 2025, then the Emmys will be considered more prestigious.

It's akin to the "why are there no movie stars anymore" discussions. There are plenty of huge stars out there for younger millennials and Gen Z -- they just aren't pigeonholed to or created in movies anymore. It's relative to the general uptick of television and downward slope of cinema as the prestige medium (and, God help us, YouTube in 10 years).

These aren't things we can decide by wishing as such. The cultural discourse dictates these decisions. 60 years ago serious actors working for stardom and success would surely much rather have a Tony than an Emmy, but things change, and the Oscars are hardly immune.

[JJ]

And sorry if I'm being too argumentative and annoying! I've been in a terrible mood these past couple weeks! LOL 2020 sucks ass.

[NATHANIEL R]

JJ -- i feel you on the mood and I understand what you're saying but history and trained cultural respect also plays a role... even with major changes. How will the Emmys ever rise to become the top award when institutionally speaking and historically speaking and culturally speaking they've been considered lesser than? They are currently in fourth place (and have been for a long time) in terms of viewership (even with the annual declining Oscars they're still FAR ahead of the Emmys), and arguably still only third or fourth in prestige too. The critical acclaim and respectful cultural enthusiasm around TV for about two decades now has barely budged their cultural cachet, so I'm just not sure how it would suddenly happen now?

[Antônio]

I think cinema was already dying before when people like Scorsese, Fincher, Campion, Cuarón, Baumbach, and a lot of A-List actors went to streaming or TV to find job or to work on their most daring projects. The moviegoing experience was awful, at least for me, because it was all about event movies/sequels/reboots which I really don’t care of. Just look at this 2021’s Warner Portfolio. But I also think (and hope) these “bad” news comes as an opportunity for a future ressurgence of cinema, more focused on artistic achievement than money machines disguised as movies. In a couple of years it will all back to the track but with a better new perspective, maybe with more space for indies, foreign films, autheur projects, original titles that is what, I assume, we all are here for. Right?

[Dan]

Antonio - Im kind of optimistic as well. The moviegoing experience is not going to die, there's still millions of ppl urging to see films on a big screen, it's the 1st thing I'm gonna do after a vaccine. And if there's a market, there will be someone to fill that. On the other hand, it will be a lot harder for studios to recoup a budget of 200/300 million, since there's going to be less cinemas and consumers around. So they will probably invest more in small or mid-budget pictures.

[Chinoiserie]

You said you want to go to leave the house and watch movies. Well you can. It’s day and date release for both theatres and streaming. So that was an odd comment.

Also if this backfires financially Warner Bros will soon change their strategy. It’s their problem not ours.