Movies

The long-running The Phantom of the Opera was once again Broadway’s highest grossing show last week, taking in a mighty $2,483,532 for the week ending Jan. 29, outpacing runners-up Funny Girl ($1,872,862) and Hamilton ($1,871,921) by a noticeable margin. The Andrew Lloyd Webber musical at the Majestic has experienced a remarkable resurgence in interest (and

While studios took advantage of expanding their Oscar nominated Best Pictures this weekend — it’s truly a post-apocalyptic, err, post-pandemic marketplace when it comes to reaping any huge box office afterglow from this year’s crop. And the irony is that there’s only one streaming title among the top 10 Best Picture bunch, that being Netflix’s

EXCLUSIVE: When a tentpole works at the global box office, there’s a ripple effect with exhibition partners, not just the studio, bathing in riches. Such is the case for CJ 4DPlex’s Screen X and 4DX auditoriums which can brag that Avatar: The Way of Water, as it clocks $2.1 billion worldwide, is the exhibitor’s highest

Even on a specialty level, horror just works post-pandemic with the latest pop from a strong showing by a trio of films, Fear and Infinity Pool, released this weekend, and Skinamarink in week three. Fear hails from Deon and Roxanne Avent Taylor’s Hidden Empire Film Group, the all-Black production company behind cult hit Meet The

SATURDAY AM UPDATE: Coming out of this weekend, by mid-week, Disney/20th Century Studios/Lightstorm’s Avatar: The Way of Water will easily surpass The Avengers as the No. 10 highest-grossing movie ever in U.S./Canada with $623.3M. The James Cameron-directed pic is expected to gross between $14M-$16M for a seventh straight No. 1 weekend streak. Avatar 2‘s seven-weekend

Earlier this week, James Cameron’s Avatar: The Way of Water became the No. 5 highest-grossing movie ever worldwide, and, as expected, has now surfed to the No. 4 position on the all-time chart. In so doing, it leaves Star Wars: The Force Awakens in its wake with nearly $2.075B globally.  Through Friday, the worldwide gross

Neon and Topic Studios present writer/director Brandon Cronenberg’s Infinity Pool at 1,835 theaters in a lively specialty weekend sandwiched between a new crop of Sundance films and noteworthy expansions in the glow of Oscar nominations. Infinity Pool, staring Alexander Skarsgard, Mia Goth, Cleopatra Coleman and Jalil Lespert, had a splashy debut last weekend in the

EXCLUSIVE: Add another wide release to the 2023 theatrical calendar as Open Road has just dated the Gerard Butler action movie Kandahar for May 26, Memorial Day weekend. The Ric Roman Waugh-directed feature joins other big theatrical titles over the four-day holiday like Disney’s The Little Mermaid, Lionsgate’s Sebastian Maniscalco-Robert De Niro movie About My

Disney/Marvel Studios’ Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania arrived on tracking today with a projected 4-day $120M opening per industry sources. The threequel arrives in theaters on Feb. 17 and is the first in an avalanche of largely weekly tentpole fare which has been absent from the marketplace since the summer. That result for Quantumania will

With Wednesday’s worldwide box office grosses included, James Cameron’s Avatar: The Way of Water has surpassed $2.054B globally, and jumped up a notch on the all-time worldwide chart.  Globally through yesterday, the epic sci-fi adventure passed Avengers: Infinity War ($2,052M) with $2,054.7M to become the No. 5 highest-grossing movie ever worldwide. As we wrote on

Regal parent Cineworld said it’s opted to pursue a sale of assets and the process “is well under way” with non-binding bids due February 16. The company said in a bankruptcy filing this week that it’s reached out to 30 “potential transaction parties” including many competitors. If the debtors (Cineworld and its affiliates) find one

With a slimmed-down roster and many productions offering 2 for 1 tickets during the annual Broadway Week promotion, Broadway box office was down 24% for the week ending January 22, with the 23-show total at $25,835,362. Attendance of 204,847 was off 17% from the previous week when 29 shows were on the boards. Despite the

Universal/DreamWorks Animation’s Puss In Boots: The Last Wish is a bonafide puss in loot, as it will cross the $300M mark globally with today’s grosses included.  The highly reviewed sequel and Shrek spinoff is at $297.8M with Sunday’s worldwide actuals included. Directed by Joel Crawford and Januel Mercado, the adventure has surpassed Croods: The New

Some great news for exhibition Monday morning: Amazon Studios is getting back into the wide theatrical-release business with Ben Affleck’s Nike movie Air, starring his fellow Good Will Hunting co-Oscar winner Matt Damon. Air will get a global theatrical release on Wednesday, April 5, heading into the lucrative Easter weekend. This is the first wide

Refresh for latest…: It’s now official, James Cameron’s Avatar: The Way of Water has become the sixth movie ever to cross the $2B mark worldwide. It is also the filmmaker’s third to hit the milestone, alongside Titanic and the original Avatar. The mega-achievement was presaged ahead of the weekend with the global gross on the

As theatrical shakes off the pandemic, Disney has moved its Rob Savage directed feature adaptation of Stephen King’s The Boogeyman from Hulu to the big screen. A release is planned for June 2, 2023. Similar to Paramount’s Smile, and the booming genre box office, a test screening prompted 20th execs to pivot the release to

Sony Pictures Classics present Florian Zeller’s The Son on 554 screens, an emotional family drama that folllows the director’s 2020 Oscar-winning The Father. As with that film, The Son is adapted from Zeller’s own stage play along with Christopher Hampton. Hugh Jackman, Laura Dern, Vanessa Kirby, Zen McGrath and Anthony Hopkins star in the cautionary tale of a

The only new wide studio release this weekend is the Stage 6 and Screen Gems thriller Missing which collected $760K yesterday off of showtimes that began at 4PM at 2,650 locations. The movie, which is from the creatives behind Sony’s micro-hit, Searching, is expected to do in the mid single digits off 3,000 theaters. Similar

Regal parent Cineworld is rejecting the leases of three dozen more theaters as part of its ongoing bankruptcy proceeding, including some major locations. In filings this week, the theater chain requested, and was granted by a bankruptcy court judge, the right to walk away from nearly 40 unexpired leases including at Union Square in New

The Sundance Film Festival returns in-person beginning Thursday after being sidelined by Covid for two editions, and three years of struggle to climb out of an abyss. The indies have emerged from a time warp into a strange new place, one that’s still evolving. Deals are expected to bubble slowly this edition with a few