Alone at the Movies in 2023
Theorizing How to Keep Theatrical Moviegoing Alive from the Confines of Empty Auditoriums
Early this year, I left my movie industry job and moved down to San Diego in what I initially envisioned as an extended summer vacation. The Hollywood labor strikes had other plans for my hiring prospects, however, which left me with more time on my hands than I had enjoyed in nearly a decade. (Yes, I recognize just how fortunate I am in this climate to still be enjoying such a break.) Being the obsessive type, I decided to pass the hours by leaning into two of my existing habits that much harder. The first – and unquestionably the superior of the two for my physical health – was walking. What used to be a three-mile walk around Pasadena four nights a week morphed into eight, nine, ten-mile walks across Encinitas and Carlsbad every morning. The second habit, of course, was going to the movies.
Equipped with Regal Unlimited, AMC A-List, and MoviePass subscriptions alike, I took to the multiplex in a way that I hadn’t since college. In the final six months of 2023 alone, I will easily exceed 150 trips to the movie theater, and I’ve made the rounds at nearly every operating cinema in San Diego County. Luckily, this has been one of the best years for movies – of all shapes and sizes – in recent memory. For what feels like the first time in over a decade, I’m genuinely excited to write up my Best of 2023 list in a few weeks from now.
For as invigorating as I found the movies themselves during the past year, I also found myself growing increasingly unnerved by what I observed in my near-daily trips to the cinema. Namely, an almost disturbing lack of other patrons. This absence was especially pronounced at older multiplexes that have not yet converted to recliner seating, but it was a trend everywhere. With the exception of the endlessly discussed Barbenheimer Weekend, I very rarely would have referred to the theater as “crowded” in the way that I often would have on any given Friday night five or ten years ago. Perhaps the most practical illustration of this that I can think of involves the parking lot at my most frequented multiplex, the ’90s-built Regal Edwards San Marcos 18. Before Covid, on weekends after 3 p.m., I wouldn’t even try to park in the lot closest to the entrance; there was almost certainly no empty space awaiting me. In 2023, I only failed to find to find a spot there twice (for The Super Mario Bros. Movie and Barbie).
But the domestic box office is “only” on track to be down about -20% from 2019 levels, and that’s not even adjusting for the major slowdown in Q3 and Q4 studio releases due to the now-resolved labor strikes, a theatrical optimist might point out. On its face, even acknowledging the dramatic rise in ticket prices and shortfall in attendance versus 2019, that might seem like an overlookable deficit as we move farther and farther out of the pandemic era. If you love movies and movie theaters, as I do, it’s easy to talk yourself into this line of thinking, especially if your personal moviegoing experiences are mostly at higher-performing locations in Los Angeles or New York. But once you step outside of that bubble, you begin to realize that the future of theatrical cinema attendance has reached its most fragile point yet.
In the past year, I have seen a lot of movies in completely empty auditoriums. I do not mean shows with five or six other patrons; I mean shows where I was the sole patron. Twenty-seven (and counting) shows to be exact, or roughly ten percent of the first-run movies I’ve attended. This became such a pervasive experience by the summer, I began snapping corny, grinning selfies of myself in empty auditoriums and posting them to my Instagram Story every time it happened so that I could keep a running tally (sincere apologies to my followers). Going back over my viewing log for the year and counting up the shows with fewer than 10 other patrons, it’s a majority. Yes, many of these were weekday matinees, but as a former employee of a low-performing neighborhood multiplex from 2005-2007, I can tell you: it was rare to ever have a completely empty show back then.
But the box office is recovering, they tell us! Yes, modestly budgeted dramas and comedies have shifted to shorter-window and streaming-only releases, but the gap can surely be bridged by a few more “big event” movies, right!? I often thought about this notion as I sat in empty auditoriums, mentally waiting out the insufferable 25-minute trailer reels that the big chains now subject their patrons to, over the past year. And my resounding takeaway is: no, they cannot. Even if Hollywood and independent distributors were able to pull off enough triumphs like Barbie and Super Mario Bros. and Across the Spider-Verse and Sound of Freedom and M3gan each year to match 2019 annual revenue levels, it would still not be enough to sustain the entire theatrical ecosystem that they depend upon.
As a primer, it’s important that we take a look at just how dramatically the landscape has shifted in favor of a small group of movies driving the overall domestic box office. While we still have a couple weeks left in 2023, the below numbers are unlikely to move much. I’ve made a chart illustrating the percentage of the Top 250 domestic releases’ grosses occupied by the Top 10 grossers and Top 25 grossers, from 2010 to present (pandemic-year excluded):
Certainly, one can easily envision a scenario where the extreme concentration of box office among the Top 10 movies could have been somewhat less severe if a number of big titles likely to occupy Slots 11-25 had not been moved out of 2023 due to the year’s labor strikes. But even in this event, the concentration of revenue within the Top 25 probably would have grown even more pronounced. With the exception of the past two years – when the box office was still in the throes of a slow recovery and propped up entirely by Marvel, Tom Cruise, and James Cameron – the revenue has never been so concentrated among a small group of titles. It’s even more concentrated than it was in 2019, when the top-grossing film, the franchise-capping Avengers: Endgame, took in over $850M on its own.
In much the same way that a number of sporting arenas that only serviced their flagship team’s games fell into complete decay in the ’90s and ‘00s, many of the movie theaters required to support blockbusters will wither away under such a peak-and-valley model, where 12 huge box office weekends subsidize the other 40. (That’s always been the model to an extent, but nowhere close to this extent.) And in an industry still struggling to secure new capital in the aftermath of the pandemic, these theaters are unlikely to be replaced with the same kind of sparkling new facilities that multi-billion-dollar sports teams (often armed with government handouts) have erected.
Unlike, say, AMC Burbank or Lincoln Square, most cinemas are not grossing hundreds of thousands of dollars on individual “event” movies (or anywhere close), especially as moviegoers increasingly flock to luxury cinemas and PLF screens for such fare. They need a steadier stream of product to pay the bills, as their high-revenue weekends – in my direct observation and according to the many theater managers I have spoken to – generally have a much lower ceiling than the country’s top hundred or two-hundred locations. Therein lies the rub: if enough of these more modestly performing screens go out of business, the industry will bleed uncontrollably. If we were talking about 10% of theaters, I could see how the closures could be absorbed by higher-grossing locations. But based on my on-the-ground experiences here in San Diego – a major moviegoing market – we’re likely talking about closer to half of theaters. These locations need Hollywood to deliver desirable films with real marketing spends behind them every single weekend.
I don’t necessarily see anyone to blame for the situation we find ourselves in. Coming out of the pandemic, studios have had to conserve their marketing dollars and bet on the biggest potential successes, while also splitting their focus with streaming services that Wall Street has seemingly impossible expectations for. Exhibitors have faced extreme financial hardship, with a number of key players taking a ticket in bankruptcy court. But I do believe that pretending like everything is fine and still in “recovery mode,” without making significant changes to the way theatrical is approached in the very near future, could spell disaster.
As a mere moviegoer on the ground, with a vested interest in the sustained importance and impact of theatrical movies, I’ve distilled my thoughts from moviegoing over the past year into five takeaways for Hollywood and another five for exhibitors. I am certain these will inspire heated disagreement among some, and others may allege I’m approaching the industry from the convenient position of a lightly informed outsider. But I hope they are helpful as food-for-thought on the potential avenues that the theatrical industry could take in reducing the number of empty auditorium selfies I subject my Instagram followers to in the coming years…
Five Takeaways for Hollywood:
1. Without a more consistent stream of modest hits, there could very well be a massive reduction in viable screens in the near future, which will inevitably impact the bottom lines for the bigger blockbusters driving overall revenue. Here in San Diego, it’s very clear that the bulk of theaters more than 20 years old that do not have at least a few upgraded PLF screens – many of them stadium-seated megaplexes – are really, really struggling. You don’t have to see anyone’s balance sheet to identify that. Even for big movies, which are often spread across five screens, I rarely observe more than 30 or 40 people in attendance on Friday or Saturday night. Newer and renovated locations have siphoned off the majority of the business in the market, but cumulatively, older screens still account for a sizable portion of the box office. It would be foolish to assume that most of their traffic would be absorbed by modern competitors if they closed.
2. Selling movies as “events” works spectacularly well for certain titles, but at the expense of cultivating a larger, mainstream culture of filmgoing. One can admire the great marketing feats of Barbie and Oppenheimer, while still wondering whether turning movies into “big events” is the most sustainable path for the industry going forward. This has been a key tenet of movie marketing strategy for years now, but I have grown increasingly leery of the way that audiences may be internalizing it. If filmgoers believe that movies must be big events in order to justify a trip to the theater, then what does that say about the other 150 movies that clearly aren’t big events (even if you try to sell them that way)? They’re just… not theater-worthy? For shame. And by selling an event that’s all about going with friends, dressing up, taking photos, and ordering a lot of concessions and alcohol… aren’t we getting farther and farther away from what engaging with movies is actually about? Can a real film culture, where movies are part of an ongoing conversation with one another, possibly survive such isolated worship of individual titles?
3. Theatrical windows thankfully grew back a bit of their length in 2023, but they were still far too short for most movies to benefit theatrically from word-of-mouth. What many in Hollywood still refuse to confront is that, as soon as a movie shows up as a tile on PVOD services, it is inherently worth less to consumers. This is not a helpful marketing tool. There is now no longer a reason to see it in a theater – and not because consumers are actually choosing to pay $19.99 for it, either, in most cases. It’s because once it’s available at home, it’s no longer a shiny new object, even if the price-point is marked up. The theatrical prospects, especially for smaller movies, are dead at that point. This trend is unquestionably eviscerating any potential for the return of WOM propping up smaller films later in their runs. In an era of mostly empty auditoriums, why not let movies hang around – without the specter of PVOD – to see if they catch on?
4. The major specialty distributors’ abandonment of multi-screen arthouses that only show limited/platform releases initially unavailable in megaplexes must be reversed if we ever want to have a healthy, adult-oriented film culture again. Theaters that once operated as arthouses have been among the hardest hit. Many are now booking wide releases in an attempt to survive, but for the most part, this isn’t working. They have been completely starved of their bread-and-butter: genuine limited and platform releases. Worse is that the few hot-ticket specialty movies that do still platform are now increasingly doing so via big megaplex locations. I understand the reasons for this, which range from contractual screen-count obligations (often tied to streaming deals), to a simple desire to play in the highest-grossing theaters. But once again, debuting an arthouse movie at the megaplex is undermining the existence of a thriving film culture. It reduces the title to “just another movie opening at the megaplex.” We have to start thinking about how to make smaller movies feel special again, and exclusive releases at theaters regular people don’t typically go to should be a part of this process.
5. The way to lure non-moviegoing audiences – especially Gen Z and younger – out to the movie theater isn’t to obsessively cater to them; it’s to give them a fresh experience they can’t get anywhere else. Stop the defeatist thinking that perhaps movies need to be shorter to better appeal to waning attention-spans, or that perhaps there should be a section in the back of the auditorium where people can use their phones during the show. Most of these well-meaning suggestions to expand the audience for moviegoing ultimately devalue the product. The only way to reach new moviegoers is to boldly convert them to the virtues of this product and, more than anything, show them something new and cool. Look to Talk to Me. Look to Saltburn. There is a way to break through, and it’s not permitting phone use in theaters. It’s to show these patrons that there’s something more compelling than their phone.
Five Takeaways for Exhibitors:
1. Exhibition’s focus on amenities has turned moviegoing into a more luxurious experience that consumers embrace, but also one that many cannot afford on a routine basis. Observing local attendance patterns first-hand, there is no question that the theaters with recliner seating perform the best. Other amenities (PLF screens, in-seat food service, etc.) are also a huge boon to attendance. But the average ticket price for these screens is often $18, $19, even $20 and higher in major markets. Sure, at AMC, A-List subscribers are entitled to PLF upgrades at no charge, but this is a relatively small portion of the overall moviegoing population. Many chains have no such subscription program, and others (like Regal) have subscriber surcharges for premium screens. What I worry about is that there is now such an overwhelming consumer obsession with these screens that regular auditoriums are suddenly considered unacceptable. So, when consumers decide whether they want to see a movie now, the choice is “Should I spend $21?” not “Should I spend $13?”, even though a $13 ticket is available. It seems to me that this may be biting theaters in the ass, especially when it comes to non-“event” movies.
2. Despite literally billions of dollars invested in reclining seats, expanded food and drink menus, and new technology, the state of basic projection and sound at a huge number of chain megaplexes is only fair. This may be a big part of why consumers demand premium screens, even if they don’t actively recognize that it is. In my 250+ trips to the movies thus far this year, I haven’t experienced as many complete-dealbreaker presentation issues as I routinely would in the 35mm film era, but I have experienced far more nagging annoyances than I did back then. Low illumination levels, green and magenta highlights from laser projectors, screens in bad physical shape (silver screens are really not aging well!), blown-out speakers, extremely low volume. And don’t even get me started on the choice to not mask the screens at the Big 3 chains. Presentation (and particularly sound) has gotten especially bad nowadays at locations where the projection is completely automated so there’s no hourly projectionist to perform a cursory check on each show. Simple tasks like closing the house doors when the show starts are often neglected by the remaining staff. Imagine paying full-price for an evening ticket as a non-frequent moviegoer and feeling like the movie would have looked and sounded better at home. You’d never go back.
3. At most of the theaters belonging to the big chains, the act of going to the movies post-Covid is an impersonal, joyless, automated experience. I’m not a people person, and I tend to dodge customer service representatives whenever possible. It’s one of the reasons I started buying all of my clothes online nearly 20 years ago. But even for my tastes, big chain cinemas are some of the least friendly, least inviting businesses currently operating. Most have gotten rid of their box office cashiers who used to make first contact with every patron, replacing them with a soulless line of kiosks and/or ticket sales at the concession stand (where even a short line can move needlessly slowly if you just want to buy tickets). Employees are often not very well-trained or friendly, though there are notable exceptions (the Harkins chain is particularly great about this). I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been to the movies and a few (usually older) patrons are standing at the entrance wondering where to even go. Even worse, the now-unused box offices themselves often haven’t been attractively decorated; they sit empty at the head of the building, frequently being used as a de facto storage room for all patrons to see.
4. Diversifying programming offerings may be helping megaplexes through a perilously slow period for Hollywood’s output, but this might also be a bit of a trap. I always find it a little funny when friends in exhibition complain about the current “lack of product,” which make no mistake, they are absolutely correct about. There have not been nearly enough big movies backed by real marketing campaigns released this year. But you really wouldn’t know it from just looking at the daily showtimes. Here in San Diego, there have never been more movies in release at once. On a given week, there are often as many as 30 new titles playing in the county, including many from local-language cinemas in India, Thailand, Bangladesh, China, Vietnam, Egypt, and the Philippines. There are tons of random, nothingburger American movies – usually indie genre fare – that lock in a silly-high number of screens and play to empty auditoriums, presumably so they can get a nice financial bump on their ancillary deals. And there haven’t been this many retro revivals of older titles, thanks to easily-screened DCP copies, since the calendar house days.
While I recognize that there’s a place for some of these movies – especially hit Indian and Chinese films that attract sizable audiences in big cities – a lot of this product is simply not worth whatever short-term financial incentives exist for the exhibitor. Why do I say this? Because if I were an infrequent moviegoer, I could look at the Fandango showtimes for an 18-screen multiplex in a mid-size city and be truly lost as to what might appeal to me. In that position, I don’t have the time or the knowhow to be researching all of the esoteric titles on the list. And, in this day and age, I probably haven’t been extensively exposed to marketing materials for the titles that should jump out at me; I honestly might not know. Gone are the days of newspaper showtimes with big, attractive ads for the major titles right next to them. At the very least, theaters and showtime aggregators need to find new ways of grouping titles into a hierarchy, so prospective patrons can quickly figure out what their truly viable options are, even if they don’t pay attention to the film press.
5. Showing 25 minutes of trailers and ads is a sorry replacement for compelling in-theater marketing. I defended the exhibitors right up to the 20-minute-mark, but now that trailer reels routinely clock in at 25 minutes, and sometimes even hit 30, I’m crying foul. Even worse, several exhibitors (most notably Regal) have agreed to show commercials for consumer products and services deep into the reel, right before the attached studio trailers. This is just abuse of the audience. And before you remind me “You don’t have to show up at showtime, you know!”, I will in turn remind you that there is no standardization here. Locally, Landmark shows about 8-10 minutes of previews, the Reading and Cinépolis chains clock in at 10-15 minutes, AMC is usually in the realm of 19-23 minutes, and Regal is 24-28 minutes (though not always, especially before non-studio movies!). The average moviegoer can’t keep track of all of this, nor should they be expected to. I’m beginning to think that there needs to be a standardized, NATO-mandated trailer reel length across all chains, probably 15 minutes on the nose.
But what’s truly stunning is not that exhibitors are forcing moviegoers to watch more trailers than they could ever possibly recall – I see so many people burying their noses into their phones during the trailers instead – but that many have forgone all other in-theater marketing. The average lobby in 2023 is positively barren. You’re lucky to get a couple of standees, and they’re nowhere near as creative as they once were. Many locations have abandoned physical one-sheets in favor of easily-ignored rotating digital signage. A friend who books a local independent cinema says he often has trouble securing one-sheets from distributors for their coming attractions. Most multiplexes no longer update their marquees to advertise what they’re playing. As others have noted, some new theater buildings are so generic, you barely know that they are cinemas at all when you look at them from the street. Which is all to say, much of the showmanship that existed even 10 years ago is now dead, and theaters are sacrificing real, local-level marketing opportunities in the process. We’re a long way from the inventive theater-level marketing tactics of yore, some lovingly detailed in Ira Deutchman’s recent documentary Searching for Mr. Rugoff.
* * *
I sincerely hope that the above doesn’t read like me shouting a laundry list of complaints into a digital echo chamber. In spite of the issues plaguing the theatrical business that I’ve detailed, I love the movies that are being released nowadays and I love movie theaters with every bone in my body. If I didn’t, I surely wouldn’t be there nearly every day of the week. I am especially in awe of many exhibitors’ ability to keep plugging along despite the seemingly insurmountable challenges coming out of the pandemic era. But if there isn’t a real strategy shift, facilitating a future in which Hollywood once again learns to care about more than “events” and exhibitors deliver an enjoyable experience for patrons at least most of the time, the cultural prominence of theatrical moviegoing will remain in great danger.
Everyone else must do their part as well. As we head into the (hopefully) busy holiday moviegoing period and beyond, I hope to see you – and not another empty seat – next to me at the theater.
Fwiw, can report the same experience from the Midwest - the ticket kiosks next to the forlorn box offices, the inconsistent pre-show timing, the empty matinees. My favorite theatres are 7-15 minutes away and my rule of thumb is to leave the house right at showtime for studio films, five minutes earlier for indie and smaller releases. In another level of vicious cycle, I often end up at the largest chain because it has more of those matinee (and late-night) showtimes than our local art house. I have a more flexible schedule than most, but even I can't pull off only two choices of a 2pm or 4pm (and I'm only so interested in what Helen Mirren has going on anyway). And I'm far from the first to say it, but what's with AMC showing the same TWO previews for themselves right before the film?
This is related to your points above which is when the theaters treat the audience like they're never there, they will tend to reinforce that impression. Even though as Barbenheimer demonstrated - and to a lesser degree the cult around the Nicole Kidman ad - audiences are primed and ready to explode when given the right conditions. My overall two cents (and your same qualifications, only less so) is there needs to be an injection of personality in the process, and I think that's where it's the theaters' turn to step up. Theaters, frankly, definitely did not have the personality factor in my (and arguably the nation's last) theater-going heyday, the late 90s and early 00s. That's when the multiplexes became extremely multi, when things like stadium seating was introduced, and they accommodated more butts in front of more screens without adding a whole lot more to the process (other than more expert projection, as you noted). But the movies, and specifically the studios, brought the extra personality with a wide array of genre movies and counterprogramming to major releases and small word-of-mouth hits.
Well, they aren't doing that at the moment, but I have hope that they will, partly because this year was a stronger and more interesting year than any sense at least the pandemic, and partly because smaller players like A24 and Neon are showing an ability and willingness to play at the highest levels with more interesting fare. But until the movies supply it more regularly, it's incumbent on the theaters to cater to the audiences rather than act like they're waiting around for someone to hand them a blockbuster or put them out of their misery. Spread the showtimes around a bit more, sell out the big movies and encourage the audience to spill over into other things (another problem that won't go away - you can tell if a movie is sold out before you get to the theater, no box office bump for backup plans). Hire knowledgeable and staff and put them front and center instead of those box office storage rooms. Host film clubs and discussion groups. It's never been easier to reach film nerds and slightly-above-casual goers, but the best theaters seem to be putting in maybe 40% of the work to make that reach. And now you can sell them beer!
Anyway, an unworthy rant to your more coherent thoughts. Thanks, and hope to see you at the movies.