Movie Theaters Are Back! Not Quite More Than Ever, But Still, Ya Gotta Be Psyched About News Like This When The Rest Of The World Is On Fire, Ya Know What I Mean? Thanks For Stopping By
Have you heard the news? President Biden recently ended the state of national emergency in response to COVID-19 in the United States, so surely that means the pandemic is over, life can go back to the way it was before, and we must be mere moments away from hanging up a "Mission Accomplished" banner as throngs of people cheer us on. What could possibly go wrong?
Okay, that's obviously not what any of this actually means, since we as a species are famous for ignoring the red flags waving right in front of us. That certainly goes double for the movie business, particularly in its quest to bring moviegoing trends back to their pre-pandemic levels. Admittedly, that seems to have been the case in recent months as a number of high-profile movies have been released in theaters and enjoyed quite a bit of success at the box office. With every positive report, it feels like the No. 1 question on the minds of moviegoers has been, "Are the movies finally back?"
That's the subject of a new report by Variety, which details the fresh wave of optimism by theater owners in the wake of the one-two-three punch of "John Wick: Chapter 4," "Scream 6," and now "The Super Mario Bros. Movie," which we recently reported has been conquering box office records left and right. The numbers, to be fair, are rather convincing. Variety cites the analytics company Comscore to note that this year's domestic box office total of $2.3 billion marks a 36.8% improvement compared to a year ago and, incredibly enough, a whopping 589.5% increase from 2021, when the quarantine shutdown was at its peak.
But is that the whole story? If you've been picking up what I've been putting down so far, the answer to that is ... not really.
Movies are back ... kind of!
Remember that famous "Spongebob Squarepants" gag where our fearless title character proclaims that they've saved the city while everything's still on fire? That's kind of the tone I'm getting from any premature celebration about the state of the theatrical business while we're still undeniably in the middle of the pandemic — especially when the immunocompromised are still unable to enjoy the same level of peace of mind as many of us do during a normal night out at the movies.
To their credit, the Variety report acknowledges the reality that it's not all sunshine and roses for major theater chains. While the success of both "The Super Mario Bros. Movie" and Ben Affleck's "Air" points to a much healthier box office than in years past, given that major streaming studios like Amazon Studios would've previously been content to overlook a theatrical release for a movie like "Air" altogether, warning signs still abound.
For instance, both AMC and CineWorld (which owns Regal Cinemas) are still struggling to navigate the marketplace at the same level as they once have. We previously reported that Regal would be shutting down dozens of U.S. theaters after filing for bankruptcy, including New York City's prestigious Regal Union Square location. As for AMC, although they've kept their head above water better than their competition, analysts can't ignore the mountains of debt (totaling over $5 billion) still on their spreadsheets.
So while it's true that a rising tide of box office hits lifts all theatrical ships, we still have a ways to go before officially declaring the effects of the pandemic to be over. As tempting as it may be to get back to normal, we still have to take these reports with a healthy grain of salt.