As I write this in Los Angeles, Tropical Storm Hilary (née Hurricane Hilary) is dumping more rain on Southern California in a single day than we usually see all year. Los Angeles hasn’t seen a tropical storm since 1939, 84-years ago, so everyone has lost their collective minds. I’ll try to make this week’s Marquee editorial brief since the electric company is sending hourly text messages stating the power could go out at any moment. Just to add to the fun, the region had a 5.1 magnitude earthquake amidst the deluge. This has all left me wondering if there is a striking screenwriter out there tapping away at their laptop right now to turn all of this craziness into a future apocalyptic blockbuster.
Just over a month ago nobody in Los Angeles was giving any thought to hurricanes and tropical storms. On the eve of the opening weekend for two of 2023’s most successful films (so far) anyone in our business who was lucky enough to score an invite was at the grand opening party for the Cinépolis Luxury Cinemas Inglewood IMAX. The latest Cinépolis multiplex cut the ribbon just two days before Barbenheimer took the world by storm (no pun intended).
Like most of Cinépolis’s venues here in the United States, it is yet another well executed example of premium cinema offerings. It has 12 screens with laser-projection, including one IMAX auditorium, full menu dine-in options and plenty of lobby space with a bar serving up an array of adult beverages. Cinépolis also happens to be one of the first tenants to open in Hollywood Park, the residential and retail district developed by Stanley Kroenke, owner of the Los Angeles Rams football team, on the grounds of what used to be a historic horse racing track. SoFi stadium, where Taylor Swift just played six sold out concerts, is across the parking lot.
Unlike the last Cinépolis theatre opening I attended in Los Angeles a few years ago, this one wasn’t a laid back affair meant just for exhibition and distribution insiders. Sure, representatives from IMAX, the National Association of Theatre Owners, Spotlight Cinema Networks, Venue Valet and Vista Cinema were among those present. However, greatly outnumbering the usual CinemaCon crowd was an army of boisterous young people, most of whom were clad in all pink for that evening’s screening of “Barbie.” Each one of them was more beautiful or charismatic than the next and almost all were wielding a camera of some kind. It turns out they were all social media influencers. After speaking with at least a dozen that evening and hearing all about their glamorous red carpet lives, I came to the conclusion that I might be in the wrong business.
As funny as that may sound (and as true as it may sometimes be), I didn’t race back to the office to pen a diatribe about how the movie business had lost its way by catering to influencers over industry denizens. Cinépolis was holding an event and inviting influencers expressly to raise the profile and build awareness of their new theatre. Given that every time I’ve tried to buy tickets to see a film at the theatre since it opened they’ve all been sold out, the marketing maneuver seems to have worked. Good for Cinépolis.
Yet a week later I was conflicted upon reading Manuela Lazic’s piece in The Guardian about how studios were relying more heavily on social media influencers to promote upcoming films than actual, legitimate film critics. On the one hand, Lazic’s piece seemed filled with resentment over not being able to see “Barbie” ahead of its release because, despite holding numerous screenings for a who’s who of social media celebrities, Warner Bros. Pictures wasn’t holding screenings for the media and/or critics in some territories.
On the other hand, all of Lazic’s frustrations about how the studios try to “control the narrative” by gatekeeping access to advance screenings, talent interviews, publicity material, etc. ahead of a release is spot on. In a world where the number of clicks determine income, importance and relevancy, it can be maddening to watch a studio favor the latest TikTok sensation only to turn back to you a week later when they have a lower profile film and need coverage.
That said, the movie business is just that, a business, and studios have a right to handle the publicity for upcoming films the same way any manufacturer would before a product is available to the public. Apple, for instance, is notorious for favoring certain media outlets and journalists over others, allowing them to review the latest iPhones on the day of release, instead of a week later. There’s even a term for this; shill marketing.
It might please Lazic to remember that, in the modern era, most shill marketing efforts eventually serve to raise the profile of those with independent, educated opinions whose guidance can be trusted. There are only so many times the public will fall for a pretty face telling them to see a movie or eat at a restaurant if the last three recommendations were rubbish.
As well, working with social media influencers can cut both ways. They can help generate positive word-of-mouth rather effectively, though this same rule applies if they ever turn against you. Anheuser-Busch learned this lesson the hard way after their recent Bud Light campaign featuring an influencer named Dylan Mulvaney.
So, like many things in life, there is no clear cut or definitive answer as to wether the the use of social media influencers to market movies or movie theatres is proper or worthwhile. Sometimes it is (as with Cinépolis) and sometimes it isn’t. Distributors have been lucky that, to date, that there haven’t been any major influencer marketing campaign stumbles, though they are all bound to have a Kendall Jenner Pepsi moment at some point if the practice continues.
Ultimately, those of us working in and around the film industry do so because we love cinema and want to see it thrive. That’s why maybe the most salient question Laciz asked about the use of influencers in marketing movies was, “If all discussion of a film’s merits before release is left to influencers, whose driving ambition is to receive free merchandise by speaking well of the studio’s products, what can we expect the film landscape to look like?”
Box Office
China’s Summer Box Office Hits All-Time High with Minimal Hollywood Contribution
Mainland China’s box office has soared to unprecedented heights during the current summer season, setting a new record. the ticketing agency Maoyan Entertainment, which defines the summer period as spanning from June to August, is reporting this year’s summer box office surpassed the CNY ¥17.8 billion (USD $2.44 billion) established in 2018, and is currently sitting at CNY ¥18.2 billion (USD $2.5 billion) with two weeks left to go.
What’s more, it was hit Chinese productions in a mix of genres that led to the box office bonanza rather than blockbuster Hollywood titles. Notable hits include “Lost in the Stars” (mystery drama), “No More Bets” (crime-action), “Creation of the Gods I: Kingdom of Storms” (historical fantasy), “One and Only” (youth dance-drama), “Chang An” (animation), and “Never Say Never” (uplifting martial arts drama). The “Meg 2: The Trench,” though an English-language action adventure, is a Chinese co-production.
Even without the usual summer blackout period in China, which has historically restricted the release of imported films during the period, Hollywood titles didn’t perform as expected in the Chinese market. Some of the biggest studio releases were “Transformers: Rise of the Beasts” (USD $97 million), “Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part 1” (USD $51 million) and “Barbie” (USD $36 million).
Artisan Gateway revealed that China’s year-to-date box office total has reached $5.51 billion, an impressive 72% surge compared to the same point last year and only a 6% decline from the equivalent period in 2019.
Source: Variety
Box Office
South Korean Police Uncover Box Office Inflation Scandal Involving Major Industry Players
South Korean law enforcement have announced the findings of their investigation into box office manipulation in which the reported performance of 323 films over the past five years were artificially inflated. Seoul Metropolitan Police have referred 69 individuals from prominent exhibition chains and 24 film distribution companies to prosecutors for potential legal action in connection with what has become an industry scandal.
The police’s anti-corruption and public crime investigation team initiated the inquiry earlier this year, culminating in raids on the offices of South Korea’s three largest cinema operators: CJ-CGV, Megabox, and Lotte Cinema. Additional searches were conducted at distributor sites including Showbox, Lotte Entertainment, and Kidari. As part of the investigation, a total of 98 film distributors and 462 movie titles were examined.
The modus operandi of the accused cinema operators involved inflating ticket sales figures in collusion with film distributors, resulting in exaggerated box office rankings reported through the Korean Film Council’s box office compiling service (KoBiz) from March 2018 to June of this year. This manipulation allegedly led to an overcount of 2.67 million viewers. Local films like “Hot Blood,” Waiting for Rain,” the 2022 documentary “The Red Herring” and action thriller “Emergency Declaration” were among those identified with inflated numbers.
The goal here was to create an illusion of a film’s success, potentially boosting licensing fees for TV, streaming, and ancillary market distribution. The case will now move to the prosecutor’s office, which will determine whether criminal charges should be pursued against implicated individuals and companies. Of course, once the case is resolved, don’t be surprised if it winds up affecting how the South Korean box office figures are collected and reported moving forward.
Source: The Korea Herald
Cinemas
UK Cinema Will Monitor Audience Reaction In Real Time
We’ve heard of studios doing test screenings to gauge the audience response of a movie before it’s release, but now a cutting-edge cinema plans to take the concept to a whole new level when it opens in Bristol, United Kingdom in May of 2024. The Instrumented Auditorium, located at the University of Bristol’s MyWorld creative hub, is the first theatre of its kind to be equipped with advanced monitoring technology which gives it the unique capability of monitoring audience reactions in real-time. The initiative aims to revolutionize content creation, offering insights that could influence commissioning, direction, and production strategies for films and television shows. So essentially, a very modest goal that nobody has ever previously attempted (sarcasm intended).
The 150m² cinema, supported by a GBP £400,000 (USD $509,600) grant from the UK charity the Wolfson Foundation, will utilize monitoring equipment to record audience members’ biometric responses while they watch and listen to content. This includes measuring heart rate, eye movement, brain activity, and even the electrical properties of the skin to gauge subconscious emotional and sympathetic reactions. So instead of having to fill out that pesky questionnaire at the end of a test screening, audiences will presumably only have to unplug all the diodes and measurement devices.
Iain Gilchrist, professor of neuropsychology at the University of Bristol, highlighted the collaborative nature of the project, involving partners such as BBC, Aardman, Netflix, and Google. Gilchrist explained, “The Instrumented Auditorium will allow us to stream data that captures audience responses moment by moment, providing unique insights that take us way beyond current questionnaire-based methods. This is the first fully instrumented facility of its kind in the world, which is exciting not just for us as researchers but for those working in the creative sector, providing insights which will shape the future of film, television and beyond.” While it’s easy to poke fun at such a concept, if it winds up offering a new level of understanding of audience engagement and preferences, thus transforming the entertainment industry, we’ll be the first to become film industry stereotypes by claiming we always knew it would be a huge success.
Source: BBC
Conferences & Trade Shows
Africa Cinema Summit Aims To Raise Profile of Continent’s Film Industry
In what may conceivably the be the first cinema industry convention on the African continent, the National Film Authority of Ghana announced a strategic partnership last week with FilmOne Group (Nigeria) and Silverbird Cinema (Ghana), to host the inaugural Africa Cinema Summit (ACS). The event is scheduled to take place in Accra, Ghana on 15 and 16 November of this year.
The collective goal of the conference is to foster growth, innovation, and collaboration by uniting cinema stakeholders from around the world. The organizers are setting the event up to facilitate business dialogues and maybe even a strategic partnership or two.
The need for such a trade show was perhaps best outlines by Juliet Yaa Asantewa Asante, head of National Film Authority of Ghana. She pointed out that, though Africa has a population of over one billion people, there are only 1,700 movie screens to serve them. Most of those auditoriums are grouped together in countries such as Egypt, Ghana, Nigeria and South Africa.
To further make her case for the future potential of the cinema industry in Africa, Asante relied on such figures. “In just seven years, Africa will have over 40% of the global youth population,” she said during a press conference announcing ACS. “Whilst the rest of the world is potentially aging, Africa is going to be the youngest continent globally. And globally, we know that cinema has been quite challenged and cinema is looking for opportunities to expand especially after the pandemic, to draw audiences back into the cinema. Truly the biggest opportunity for cinema in the 21st century is Africa. We are here today to say to the rest of the world; Hey, look at Africa. We are ready for you. The people of Africa are ready to go to the cinema.”
Source: Celluloid Junkie
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