Weekend Box Office Forecast: Godzilla vs. Kong Gears Up for Pandemic Era Breakout at Domestic Theaters, Could Reach $30-35M+ Debut

For everyone following the box office over the last year-plus, there have been very few causes for what could even be deemed mild celebration. Occasional smatterings of high profile films and a handful of opening weekends that exceeded conservative expectations have ruled industry headlines during the pandemic as studios have largely withheld their big mainstream movies for better days.

To some degree, that’s about to change this weekend as Warner Bros. and Legendary’s Godzilla vs. Kong tracks to become the biggest box office opener of the pandemic era so far. The studio will open in 2,409 North American theaters on Wednesday, followed by an expansion to 3,064 on Friday.

That will make this film the first to play in over 3,000 cinemas since the pandemic became official and theaters were shuttered twelve months ago. Included in the footprint will be a presence at 282 IMAX venues and more than 625 PLF locations by Friday.

The anticipated sequel already started with $123.1 million globally last weekend, driven by China’s strong $69.2 million bow. While numbers like those are definitely not expected stateside as pandemic recovery remains a slow burn process, pre-release forecasting models indicate Godzilla vs. Kong should have no problem roaring past the likes of Tenet ($20.2 million 12-day staggered opening), Wonder Woman 1984 ($16.7 million three-day weekend), Tom & Jerry ($14.1 million), and The Croods: A New Age ($14.3 million five-day opening) when it comes to the top box office starts since theaters began reopening last year.

The mostly positive news surrounding theatrical exhibition and a national improvement in vaccine distribution in recent weeks has played a major role in beefing up this film’s expectations. As New York City and California have reopened cinemas throughout the past month, the domestic market has earned noticeable bumps across daily and weekend box office results.

Even more significantly, the re-emergence of those two markets is beginning to inspire more confidence in studio marketing campaigns as consumer sentiment itself slowly improves. That’s been increasingly evident as Warner’s own Tom & Jerry and last weekend’s Nobody from Universal received more robust advertising pushes than other films have during the COVID-19 era, and it certainly is clear from the efforts put behind Godzilla vs. Kong up to this point.

Granted, this film is still an atypical release as it will be available for free to HBO Max subscribers on the same day as its theatrical launch (Wednesday, March 31). Hollywood is still hedging its bets in the short term and banking on the long-run recovery of moviegoing, making certain films available to as wide an audience as possible while also aiming to build out streamer subscriber growth while the opportunity is available in the middle of a pandemic that has kept people stuck at home through numerous lockdowns.

Nevertheless, Godzilla vs. Kong is looking like it could be the kind of turn-off-your-brain popcorn entertainment with appeal to fans and the masses alike that could spur the next stage of theatrical recovery. Strong-for-its-genre reviews are an encouraging sign as well. Not everyone is able or ready to return to cinemas quite yet, but this movie’s pre-release metrics are dwarfing those of any film released in the past 13 months.

Pre-sales have continued to heat up in recent days as just over half of all domestic theaters were open as of last weekend and news arrived this week that Los Angeles will be allowed to sell tickets up to 50 percent capacity or 200 people in a single auditorium. Godzilla vs. Kong‘s social media reach is impressive with over 171,000 combined followers on Twitter and Instagram alone. Trailer views are likewise massive for the hybrid release as the official studio page on YouTube counts over 77 million hits from one trailer.

It should be noted that many of the pre-sales trends include private watch parties, which have developed a habit of skewing forecast models due to their popularity during the pandemic. There are also varying capacity limits state-to-state that remain challenging to give weight in any projections, and walk-up business could be more muted than in pre-pandemic times now that social distancing and online ticketing are top of mind for consumers.

Still, even traditional shows are selling very well for the five-day holiday opening as more than just die-hard fans of the genre are booking tickets for the Good Friday and Easter Sunday frame.

As of Wednesday morning, The Boxoffice Company’s Showtimes Dashboard tallied almost 136,000 showtimes booked Wednesday, March 31 through Thursday, April 8. That figure is guaranteed to rise as a higher sample of theaters confirm bookings by this weekend, likely surpassing 155,000 for the noted time frame.

For the weekend proper, Godzilla vs. Kong is currently booked for nearly 67,000 showtimes at 2,426 locations, according to the Dashboard. That represents 34 percent of the total showtimes universe across all movies.

Given Warner Bros.’ confirmation of 3,064 theaters starting Friday, mentioned earlier in this report, total showtimes should easily surpass 80,000 for the Friday through Sunday period. By comparison, Wonder Woman 1984 is estimated to have played just over 50,000 shows during its opening frame at 2,151 locations domestically.

The continued absence of Regal theaters across most of the country, as well as most of Canada’s market, will present another ceiling to breakout success this weekend. The largest exhibitor in the country, owned by parent Cineworld, will only be re-opening some of its highest performing locations in time for this current holiday frame.

Regal is opting to restart a much wider swath of its theaters on April 16, though. That strategy was partly timed for Warner Bros.’ next film, Mortal Kombat, which has now been delayed one week to an April 23 release. The move serves as a win-win for the studio and exhibitors: it allows Godzilla vs. Kong to take further advantage of its growing momentum and enjoy three weekends unrivaled, while shifting Kombat‘s eventual fan appeal and premium screen demand closer to what traditionally would be the start of summer movie season come May.

Many caveats persist as we remain steeped in unprecedented times, but all indicators point to a major jolt at the domestic box office in the days ahead. After so much uncertainty for so many months, Godzilla vs. Kong looks to be the next major mile marker on the road to greater theatrical rebounds in the coming months.

The Unholy and Holdover Expectations

Not to be forgotten amid the monster showdown this weekend will be Sony and Screen Gems’ The Unholy, a horror title produced by Sam Raimi and starring Jeffrey Dean Morgan. The PG-13 picture is intentionally hoping to counter-program Warner’s behemoth and the religious holiday weekend at the same time, opening at an estimated 1,850 locations.

The strategy certainly isn’t unheard of as Warner Bros. itself opened The Curse of La Llorona on Good Friday in late April two years ago. The Unholy won’t be matching that film’s $26.4 million weekend start back in normal times, but it could vie for a spot in the top five this weekend.

With screen demand still rising for Godzilla vs. Kong, projecting this weekend’s holdovers has an unusual element of volatility. Traditionally, family-leaning films fare well on the holiday frame as schools let out for Good Friday. That should be good news for Raya and the Last Dragon and Tom & Jerry, although it’s possible the latter’s screen count will take a larger hit since its fellow studio release will be given priority. The Warner film’s 31-day availability on HBO Max ended on March 28, though, so all is not lost for continued legs at the box office as the heart of spring approaches.

With regard to last week’s solid debut, Nobody will be fighting for the number two position as it takes a double whammy from the monster epic in terms of losing premium screens and sharing a crossover audience of adult men. Positive word of mouth should eventually help it stabilize after taking what will be a noticeable hit this weekend.

Theater counts are still being finalized, so the below forecast may evolve slightly before Friday.

This Weekend vs. Last Weekend

Boxoffice projects the three-day Easter weekend’s top ten will increase XX percent from last weekend’s $17.1 million. (Projection to follow on Thursday as theater counts are finalized.)

Godzilla vs. Kong Forecast Ranges
3-Day Weekend Range: $17 – 27 million
5-Day Opening Range: $28 – 38 million

Preliminary Weekend Forecast

(Updates to follow…)

Film	Distributor	3-Day Weekend Forecast	Projected Domestic Total through Sunday, April 4	Location Count	% Change from Last Wknd
Godzilla vs. Kong	Warner Bros. Studios	$22,000,000	$35,000,000	2,409 on Wed. / 3,064 on Fri.	NEW
Nobody	Universal Pictures	$3,500,000	$12,300,000	~2,500	-49%
Raya and the Last Dragon	Walt Disney Pictures	$3,300,000	$33,300,000	~2,200	-12%
Tom & Jerry	Warner Bros. Studios	$2,400,000	$40,600,000	~2,200	-11%
The Unholy	Sony Pictures / Screen Gems	$2,000,000	$2,000,000	~1,850	NEW

All forecasts subject to change before the first confirmation of weekend estimates from studios or alternative sources.

Theater counts are updated as confirmed.

Forecasts above do not necessarily represent the top ten, but rather films with the widest theatrical footprint based on studio confirmations entering the weekend.

For press and media inquiries, please contact Shawn Robbins

Follow Boxoffice PRO on Twitter

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Brad Wechsler to Step Down as Chairman of IMAX Corporation

Imax Corporation has announced that Bradley Wechsler will be stepping down as Chairman of the Board of Imax at the annual shareholders meeting on June 9, 2021. 

Wechsler, along with Imax CEO Richard L. Gelfond, acquired Imax in 1994; from 1996 to 2009, the two served as co-CEOs. Since 1994, Wechsler has served as Chairman or Co-Chairman of Imax’s board. In the decades since Imax’s acquisition by Wechsler and Gelfond, the PLF provider has grown into a global brand with a particularly strong presence in the growing market of China.

Wechsler is currently CEO and Managing Partner of Elysium LLC and serves on the boards of Apollo Investment Corporation, NYU Langone Hospital and Medical Center and Math for America, as well as several private boards. He served on the board of Assay Healthcare Solutions from 2010 to 2014 and is a member of the Motion Picture Academy of Arts & Sciences.

Said Gelfond of Wechsler’s departure as Chairman: “Brad and I have had an outstanding working relationship since we acquired IMAX together nearly 30 years ago, during which time IMAX has been transformed into one of the leading entertainment technology companies in the world. I thank him for his dedication, wisdom, insight, support, and guidance. I know all of IMAX’s employees past and present recognize and appreciate his many contributions. As he leaves his role, I am proud to have partnered with him and to call him my friend.”

Added Wechsler:  “It’s been almost thirty years since Rich and I acquired IMAX, and we’ve seen a tsunami of changes over the years. One thing that has remained constant though is the power of The IMAX Experience® and the power of the IMAX brand. I’m proud to have been part of building this great company and wish the Company and Rich continued success in growing this unique franchise.”

With Wechsler’s departure from the Chairman of the Board position, the Board will select a new chairman, to be announced shortly after the July 9 meeting. 

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Los Angeles Cinemas Go to 50 Percent Capacity as County Enters Orange Tier

Following guidelines laid down by the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health, Los Angeles County has entered the orange tier for reopenings—meaning that movie theaters in that county can increase their capacity limits from 25 to 50 percent.

As laid out in California’s Blueprint for a Safer Economy, with L.A. County’s move to the orange tier, movie theaters can operate at 50 percent capacity per auditorium or 200 people, whichever is fewer. The change to 50 percent capacity is expected to be enacted in the coming days.

Los Angeles theaters were allowed to reopen weeks ago at the red tier, meaning a capacity limit of 25 percent or 100 people per auditorium. Before that point, theaters in Los Angeles County had been shuttered since last March. Shortly before the reopening of L.A. theaters, New York City allowed their cinemas to reopen under a 25 percent capacity limit—signaling a return to moviegoing for the domestic market’s top two DMAs.

Also roughly coinciding with Los Angeles cinemas’ bump to 50 percent capacity will be the reopening of Regal cinemas across the U.S.. The cinema chain, North America’s second largest, will begin reopening theaters on April 2, with a larger wave of theaters reopening on April 16.

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Cinematic Slugfest: Director Adam Wingard’s Godzilla vs. Kong Dukes It Out On the Big Screen

If there’s a genre that deserves the full cinematic experience, it’s “giant monsters beat the crap out of each other.” Luckily, moviegoers in North America will have just that opportunity on March 31, when director Adam Wingard’s Godzilla vs. Kong debuts in theaters . (And, simultaneously, on HBO Max.)

International viewers have already put their stamp of approval on the film, which surpassed Tenet to be the top opener of the pandemic period. It’s a fair bet that, for many, Godzilla vs. Kong will represent that first trip back to the movies since the onset of Covid-19—and a fun, spectacle-laden blockbuster where two titans of the silver screen duke it out for just under two hours is a perfect fit for just that sort of excursion. Below, Wingard (The Guest, You’re Next) speaks exclusively to Boxoffice Pro about making a fun, monster-packed epic—and the experience of watching his own film on Imax.

I want to thank you—first off, because I really enjoyed the film. But more specifically than that, thank you for directing a film that is not two hours and 20 minutes long.

Well, thank you. It’s funny you mention that, because some of the hardcore Godzilla fans are mad at me because the movie’s not three hours, and because they just want more and more. I always have to explain to them: “Listen, if this movie had an extra hour, it’s not going to be more monsters fighting. It’s going to be boring scenes of people talking about monsters.” What we tried to do is make it as dense an experience as possible.

No one tunes in to watch the human parts of a Godzilla movie.

Exactly. So why give them more?

This movie felt really ’90s to me, in a weird way. And I think one of the elements of that is that it doesn’t have that bloat that a lot of the modern Hollywood spectacle films do. There’s very little fat on it.

You can look back at my other films. I’m a director that’s sort of obsessed with efficiency and pacing. I’ve never made a movie over two hours. This is my longest film to date, and it’s still under two hours. So it’s kind of funny that that’s a thing, but it’s something I’m very conscious of. I think that if you’re going to go over two hours, the movie has to be Lawrence of Arabia or something like that. You can’t just arbitrarily do it. A lot of times movies go over two hours because people fall in love with the wrong things, or they just get lazy. And it really boils down to that. Maybe sometimes my movies move too fast for people, but I like that. I like that we’re creating a real dense piece of entertainment for people.

And you don’t get bored watching it. You don’t feel condescended to; “Okay, I get what you’re trying to tell me, let’s move on.”

These movies are for kids, too, you know? I remember very specifically being bored in a lot of movies as a kid. Even some of my favorite movies, they would have these moments where you’re just bored. For me, I tried to consider that ADD vibe a little bit and tried to make sure that we’re catering to it just a little bit. 

We have a challenge with a film like this. I’m trying to make an efficient, densely entertaining movie, but we’re also making a sequel to a preexisting franchise. But it also needs to feel like a standalone movie at the same time. And so I always knew that the first half hour is going to be a big setup period for us, that we had to lay in a lot of exposition, we have to set up the characters and try to do it as quickly as possible while still sucking you in. So it was always important to me that, despite all those odds against us, that the monsters are never too far. They may not be battling all the time— you’re still gonna get to see them blow some stuff up occasionally and all that—but just keeping them in almost every scene. They’re always right there. They’re always just off to the side. We never move too far away from them. Because that’s when these movies get in trouble, is when you feel like you’re just waiting for the monsters to show up again. But this movie, once it hits the half hour mark, it’s pretty relentless. I’ve never done anything like this, even with my obsession with pacing and all that kind of stuff. This movie just takes off, and it’s pretty much nonstop action.

Copyright: © 2021 LEGENDARY AND WARNER BROS. ENTERTAINMENT INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. GODZILLA TM & © TOHO CO., LTD. Photo Credit: Courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures and Legendary Pictures

I love the Showa Godzilla movies. But even in those those older ones, when the human characters come on, that’s when you check your phone, that’s when you go to the bathroom. The script comes to you, I guess, mostly done. How do you make the human characters in a Godzilla movie interesting?

This one actually didn’t have a script when I came on. There was a little three- to five-page proposal outline that Terry Rossio and a writers room had created. So we knew the big set pieces, the general idea of them, where the movie was going, the structure of it, and who most of the characters were. But then I was able to work with him in terms of developing it into the script, so I was able to get in right at the beginning. At the end of the day, you have to shoot a lot of extra stuff to figure out how to whittle it down. I’m sure we overcompensated initially, trying to make sure that we dotted every i and crossed every t when it came to where the characters start and where they end. And I have to be honest, a lot of it just ends up getting cut, because of what you’re alluding to. You watch the film and you’re just like, “It doesn’t really matter.” The characters need to take us from one place to the next, and they’re always associated with the monsters. But at the end of the day, the efficiency of that is the most important. Because Godzilla and King Kong, they’re not just monsters. They’re characters in the film, too, you know? That’s what people are coming to see, that’s going to be the main event, and that’s where I tried to focus us as much as I possibly could.

If it’s just two people fighting each other—that’s an issue I have in some modern action movies, not not to name names. But it’s just constant. And it gets it gets dull after a while.

You become desensitized to it a little.

With King Kong, I feel his sadness and his want for a family. And Godzilla always kind of whips me up into a primordial rage.

To me, that was what the real goal was, was trying to really set up Kong as the heart of the movie. He’s definitely an underdog from the get go. Godzilla, in this film, he gets to be the heel of the movie. He’s the WWE villain, he’s the Undertaker. And so that’s really fun to play off of. But I felt like we needed to get people in that headspace, so that when they start fighting, you’re just having a blast, and you know what the stakes are with them.

Copyright: © 2021 LEGENDARY AND WARNER BROS. ENTERTAINMENT INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. GODZILLA TM & © TOHO CO., LTD. Photo Credit: Courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures and Legendary Pictures

And the first scene does that so well, setting up that Kong is trapped and alone.

We had one test screening before the pandemic hit. And in that test screening, I invited Robert Kirkman, who does ‘The Walking Dead.’ He and I are friends. And he was sitting right next to me during the test screening. And right before the movie started rolling, the room went black. And he’s a funny guy, he’s got a very funny sense of humor, very dry. He leaned over to me and was like: “So how long do we have to wait for the monsters to show up?” And the second shot of the movie is of King Kong, and he just started laughing his ass off when he saw that.

That was really important to me, that the movie’s kind of saying: “Listen, you’re in safe hands here. What you came to see is what we’re gonna deliver.” It’s not always just about seeing the monsters fighting. You can watch the monsters do literally anything and it’s really amazing and engaging. So just watching Kong go through his morning routine, scratching his butt, taking a shower in a waterfall—that in itself is, to me, really super engaging. I could watch him do just about anything and it’s really cool. I mean, one of the best scenes in Skull Island, probably the best scene, is Kong eating that octopus or squid or whatever, because it’s just really interesting to see on that big scale.

Or in something like Shin Godzilla, seeing the way Godzilla evolves and how that adds onto the Godzilla mythology.

That’s a great movie. You know, it’s funny that Shin Godzilla hasn’t really come up at all in any of the interviews that I’ve done. Maybe just very quickly, in passing, but the conversations always end up going to the other films. But the big inspiration I got from Shin Godzilla—other than the fact that that’s just one of the best Godzilla films of all time—is I love the way that they showed Godzilla’s nuclear breath in that film. That laser thing that he’s doing with that kind of pinkish hue to it. But the way they depicted that. So I actually took a lot of inspiration from the way that they used the atomic breath in that film, to the way that Godzilla uses it in my movie.

Copyright: © 2021 LEGENDARY AND WARNER BROS. ENTERTAINMENT INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. GODZILLA TM & © TOHO CO., LTD. Photo Credit: Courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures and Legendary Pictures

I love Shin Godzilla. When you’re working on a Godzilla film, are you involved with Toho? Are you in communication with them? Because I know they’re super protective. Godzilla is their baby.

Yeah, they’re very protective. I mean, they have certain things that you can and can’t do emotionally with Godzilla, obviously. They have a guy there that—I think this is the title, it’s Chief Godzilla Officer or something. And he has a business card and everything. He’s a really nice guy, really funny. All the Toho guys are super, super cool. We went and had dinner with them during the shoot. They came in and visited. And I’ll never forget—I was very nervous, actually, for Toho to show up, because obviously I have a lot of respect for where they’re coming from, and they’re the gatekeepers of Godzilla and always have been.

They hadn’t seen anything from the movie, and they came to Australia to visit. The editors put together a little sizzle reel of about, I don’t remember, it was maybe three to five minutes, probably about five minutes actually worth of footage. And they cut together all of our coolest footage with some of the previz, just to give them an idea of how things were going at that point. And I remember the Toho guys were in the office doing that. I was shooting a scene. And then at a certain point, I finished shooting the scenes, and I came out and the Toho guys were all standing next to [Godzilla vs. Kong producer] Alex Garcia. They kind of waved me over, and they introduced me and everything. And I’ll never forget, one of the heads of the company, he was standing there and somebody was translating for him for us. They said, “Oh, he just watched the sizzle reel.” And then he interrupted and said in English: “We have satisfaction.” And it was such a great moment. Relief, too. But I was just so excited. And he said it with a sense of humor, which was really funny. He was very real and authentic in his enthusiasm. So it was it great moment for me, making a Godzilla movie.

Sadly, I had to watch a screener on my TV. I have my Imax tickets, they’re purchased. Have you been able to see it on a big screen? I really hope people do, because this is a great film for it. [Godzilla vs. Kong has delivered the biggest opening weekend for a film on Imax since December 2019.]

Oh, absolutely. I was fortunate to be able to have an Imax to myself for two days straight. I went down to their headquarters, and they have a gigantic screen there. Basically, I had to watch back all the different Imax versions. So the first day, I watched both 2D versions of the movie, because there’s different sized Imax screens—there’s the slightly smaller IMAX screen and then the gigantic one. And so my day would begin. I would go to the first Imax screening, and then the next one. And then the next day I went in and it was the both of the 3D versions. And it was one of the best experiences for me as a filmmaker, ever, just having an entire theater to myself. There’s even an operator behind me, so if I wanted to pause it, I could pause it at any point. Which I never did. I like to be able to go through it. But it was just so cool.

I remember when I got there—you’re in this theater, and the screen is so big. And so your natural inclination is, I’m going to go to the back of the room. And I remember asking them, kind of jokingly, “Well, where does Christopher Nolan sit when he’s in here?” And they’re like, “Well, he sits down at the third row.” And I thought “Good Lord, he sits at the third row?” I started watching the movie, and it got right up to the ocean battle scene, and I thought: “You know what? I’m going to go down there. I’m gonna get a face full of this thing.” I didn’t move to the third row. I think I sat in the fifth row. And I feel like that’s the sweet spot for me, the fifth row in Imax. You would think it would be too much. You would think you would miss things. But the fifth row is perfect. Your periphery, it’s like you’re just in the movie. And even the 3D version worked in the fifth row. So that’s my big recommendation.

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Spotlight Cinema Networks Signs Contract Extension with Cinépolis Luxury Cinemas

PRESS RELEASE —

Cinema advertising company Spotlight Cinema Networks announced a contract extension Tuesday with Cinépolis Luxury Cinemas, including 88 more Cinépolis screens.

By April, Spotlight will be represented at all 218 Cinépolis domestic screens across 23 locations, including Cinépolis Chelsea in New York City. Spotlight’s national theater network currently encompasses more than 1,200 screens at nearly 300 locations.

“The additional screens joining our portfolio, with key market representation, will be very attractive to our advertising community as audiences return to the cinema and enjoy films the way they were meant to be viewed: on the big screen,” Spotlight Cinema Networks President Michael Sakin said in a press release

“Although many advertisers took a break from cinema advertising in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, as vaccinations become more widespread, we’re looking forward to the reemergence of cinema experiences nationwide with Cinépolis as a key component to our strategy.”

“We are truly excited about extending our partnership with Spotlight Cinema Networks,” Cinépolis Luxury Cinemas CEO Luis Olloqui added. “As our theatres reopen and moviegoers return to cinemas, we are confident we will be providing quality in-theatre programming that matches our unrivaled moviegoing experiences.”

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Europe’s First THX Ultimate Cinema Opens in Copenhagen

PRESS RELEASE —

THX opened its first “THX Ultimate Cinema” location in Europe today, at Nordisk Film Cinemas’ Imperial Theatre in Copenhagen, Denmark.

Using a 1,500 square foot Cinionic Giant Screen (CGS) premium large format offering with 4K image resolution, along with Barco dual laser projection for sharper visuals, the auditorium seats just shy of 1,000 people.

THX opened its first such “Ultimate Cinema” location in 2019 at the Regency Westwood Village Theatre in Los Angeles.

“[We] will now reach this important cinematic milestone by bringing to the Imperial Theatre the best movie experience available anywhere in the world to thrill and immerse moviegoers in Denmark,” Nordisk Film Cinemas executive country manager Casper Bonavent said in a press release. “The introduction of THX Ultimate Cinema shows our faith in the strong future of cinema as well as Nordisk Film Cinemas’ ambitions to enhance the cinematic experience for our guests.”

“The launch of the first THX Ultimate Cinema in Europe is an example of our commitment to enhance movie enjoyment,” THX Ltd. chief executive officer Min Liang-Tan said in a press release. “We are pleased to be working with Cinionic and Nordisk Film Cinemas to bring this offering to life for moviegoers to immerse themselves in films as close as possible to the way the artist intended the narrative to be heard and viewed.”

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Cineworld Reports 80 Percent Year-On-Year Admissions and Revenue Drop in 2020 as they Prepare for Regal Reopening

Following Cineworld’s announcement last week as to their reopening timeline in the U.S. and their multi-year deal with Warner Bros. for a shortened theatrical window, CEO Mooky Greidinger expanded on the multi-national circuit’s 2020 performance and plans for the chain moving forward in a Q4 2020 earnings call. 

Admissions and revenue both fell 80 percent year-on-year compared to 2019, figures affected by the ongoing pandemic, a shortage of major studio releases, and Cineworld/Regal’s decision to keep their theaters closed through the bulk of 2020, aside from the pre-Covid early months and a brief stint in autumn surrounding the release of Tenet.  

Said Nisan Cohen, CFO of Cineworld: “If you look on the adjusted EBITDA, the IAS 17, which includes also the rent expense, the adjusted EBITDA is negative $650 million. The free cash flow…  was almost a negative of $700 million. Our net debt grew by $1 billion to $4.5 billion.”

On the positive side, Greidinger notes that “We have secured over $800 million additional liquidity” in addition to announcing “an additional $213 million in convert bonds that will help us to be in a good shape and liquid enough through the time which is ahead of us.” Cohen also noted that they expect to receive money from the U.S. government’s CARES act “in the next three weeks,” which—added to the convertible bond—gives the chain “pro forma liquidity of $732 million.” Of financial benefit to the company moving forward is the closure of 20 underperforming sites since the onset of the pandemic.

On the call, Greidinger reiterated that Cineworld’s U.S. Regal locations will begin opening on April 2, estimating that it would be “about five, maybe six weeks until we’ll be fully operational.” In the U.K., the tentative date for indoor cinemas being allowed to reopen remains May 17. Subject to government restrictions, Greidinger said he expects that Cineworld locations in Israel and Central Europe will be able to open in late April and May, respectively. 

During Regal’s period of closure, the company underwent renovations on select locations, including theaters in Irvine, California; Pinnacle, Tennessee; University Town, California; and Union Square, New York City, where three more screens were added to the former 14-plex. The chain also looking forward opening a new-build theater in Benders Landing, Texas. 

When Regal cinemas do reopen, they will do so under vastly different circumstances than when they closed when it comes to evolving theatrical windows. Paramount has announced their intention for a 30-45 window on major titles, while Universal has struck deals with AMC, Cineplex, and Cinemark for a shortened window of their own—as little as 17 days for specialty titles, with major releases getting a longer period of theatrical exclusivity. Warner Bros. has opted to go day-and-date with their 2021 slate, while Disney continues to make release decisions for their upcoming titles on a film-by-film basis.

Regal, as announced last week, has become the first chain to ink a deal with Warner Bros. for a shorter window in the 2022 post-pandemic period. Speaking of Cineworld’s negotiations with studios around the future of theatrical exclusivity, Greidinger noted that “things that were good for June were not good for September, and things that were good for September were not good anymore at December. But I think that the dialogue is good. And you’ve all seen our Warner deal… which we think is a very important step forward. We trust and believe that at the end of the day, the theatrical exclusivity is of the interest of both sides, exhibition and studios and movie makers.” 

Greidinger also noted that Cineworld is “working with Universal on an agreement that will also cover international,” though they don’t “have a deal with Universal yet—but that doesn’t mean that we are not showing their movies. The 17 days for smaller movies and the 31 days for the bigger movies from premium VOD for the Universal window is a given at this stage.” Greidinger added that he expected agreements with Universal and “other studios” to be reached in the coming weeks, “and we’ll see how this will go.”

With a strong slate moving into the back half of 2021 and on into 2022, Greidinger expressed the opinion that the industry will reach 2019 levels in 2022—”maybe a little less, maybe a little more. Subject to the movies, of course. At the end of the day, as long as theatrical exclusivity is kept in a way… people will still run to the movies in the cinemas.”

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Godzilla vs Kong Delivers Biggest Opening Weekend on IMAX for a Hollywood Film Since December 2019

Premium Large Format (PLF) continues to make an impact in the overseas cinema recovery with Godzilla vs. Kong delivering a $12.4 million bow on Imax across 891 screens in 40 markets outside of North America. The weekend take represents the highest-earning bow for a Hollywood title on Imax since December 2019.

China brought in over 75 percent of that figure, netting $9.4 million in Imax ticket sales––14 percent of the film’s total Chinese box office despite only playing in 1 percent of screens in the market. Other top performers on Imax over the weekend include Australia ($63K), Hong Kong ($51K), Saudi Arabia ($43K), Thailand ($31K), UAE ($21K) and Singapore ($21K). Globally, Imax screenings represented 10 percent of Godzilla vs Kong’s $121.8 million debut.

The title will open in North America on March 31, at which point it will increase its Imax footprint to at least 1,170 Imax screens worldwide.

“Godzilla vs. Kong demands to be seen on the biggest screen possible and audiences worldwide are answering the call—continuing to drive market share gains for IMAX and proving there is real business to be done for Hollywood blockbusters,” said Rich Gelfond, CEO of IMAX. “We are particularly encouraged by the film’s strong debut in China, where audiences turned out in a big way for this Hollywood franchise.”

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WEEKEND BOX OFFICE: Nobody Battles Its Way to #1 w/ $6.7M Opening, Godzilla vs. Kong Spews Fire w/ $121.8M Overseas

With the rollout of vaccines continuing at a robust pace across the U.S. and more and more theaters opening their doors to the public, this weekend was one of the most robust of the pandemic to date. But perhaps the real story of the weekend happened overseas, where <em>Godzilla vs. Kong</em> exploded onto the scene with a terrific $121.8 million debut.

Coming out ahead of the pack in North America was the freshly-released action-thriller Nobody, which debuted at No. 1 with an estimated $6.7 million from 2,460 locations, good for a per-theater average of $2,724. That total is roughly in line with pre-release expectations, with Boxoffice Pro’s own forecast estimating an opening gross anywhere between $4 million and $9 million heading into the weekend.

The Universal release, which stars Better Call Saul’s Bob Odenkirk as a man who runs afoul of a drug kingpin, was boosted by largely positive critical reviews (it currently has a 79% “Fresh” rating on Rotten Tomatoes), a robust following on social media platforms and presumably strong word-of-mouth, with a Cinemascore of A- and a Rotten Tomatoes Audience Score of 94% from over 500 ratings.

It also helped that Nobody’s marketing campaign was strongly geared toward adult males, who have been a relatively reliable demo during the pandemic after turning out for films such as The Marksman, Honest Thief and Unhinged. Indeed, the opening-weekend audience was 62% male and 73% 25 and older.

Dipping to second place in its fourth weekend of release was Disney’s Raya and the Last Dragon, which took in an estimated $3.5 million from 2,212 locations after topping the box office three weekends in a row. The critically-acclaimed animated title now stands at $28.39 million.

Tom & Jerry finished in third place with an estimated $2.51 million from 2,464 locations, a drop of 34% from last weekend. The animated/live-action hybrid has $37.07 million to date.

Lionsgate’s Chaos Walking finished in fourth with an estimated $1.19 million from 2,036 locations, a drop of 38% from last weekend’s take. The YA sci-fi title has $11.47 million to date.

At No. 5 was Roadside’s The Courier, which took in an estimated $1.04 million in its sophomore weekend. The Benedict Cumberbatch thriller now stands at $3.48 million.

OVERSEAS

Marking perhaps the most dramatic shift toward relative normalcy at the global box office since the pandemic began, Warner Bros.’ <em>Godzilla vs. Kong</em> erupted with a sizzling $121.8 million in 38 markets. The studio reports that the film’s opening was on par with <em>Kong: Skull Island</em> and came in 11% ahead of <em>Godzilla: King of the Monsters</em> and 57% ahead of 2014’s <em>Godzilla</em>. Nearly 10% of that total came from the IMAX format, where the film brought in $12.4 million from 891 screens worldwide.

In China, <em>Godzilla vs. Kong</em> accounted for an 82% share of the market in the country, where it opened to a massive $70.3 million ($9.4 million of which came from IMAX screens). The film also opened with $6.3 million in both Mexico and Australia, $5.8 million in Russia, $5.2 million in Taiwan and $4.8 million in India. Originally slated to open in North America in March 2020 before being delayed due to the pandemic, the tentpole is slated to debut in select theaters domestically and on HBO Max on Wednesday, March 31.

Raya and the Last Dragon brought in an estimated $3.9 million from 28 territories, bringing its international total to $54.2 million and its global sum to $82.6 million. The top markets for the Disney release are China ($18.7 million) and Russia ($10.9 million).

The Avatar re-release brought in an estimated $3.5 million in China, where its total now stands at $51.7 million (not counting the film’s original run in the country).

Tom & Jerry grossed an estimated $2.7 million from 42 markets, lifting its international total to $48.3 million and its global tally to $85.4 million.

Nobody grossed an estimated $1.18 million in its second weekend in Russia, U.A.E., Egypt and other Middle Eastern territories. Its international cume is $5.03 million and its global total is $11.73 million, including $15.9 million in China and $7.9 million in Russia.

Sony’s Peter Rabbit 2: The Runaway debuted with $2.1 million in Australia, about 24% behind the opening of the first film as the pandemic continues to depress turnout. The sequel to the family-geared hit opens in North American theaters on May 14.

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Title	Estimated weekend	% change	Locations	Location change	Average	Total	Weekend	Distributor
Nobody	$6,700,000		2,460		$2,724	$6,700,000	1	Universal
Raya and the Last Dragon	$3,500,000	-32%	2,212	-49	$1,582	$28,389,857	4	Walt Disney
Tom and Jerry	$2,510,000	-35%	2,464	-44	$1,019	$37,067,000	5	Warner Bros.
Chaos Walking	$1,185,000	-38%	2,036	-96	$582	$11,468,256	4	Lionsgate
The Courier	$1,040,000	-45%	1,641	208	$634	$3,477,707	2	Roadside Attractions
The Croods: A New Age	$540,000	-14%	1,319	-92	$409	$55,972,933	18	Universal
The Marksman	$375,000	-20%	851	-254	$441	$14,796,109	11	Open Road
Boogie	$340,000	-43%	1,028	-156	$331	$3,806,840	4	Focus Features
Minari	$275,000	-10%	912	126	$302	$1,840,000	16	A24
Wonder Woman 1984	$245,000	-47%	1,128	-30	$217	$45,857,000	14	Warner Bros.
The Father	$164,800	-47%	652	-281	$253	$1,231,294	3	Sony Pictures Classics
The Little Things	$140,000	-59%	1,001	-129	$140	$14,912,000	9	Warner Bros.
Promising Young Woman	$130,000	-33%	733	-98	$177	$5,938,915	14	Focus Features
News of the World	$120,000	56%	620	-78	$194	$12,566,355	14	Universal
City of Lies	$118,148	-58%	443	-58	$267	$500,378	2	Saban Films
Nomadland	$107,500		600		$179	$2,180,000	6	Searchlight Pictures
Judas and the Black M…	$105,000	-58%	842	-109	$125	$5,195,000	7	Warner Bros.
Wrong Turn	$91,517	-16%	133	-4	$688	$944,403	9	Saban Films
Monster Hunter	$82,000	-46%	215	-97	$381	$14,961,025	15	Sony Pictures Entertainment
The War with Grandpa	$74,473	-33%	338	-75	$220	$21,000,995	25	101 Studios
Six Minutes to Midnight	$56,000		145		$386	$56,000	1	IFC Films
Dutch	$46,228	-46%	129	-51	$358	$323,167	3	Faith Media
Long Weekend	$20,000	-82%	261	-560	$77	$511,651	3	Sony Pictures Entertainment

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Global Box Office Report: Godzilla vs. Kong Roars to $21.5M Opening Day in China, Nobody Estimated at $2.4M Friday in North America

The two biggest box office markets in the world are generating early Friday estimates from multiple Hollywood studios for the first time in quite awhile as Warner Bros.’ Godzilla vs. Kong hits China this weekend and Universal’s Nobody rolls out domestically.

The monster-on-monster extravaganza is off to a very big start in the Middle Kingdom with a $21.5 million (RMB 140 million) opening day estimated by Warner Bros. this afternoon. Marketed and distributed by Legendary, the sequel recorded the biggest opening day of any imported title in China for all of 2020 and 2021. The previous claim belonged to Christopher Nolan’s Tenet with RMB 57 million, or roughly $8.7 million on opening day last year.

Godzilla vs. Kong also scored the highest pre-sales for opening day among all imported titles since the pandemic began, drawing RMB 45 million (just shy of $7 million) to top Tenet‘s RMB 22.5 million (over $3.4 million).

The biggest tentpole release since the studio’s Wonder Woman 1984 back in December, Godzilla vs. Kong is also opening in most other overseas markets this weekend, although Warner Bros. is not expected to report full global results until later in the weekend.

The film launches domestically next Wednesday, March 31 in theaters and day-and-date on HBO Max for subscribers. Pre-release tracking is very strong for the film by pandemic standards.

Nobody Pacing to Top Domestic Box Office

Meanwhile, Universal continues to make good on exclusive theatrical releases during the slow-to-develop theatrical rebound with Nobody hitting cinemas this weekend. As of early Friday afternoon Pacific time, the studio reported a projection of $2.4 million on opening day and a potential $6.5 million opening weekend.

Universal notes that these figures are speculative and they’ll provide further updates should they change drastically.

If the numbers hold, Nobody‘s opening would fall in line close to expectations and our weekend forecast while topping the starts of other recent action-thrillers released in North America during the pandemic.

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Alamo Drafthouse to Screen Dazed and Confused Reunion with McConaughey, Linklater, Jack Black on Week of 4/20

PRESS RELEASE —

Matthew McConaughey and Parker Posey will reunite with director Richard Linklater in a Zoom reunion for the movie Dazed and Confused, hosted by Jack Black and screening exclusively at Alamo Drafthouse Cinema locations starting Tuesday, April 20.

The 1993 film has achieved cult classic status through the decades, by featuring future stars including McConaughey, Ben Affleck, and Milla Jovovich, and helmed by future star director Linklater before he achieved further renown with the likes of Boyhood and Before Sunrise.

Fans can submit a question to the cast using the hashtag #Dazed on Twitter. Screenings of the conversation will continue through the end of May, and can be bought at drafthouse.com/Dazed.

The conversation can also be purchased as a Your Own Private Alamo screening, the chain’s private screening option which they launched last August. It will also be made available on the chain’s streaming platform Alamo on Demand later this year.

This marks Alamo Drafthouse Cinema’s second such “Support Local Cinemas” cast reunion event, along with the The Lord of the Rings reunion. That screening begins at Alamo Drafthouse locations starting today, hosted by Stephen Colbert and featuring director Peter Jackson with stars including Elijah Wood, Viggo Mortensen, Cate Blanchett, Ian McKellen, and Orlando Bloom.

Alamo Drafthouse Cinema ranked #12 on Boxoffice PRO‘s Giants of Exhibition 2021 list of North America’s largest cinema circuits, with 317 screens at 41 locations.

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National CineMedia Appoints Cinemark CEO Mark Zoradi to Board of Directors

PRESS RELEASE —

National CineMedia, Inc. (NCM) appointed Cinemark CEO Mark Zoradi to its Board of Directors, effective Friday, replacing Cinemark Executive Chairman Lee Roy Mitchell.

Mitchell will continue to serve in his role at Cinemark, but resigned from the NCM Board effective immediately, to focus on personal ventures.

NCM is the largest cinema advertising network in the U.S., owned 48 percent by the publicly traded National CineMedia, Inc. and 52 percent by a combination of Cinemark and Regal’s parent company Cineworld.

Cinemark ranks #3 in Boxoffice PRO‘s Giants of Exhibition 2021 of North America’s largest domestic cinema circuits, with 4,517 screens at 331 locations.

“National CineMedia is extremely grateful for Lee Roy’s long commitment and dedication to our company as a founding member exhibition partner and consummate Director,” NCM Inc. CEO and Director Tom Lesinski said in a press release. “His leadership, integrity, and service has had a profound impact on our company. Over the past six years, it has been an honor to work with him and serve alongside him on the Board.”

“I look forward to continuing our long-standing and highly productive relationship with Cinemark while benefiting from Mark’s extensive experience on both the studio and exhibition side of the business,” Lesinski continued. “I have known and worked with Mark for nearly a decade and am excited by the contributions he will make to NCM and the Board, especially given his experiences in navigating the challenges associated with the pandemic.”

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Cinemark Announces Annual Oscar® Movie Week Festival, Will Play All Best Picture Nominees on the Big Screen

Cinemark is partnering with Focus Features—the specialty arm of Universal—for the chain’s annual Oscar® Movie Week, taking place from Friday, April 19 through Sunday, April 25. More than 100 Cinemark locations are participating in the series, which gives moviegoers the opportunity to check out this year’s Best Picture nominees—as well as a selection of nominated short films—on the big screen. Tickets are now on sale now at Cinemark.com or on the Cinemark app.

“Cinemark is thrilled to be giving the big screen treatment to the past year’s best films and to bring back one of our most popular programs of the year with our annual Oscar® Movie Week,” said Justin McDaniel, Cinemark SVP of global content strategy. “These films and shorts deserve nothing less than the cinematic experience, and there is no place more cinematic than Cinemark with our immersive viewing environment. We are happy to welcome moviegoers back for this time-honored tradition.”

Tickets to the Best Picture-nominated features—Judas and the Black Messiah (Warner Bros.), Mank (Netflix), Minari (A24), Nomadland (Searchlight Pictures), Promising Young Woman (Focus Features), Sound of Metal (Amazon), The Father (Sony Pictures Classics), and The Trial of the Chicago 7 (Netflix)—are available for $5 apiece. Tickets to the shorts program, playing between April 23 and April 25, are $10. For more information on Cinemark’s Oscar® Movie Week, including participating theaters, showtimes and how to purchase tickets, visit Cinemark.com/movieweek.

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Russian Chain Karo Opens Private Cinema Rentals to Gamers

Karo, one of Russia’s leading cinema chains, has opened its private cinema rentals to gamers—allowing customers to book Karo auditoriums to play a video game of their choice in the company of friends. As the popularity of private cinema rentals has exploded in the pandemic era, so too have chains begun to further explore the possibility of gaming to bring in audiences.

Say Paul Heth, executive chairman and CEO of Karo Group, and Karo Cinemas President Olga Zinyakova in a joint statement:

“The gaming industry is showing tremendous growth rates in Russia and around the world. We see an unique opportunity for effective collaboration between the gaming community and the technology and hospitality of our cinemas. Russia has nearly 70 million ‘gamers,’ many of whom are also movie goers. Clearly this is a large market that we would like access and provide a unique out of home entertainment experience.  Today’s offer is the first step towards creating a new major business direction for Karo and the Russian film industry, which will be supported both by us and key companies from the Russian gaming industry.”

Those who wish to rent a Karo auditorium for a private gaming experience can do so by filling out the application form—with details such as date, time, and preferred auditorium—at http://event.karofilm.ru/. Following the receipt of the application, the guest will be told the preliminary price, which is offered in two-hour increments and varies depending on the day of the week. Add-ons, including a cinema bar, decoration, on-hand staff, organization of receptions and coffee breaks, and technical support, are available for additional fees. Currently, only Karo cinemas in Moscow and St. Petersburg are offering private rentals for gaming, but the chain plans to expand the service further moving forward.

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Global Box Office Down 72%, Digital Leads Home Entertainment in 2020

The global box office fell by 72 percent in a beleaguered 2020 for the movie theater industry, finishing the year with $12 billion in ticket sales according to the Motion Picture Association’s (MPA) annual THEME report.

Overseas box office was responsible for $9.8 billion in ticket sales, representing 81 percent of the overall global market. Much of that business came from the $6 billion earned by the Asia Pacific region, which hosted three of the world’s top 5 box office markets in 2020: China (#1, $3 billion), Japan (#3, $1.3 billion), and South Korea (#5, $0.4 billion). The Europe Middle East & Africa (EMEA) region suffered a 61 percent drop to $3.3. billion, while Latin America suffered the biggest losses during the pandemic with an 82 percent drop to $0.5 billion.

The North American market, comprised by the United States and Canada, experienced an 80 percent decline in box office ($2.2 billion), translating to a total of 240 million admissions in 2020. The number of cinema admissions in the United States had previously fluctuated from 1.24 to 1.36 billion since 2011. According to the MPA, the typical moviegoer bought 1.5 tickets in 2020, down from 4.6 the previous year.

Less than half of the U.S./Canada population attended a cinema in 2020, a year where digital home entertainment accounted for 82 percent of the entire entertainment sector. Streaming revenues in the United States have more than doubled over the last four years––from $11.4 billion in 2016 to $26.5 billion in 2020––while physical media has shrunk by more than half during the same term––from $8 billion in 2016 to $3.5 billion in 2020. Theatrical revenues had consistently surpassed $11 billion since 2016, until falling to $2.2. billion in 2020 due to the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic.

2020 Top 20 Global Box Office markets – All Films (US$ Billions)
Source: Omdia, local sources

Rank	Market	Box Office (Billions)
1.	China	$3.0
2.	North America (U.S. & Canada)	$2.2
3.	Japan	$1.3
4.	France	$0.5
5.	South Korea	$0.4
6.	U.K.	$0.4
7.	India	$0.4
8.	Germany	$0.4
9.	Russia	$0.3
10.	Australia	$0.3
11.	Italy	$0.2
12.	Spain	$0.2
13.	Netherlands	$0.2
14.	Mexico	$0.2
15.	Taiwan	$0.1
16.	Brazil	$0.1
17.	Indonesia	$0.1
18.	Denmark	$0.1
19.	UAE	$0.1
20.	Poland	$0.1

Data courtesy of the Motion Picture Association

The pandemic upended the usual revenue driven by theatrical and helped spur a dramatic rise in home entertainment earnings as audiences stayed home. Home Entertainment brought in a total of $68.8 billion worldwide in 2020, driven almost entirely by digital––with physical media representing only $7 billion of that figure. Combined, theatrical and home entertainment earned a cumulative total of $80.8 billion in the year, down 18 percent from 2019’s $98.3 billion.

Image courtesy of the Motion Picture Assocation

Data courtesy of the Motion Picture Association

Subscription-based services within the digital home entertainment category experienced a particular upswing in 2020, a reflection of new platforms introduced by major media conglomerates. Subscription Video on Demand (SVOD) was up by 35 percent in 2020, earning $21.2 billion in the year––nearly three times the $7.8 billion SVOD brought in 2016. Transactional digital home entertainment, however, shrank by 2 percent in 2020 to $8.8 billion––down from $11.6 billion in 2016.

The growth of digital home entertainment has been significantly more disruptive for linear television than it has for the theatrical industry. Television content represents 92 percent of the overall online views and transactions in the United States. Although it represents a minority of digital transactions and viewership, streaming movies at home has seen a relative rise in popularity in recent years. Online movie views and transactions in the United States have more than doubled since 2016, and increased by 45 percent over the prior year in 2020.

Image courtesy of the Motion Picture Association

Seven of the top ten streamed movies in the United States in 2020 were released in 2019 or before––including the top three titles of the year. Notably, eight of the top ten most-streamed movies in 2020 were children’s titles. The data reveals that despite an increased adoption and engagement in digital home entertainment platforms because of the Covid-19 pandemic, the bulk of home viewership remains centered around serial television content and library catalogue titles at this time.

Top 10 Streaming Films in the U.S. in 2020
Source: Nielsen

Rank	Title	SVOD Provider	Minutes Streamed (Nearest Millions)
1.	Frozen II (2019)	Disney+	14,924
2.	Moana (2016)	Disney+	10,507
3.	The Secret Life of Pets 2 (2019)	Netflix	9,123
4.	Onward (2020)	Disney+	8,367
5.	Dr. Seuss’ The Grinch (2018)	Netflix	6,180
6.	Hamilton (2020)	Disney+	6,132
7.	Spenser Confidential (2020)	Netflix	5,374
8.	Aladdin (2019)	Disney+	5,172
9..	Toy Story 4 (2019)	Disney+	4,416
10.	Zootopia (2016)	Disney+	4,400

Nielsen SVOD Content Ratings (Netflix, Amazon Prime, Disney+, and Hulu), Nielsen TV Panel, U.S. Viewing through Television. U.S. persons aged 2+, total minutes viewed during 2020 (12-30-19 to 12-27-20)

Despite the disruption caused by the pandemic, the number of cinema screens around the world increased by 6 percent in 2020 to a total of 207,650 screens. Asia Pacific accounts for nearly half of the world’s cinema screens with 103,603, followed by EMEA with 44,902, North America (U.S. & Canada) with 44,111, and Latin America with 15,034.

The number of cinema screens in North America increased by one percent in 2020 and has risen by 3 percent since 2016 despite the increasing popularity of digital home entertainment platforms. In the United States specifically, the number of screens decreased by 0.4 percent, from 41,172 to 40,998, but was nevertheless higher than the national screen counts of every year dating back to 2016.

Image courtesy of the Motion Picture Association

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Franco-Cinephilia: Bertrand Tavernier Takes Us On an Intimate Journey Through French Cinema

By Daniel Eagan

The below interview was conducted for Film Journal International in the summer of 2017, tied to the release of renowned director Bertrand Tavernier’s Journey Through French Cinema. Boxoffice Pro republishes this piece now following Tavernier’s death on March 25, 2021.

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In his latest work, My Journey Through French Cinema, Bertrand Tavernier gives an account of the movies and artists who influenced him. Like the director himself, the documentary is warm and engaging, filled with first-hand details that offer new insights into the hallmarks of French filmmaking. The Cohen Media Group release opens today in New York City.

In his narration, Tavernier gives a short version of his childhood in Lyon and his love affair with movies. He then analyzes some of his favorite cinema artists—actors, composers and screenwriters as well as directors—in segments lasting from ten to twenty minutes.

Tavernier doesn’t talk much about himself in his voiceover, so it’s worth noting how passionately he involved himself in the film industry, first as a founder of the Nickel Odeon club, then as a critic, actor, assistant to Volker Schlöndorff and Jean-Pierre Melville, and press agent for Rome-Paris Films. He had broad experience in the industry before directing his first feature, The Clockmaker, based on a novel by Georges Simenon, in 1974.

“What touched me about the novel were the emotional issues, how the father is getting closer to his son when his son is on the run,” Tavernier says. “The father’s trying to understand what happened, learns that he never really talked with his son, never knew him, but he’s going maybe to know him a little bit better. In most other films, people go from A to Z. Here you are going from A to C or D. Small steps.”

My Journey Through French Cinema opens with a segment on Jacques Becker, whose titles include Casque d’Or and Touchez pas au Grisbi. (Coincidentally, a restored version of his last film, Le Trou, opens on June 28 in New York.)

“People in his films are always doing things, carrying water, cutting trees, they are always busy,” Tavernier points out. “Maybe I was influenced by Becker because I loved his way of telling the story, but also by the way everybody in his film was working. So in The Clockmaker and L.627, even in ’Round Midnight, I am trying to show jobs, work, and emotions connected to work.”

Tavernier suggests that he may have absorbed the work of directors like Becker and Jean Renoir without fully understanding how they influenced him. “I remember being very impressed, very early, by the way Jean Renoir was moving the camera,” he recalls. “It was never just functional, it wasn’t just to follow or proceed somebody walking. The camera was revealing something more about space, about the position of characters in the space, in the landscape. It was a way also of connecting several layers of action with people, often through overlapping dialogue.”

The director agrees that during the height of the studio system, it was easier for directors to control and manipulate the frame and action within it, skills modern-day directors often seem to lack.

“Digital cameras and effects may seem to make things easier today,” he concedes, “but as my friend André de Toth once told me in Lyon, ‘They are only tools. They cannot replace vision.’ And on the other hand, digital can give a freedom to some shots, help you avoid the dictatorship of composition. In Robert Altman’s films, for instance, nothing seems composed.”

Tavernier adds that tools like Steadicams and handheld camera rigs can make shots look “accidental,” not designed. “To get that look took a lot of time in the old days,” he jokes. “John Ford told me once the reason why he always tried to get the scene on the first take was because you always had accidents on the first take. He loved to incorporate those accidents into his movies, use them to break out of his scripts.”

Ford had a notoriously difficult personality, and in My Journey Through French Cinema Tavernier doesn’t ignore the flaws besetting Becker, Renoir, Melville and others. Renoir expressed troubling sentiments in letters that were published after his death. In Melville’s films he sometimes shows little sympathy for his characters, especially women.

“There can be a kind of coldness, a lack of empathy for any kind of human feeling,” Tavernier admits. “So I see clearly why some of Melville’s films move me less than Becker or Claude Sautet. But at the same time he was not trying to move me, he was trying for another kind of emotion. And in Army of Shadows he succeeded in getting everything right, because it was a subject that was very close to him. He had been in the Resistance, and in fact he incorporated some part of his life in that film.”

In his segment on Marcel Carné (Le jour se lève, Children of Paradise), Tavernier includes highly critical comments from screenwriters Jacques Prévert and Henri Jeanson.

“They didn’t like him, but they were not fair,” he argues. “I agree with some of what they said—I don’t think he had a great instinct for actors, and he could not write dialogue, that’s true. But he was such a tough worker, and he had such a passion; in his way he was breaking the shot, getting the relationship between this shot and the next, he was transcending the story. As screenwriters, Prévert and Jeanson couldn’t perceive that, they underestimated him. He wasn’t just ‘photographing’ the screenplay, he was giving it power, strength.”

Tavernier says movies like 1937’s Le jour se lève with Jean Gabin, a precursor to film noir, made him a fervent admirer of Carné. “Look at the beginning of that film, how he takes the most uninteresting setting, a very poor city hotel, nothing visually exciting, and how he makes every shot great, has every shot moving the story forward. Contrasting high and low angles, thinking about the lenses, how you manage to film in a very tight set—that opening sequence should be a test for every director.”

The director says that the way Carné (and Melville, Henri-Georges Clouzot and other directors) filmed reverse-angle shots had a big impact on his own filmmaking. Especially in television, directors often film conversations in a shot/reverse-angle shot formula because it is easy and cheap.

“Carné mastered them, particularly in Le jour se lève,” Tavernier says. “Melville too, his shots are so symmetrical that he makes an art out of the cliché. I always try in my films to be asymmetrical. When I had a shot on somebody, the reverse is over the other shoulder, for example, with a completely different lens. But Carné showed me that the reverse can be so beautiful that one must not be afraid of it. He made an art out of symmetry.”

Tavernier points to Renoir’s use of a moving camera, how it opened up the world outside the frame, as another example of influence on his directing style. “You must never forget what is behind the characters,” he says. “When you are for instance shooting a scene in a restaurant, people eating a meal, I always try to incorporate some kind of background action so it will not be a static shot. Somebody passing behind, trying to include a window, trying to get something that will make the shot interesting, and not rely only on the shot and reverse shot. I’m always trying to put a little disorder in that. I like disorder. For me sometimes, a shot and reverse shot seems too clean, too easy. So I like to destroy that order a little bit.”

In My Journey Through French Cinema, Tavernier gives examples of how editing adds emotional weight to a conversation. “For me, direction is music,” he explains. “I think I have a good sense of music. My cuts are musical. There is a moment in the rhythm of a scene in which you might need a wide shot, not for any narrative reason, but to let viewers breathe.”

At one point he jokes about how Melville used rulers to line up shots. When Tavernier tells stories about Melville, Sautet and Ford, he is drawing from his personal experiences with them. Early in his career he sought out filmmakers like Howard Hawks, Raoul Walsh, Stanley Donen and Michael Powell, interviewing them in order to learn from their work.

“I believe the fact that I was interested in meeting all these people, it shows in my films. I was always interested in subjects that nobody did before. Nobody had used the setting for Let Joy Reign Supreme. Before ’Round Midnight there were very few films about jazz with jazz musicians. Life and Nothing But, there was nothing about that period. I tried to show how schoolteachers, cops, soldiers lived. How people worked during the Occupation, for example. The passion, the curiosity I had in meeting those people I hope is in synch with the passion and curiosity in My Journey Through French Cinema.”

If Tavernier’s documentary seems to concentrate on a dark vision of history, he points out that he was dealing with filmmakers whose forte was social drama. “I’ve just finished eight more hours, eight more episodes which will be shown on French television in October,” he adds. “There I talk about Pagnol, Guitry, Clair, Ophuls, Tourneur, even some forgotten directors who did musical comedies in the 1930s. So you will see a sunnier picture there.”

The post Franco-Cinephilia: Bertrand Tavernier Takes Us On an Intimate <em>Journey Through French Cinema</eM> appeared first on Boxoffice.

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