Coming soon to theaters — not audiences
COVID-19 is challenging the film industry, but these changes were inevitable.
During our vacation up north in July, we passed something that is a rarity these days: an open movie theater. It didn’t appear to be attracting much business, but it was showing Back to the Future, The Goonies and Jon Stewart’s Irresistible.
I have to admit that when I saw that flashing marquee and caught a whiff of popcorn, part of me wondered whether we should take the kids to get their first experience with Sloth or Marty McFly. The shudder that followed as I imagined sitting in the theater, breathing uncirculated air for two hours while strangers shoveled popcorn in their mouths, convinced me otherwise. I’ve seen “Outbreak.”
Two months later, not much has changed. Movie theaters have opened in other areas of the country, but in the Detroit area, you have to head about four hours north or head to Ohio (and no self-respecting Michigander wants to venture to Ohio). Restaurants and shopping centers reopened with restrictions in June and our governor gave approval for bowling alleys and gyms to do the same a few weeks ago, but the cinema remains shuttered. I’m not saying that’s right — I can’t fathom why gyms, casinos and strip clubs are open but cinemas are closed — but it’s the way it is.
But if theaters were open, would I go? I don’t think so. The last time I set foot in a theater was in mid-February, when I took my son to see Sonic the Hedgehog. It’s very likely that my only movie-going experience this year will be a SEGA movie starring Jim Carrey.
It should be obvious to everyone reading that I love going to the movies. My podcast partner, Perry, and I did an entire episode about our love of the theatrical experience. Ever since my parents took me to see E.T. as a 3-year-old, movie theaters have been my happy place. Some friends have called it my second church, and I don’t know if they’re that far off; something happens when the lights dim and the show starts that affects me on a very deep level. I miss going to the theater, smelling the popcorn and having one of our culture’s very few remaining communal experiences.
But I don’t see how going to a movie can be safe at this point, at least in a way that makes it worth the theaters’ while to remain open. As this AV Club article pointed out last month, when you go to the movies, you’re basically sitting in a giant box. You’re surrounded by strangers for upwards of two hours, breathing air in a room with very little proper ventilation. While masks and social distancing might be the rule of the day, theaters depend on concession sales, so they’re not going to block the ability to get popcorn and Coke, which means your fellow patrons are constantly going to be taking down the mask to put food in their mouths. And even if there are rules in place, theaters are notoriously lax at enforcing anything; you’re technically not supposed to use your phone or talk during a movie, and we all know how well that works.
My wife and I have been cautious throughout this pandemic, but not to the point where we are hermits. We went on a vacation to northern Michigan. We’ve stayed at hotels and B&Bs. We even went to an amusement park with our kids. But some activities still remain off-limits, and much of that comes down to how much time is spent indoors and how strong enforcement is. We try to stay out of department stores. We go to church for outdoor service. And while we’ve gone to some restaurants, our success rate hasn’t been great; too many servers have masks under the nose, and we try to stick to locations with outdoor eating. So while we would take movie-going into consideration if we felt it was safe, we just don’t feel it’s an activity worth doing right now. Probably not until caseloads are closer to zero and a vaccine is on the way.
And we’re not alone. Box office reports have been dismal. In a normal year, a new Christopher Nolan movie would easily guarantee a $100 million opening weekend or higher in the U.S. Tenet’s first two weekends were about $9 and $6 million, respectively. That’s bad for almost any studio release; for Warner Brothers’ biggest non-comic book film of the year, it’s abysmal. Tenet and WB will be okay; the film is currently at about $200 million globally, so it’s going to make a healthy amount. But that stumble proves that the U.S. movie industry is in a precarious place. Theaters still are not open in many areas across the country. Theaters that are open must operate at reduced capacity. And moviegoers in cities where theaters are still open still may not feel fully ready to risk their lives for what is, if we’re honest, a frivolity.
And studios are taking notice. Last week, it was announced that Warner Brothers is going to move Wonder Woman ‘84 back again, from its October berth to Christmas Day. It was reported this week that Disney is considering pushing Black Widow back from its November date and releasing the Pixar film Soul to Disney+, potentially as a premium offering.
I’d put money on both of these happening. Black Widow, as part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, is a guaranteed billion-dollar-grosser for Disney, and I’m sure they don’t want to lose the potential for making that theatrical revenue. But the MCU’s popularity is based on the interconnected nature of its films. To push one back means pushing back the entire slate, and depending on what storylines their Disney+ shows “WandaVision” and “Falcon and the Winter Soldier” want to cover, it could affect them. Variety posits that Black Widow could potentially take the February 2021 slot set for The Eternals, which makes sense. But I can’t see them waiting longer. I wouldn’t be shocked to see them try and goose their subscription rate by launching this on Disney+, either as a premium or as a way to somehow link it in with “Falcon and Winter Soldier.” And for Soul, Disney is obviously hoping to get it out in time to submit it for Oscar consideration, which means February is as late as it can go. They seemed to have success launching Onward on the platform in April, so I wouldn’t be shocked if this Pixar movie followed the same trajectory (although hopefully it’s more of a creative success).
It’s a dire time, whether you’re making movies or whether you love them. Not only was there not a summer movie season, it’s looking like there won’t be a Christmas one as well. As a critic, I look forward to fall as the time when prestige pictures start hitting the theaters, and about now is the time when I would be sending in my information for the Detroit Film Critics Society. With Oscars pushed back to April 2021, I have no clue how award season works this year. Perhaps it just means we’ll be getting screeners and building top ten lists in January and February — which, to be honest, is a much better time to be catching up on things, but making a top ten list in the middle of the year feels odd.
But realistically, theaters and studios are being forced to confront things that have been inevitable, even without the pandemic. Streaming services, video on demand, and declining theater revenues meant that eventually Hollywood was going to have to figure out a way to make films more available to a public that increasingly prefers to watch them from home. Theaters spent so long making the movie-going experience miserable that, much like the airline industry, they shouldn’t be surprised that the public isn’t rushing back. And studio dependence on blockbusters has hobbled it to the point where a major studio can’t lean on a mid-budget movie to save them anymore; indeed, one benefit of this pandemic has been the way smaller releases like Boys State, Bill and Ted Face the Music, and I’m Thinking of Ending Things have had an opportunity to flourish in the vacuum left by bloated event films (I’ve heard far more internet discussion about Bill and Ted, for instance, than Tenet or Mulan.)
And that’s what we have to realize the pandemic has really been doing. It’s forcing changes that we knew we’d have to reckon with but wanted to put off. The movie industry has to figure out how it will adapt and evolve in a digital area, just as workplaces are going to need to find a way to provide better work/life balances for employees now realizing just how broken the system was. Our culture has been stacked against minimum wage workers who have now revealed themselves to be essential to our functioning. It’s a bit terrifying, but also fascinating, because these last six months are going to reshape much of what we’ve long considered normal in American society. I’m sure we’ll discuss these aspects in more detail in future installments.
The Digest
Antebellum is a twisty, muddled mess
This week, I review Antebellum over at BHM Pop Culture. I was looking forward to this, as it’s from the creative team behind Get Out, and I think Janelle Monae is proving herself an actor of tremendous skill. The result, however, was not what I’d hoped for.
The joys of working remote
I also did something a bit different this week and wrote a productivity piece for Medium. One of the benefits of the pandemic (and there are only a few) has been how I’ve kind of found my groove working from home. It’s brought balance to our household and helped me really find a tempo in which I can thrive. So, I wrote about how I make it work.
Cross.Culture.Critic. talks FIF, nostalgia and getting old
On the new Cross.Culture.Critic, Joe and I talk about Five Iron Frenzy’s unbelievably successful Kickstarter campaign to record a new album (full disclosure: I’ve backed it). From there, we talk about the recent span of TV and movies dealing with old guys coming back to complete unfinished jobs, talk about our own nostalgia and growth, and then talk about the documentary Class Action Park. Listen and subscribe!
Chrisicisms
A few fun things I wanted to bring up this week.
Cobra Kai (Seasons 1-2) Netflix
Like many people, I initially dismissed Cobra Kai as a joke when it debuted on YouTube a few years back. I thought it was a trip back to the well we didn't need. Even when several people tried telling me it was good, I resisted. But, when it ended up on Netflix a few weeks back, I decided to give it a shot. Two weeks later, I’m only two episodes away from having seen them all.
This show should be taught to all aspiring screenwriters and producers as an example of how to successfully reboot a beloved property. The show, particularly its first season, is just a modern retelling of The Karate Kid, but the decision to switch perspectives and let Johnny Lawrence (William Zabka) be the focal point this time around gives it a richness I didn’t anticipate. There are quite a few easy ‘80s jokes and moments where the show leans too hard into meta humor, but Zabka’s performance is sincere and lived-in. It’s fascinating how it takes an iconic film and explores what might have been going on outside the frame. What happens to the villain of one of these sports films? What if the same event that changed the hero’s life also was a turning point for the bad guy that they would have to live with? What if there was more going on to the character than just a rich white bully?
Cobra Kai has fun with the innate badassness of Johnny Lawrence, but also allows Johnny to have his own shot at redemption as he reopens his former dojo. The show is also canny in how it uses Daniel LaRusso (Ralph Macchio); Daniel’s life has turned out well, and he’s still a nice, well-intentioned guy, but the show is insightful in how it plays with how blindspots and explores how assumptions can change who we view as heroes and villains.
The first season is one of the most purely enjoyable, compulsively watchable shows I’ve seen in a long time It works as comedy and teen soap opera, but it’s also a sincere redemption tale and gripping sports story. By the final episode of season one, I didn’t know who to root for, which is always the mark of an interesting sports movie.
Like I said, I’m two episodes shy of finishing season two, but I have to admit the sophomore season is a bit of a step down. There’s still plenty of entertaining drama and humor, and Zabka and Macchio’s performances continue to impress. But tonally, the show whiplashes too frenetically, and there’s not a unifying story to pull it all together as in season one. But there’s still enough to enjoy that I’ll be happily awaiting season three when it hits Netflix early next year.
Before Happiness by Shawn Achor
Shawn Achor’s The Happiness Advantage was one of the best books I’ve read about happiness, purpose and work. His followup, Before Happiness, is another great read. Achor, whose expertise is positive psychology, is evangelical about how happiness can give us more meaning and fulfillment in our jobs and how we can train our brains for it. Some areas here are repeats from his previous book, but I appreciate how Achor sets the stage for a mindset change that can then move on to accomplish what he lays out in his predecessor. If Happiness Advantage was about changing our perspective in order to view circumstances more positively, Before Happiness is about the practices that set us up for that success. I particularly loved the very practical steps about “Success Mapping,” his tips for canceling out negative noise, and his use of the term “Positive Inception” to describe how we can spread positive attitudes and perspectives to our families, coworkers and others we come in contact with.
Confronting Christianity: 12 Hard Questions for the World’s Largest Religion by Rebecca McLaughlin
I’ll admit that I’m mostly weary of apologetic books, but McLaughlin knows how to defend Christianity from a rational, scientific and philosophical level. Like Tim Keller’s The Reason for God, this book never talks down to skeptics or pretends that their concerns are invalid. Instead, it presents 12 of the most common objections to Christianity and then discusses how science, history, philosophy and a true understanding of the Bible can help answer them. McLaughlin’s a bit more theologically conservative on some issues than I am; I reckon her answers about the LGBT community might not satisfy some, and I think her chapter on Hell dodges the question by instead trying to serve as a (well-written) altar call. But McLaughlin’s writing is smart and engaging, and the book does a good job acknowledging the sincerity of people’s critiques of Christianity while also discussing why believers can rest assured that no one question will cripple the faith.
That’s all we got this week! We’ll be back next Friday!
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