Exhibition’s recovery is so real that it’s time media doomsayers & Wall Street gloomy finally admit moviegoers are back and streaming hasn’t killed theatres.
Analysts insist the jury’s still out on moviegoing. Still, it’s clear from pandemic hits like GODZILLA VS KONG, A QUIET PLACE 2, F9, BLACK WIDOW, SHANG-CHI & now VENOM 2 (pictured) opening to $90.1M that the Delta Variant hasn’t kept moviegoers out of theatres and audiences aren’t embracing streaming as a cinema substitute.
People want to escape being home — especially if they’re now working from home — and a great way to do it is to see movies with friends. Just because they only want to see what they’re excited about doesn’t mean moviegoing’s dead!
As for family films being an endangered species, Disney’s ENCANTO will have great playability when it opens in theatres on 11/24 for Thanksgiving. It will also be a hit 30 days later (12/24) when it hits Disney+ for Christmas. The lower profile family films that fizzled would also have fallen flat pre-pandemic. Moms-with-kids skipped them not because of covid, but because what they — and everybody else — want to see are event films.