- The Sept 2022 domestic box office total was only $328 million. Not counting 2020 when most movie theaters were closed, that’s the lowest September box office since 1996 – OVER 25 YEARS AGO. Even Sept 2021 did better with $367 million (thanks to “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings” $75 million over Labor Day weekend 2021). NO MOVIE made over $20 million on any weekend in Sept 2022 and Labor Day weekend 2022 didn’t have a single movie make over $8 million dollars.
- The first weekend of Oct 2022 this past weekend the #1 movie was the horror/thriller “Smile” which surprised with $22 million. That’s the highest opening weekend since the “Bullet Train” opening weekend 2 months ago. It was also an impressive per screen average with $6 thousand per screen on about 3650 screens (last weeks #1 was on 4100 screens and made $4700 per screen). Unfortunately, the rest of the movies didn’t do very well. #2 made only $7.3 million and the weekend total was $64.2 million which is one third less than the $94.5 million from the same weekend in 2019.
- Most people think that the domestic box office slump will continue until the end of Oct when the DC superhero movie “Black Adam” opens. However, even with “Black Adam”, “Avatar 2”, “Black Panther 2”, and other movies this holiday season, 2022 doesn’t have a chance of catching up to the 2019 domestic box office total of $11.4 billion. Currently the 2022 domestic box office is about 50% of 2019 with $5.5 billion.
- Speaking of upcoming movies, the final trailer for “Black Panther Wakanda Forever” premiered online today.
- “Smile” also did pretty well interationally coming in in several foreign countries with a global total of $36.5 million globally. The #1 movie in China was a local movie called “Home Coming” which made $60 million in that country. The other notable thing in the international box office was “Avatar” became the first movie to have a global total over $2.9 BILLION.
- Due to their recent bankruptcy filing, Regal Cinemas in the process of closing 12 cinemas in the US including 3 in the greater Los Angeles area (Anaheim Hills 14, Calabasas Stadium 6, and Westpark 8).
- It looks like this weekend the annual “award season” will be kicking off with an exclusive run of “Tár” in a couple theaters in Los Angeles and New York (it opens a little wider at the end of Oct) and the wide release of “Amsterdam”. “Tár” is the first movie from writer/director Todd Field since 2006 (“Little Women”) and stars Cate Blanchett (who already won best actress for the movie at the Venice Film Festival). “Amsterdam” is from writer/director David O Russell (“Silver Linings Playbook”, “The Fighter”) and stars Christian Bale, Margot Robbie, and John David Washington.
Little Bit of Humor….
Feel old yet…..
Sean Connery also played Bond in the “unofficial” Bond movie “Never Say Never Again” in 1983. It’s unofficial since it wasn’t produced by EON Films – the producer of all the other Bond movies.
LOS ANGELES FILM REVIEW 