America’s leading actors, directors and producers from Tinseltown has been mesmerising audiences around the globe for decades. The bad news is that this fall season reveals a disturbing pattern. Despite lofty expectations, many of those marquee names have not yet delivered when it comes to box office success. Leonardo DiCaprio on the set of “One Battle After Another” expected to bring in over $200 million worldwide. Yet, while this achievement is remarkable, it actually highlights a much larger issue in the industry.
The film business has ebbed and flowed over time like any other medium. This season, the climate seems especially daunting for the A-listers. The Smashing Machine is unusually star-studded, starring Dwayne Johnson and Emily Blunt. Yet surprisingly, most films starring one of these big name actors are failing to resonate with audiences.
The tide is turning, and the fate of an exhibition industry that still can’t decide what keeps audiences flocking to cinemas is hanging in the balance.
One Battle After Another is a refreshing exception that stands out as one Battle to the next. With an Imax-sized budget and a director who has received multiple Oscar nominations, the film has garnered almost universally positive reviews. It’s an exception in a deluge of films that are floundering and failing—can’t even find their feet. Compared to that, recent market entries such as “Challengers,” “Poor Things,” and “The Fall Guy” have failed to ignite interest. These films have garnered relatively lukewarm audiences, well below the kind of massive success enjoyed by previous movie events.
This fall movie season — which has seen a boon of top notch performers as of late with actors such as Margot Robbie, Colin Farrell, and Dwayne Johnson — is no different. Yet all their star power has not managed to produce such a hit. The absence of a hit movie headlined by these stars raises fundamental questions about their marketability. It’s a reflection of the evolving tastes of today’s audience.
Now, Warner Bros has proven that every blockbuster doesn’t have to be a sequel and reboot. All this originality is paying dividends at the box office! Songs like “Sinners,” “Weapons,” “F1,” and the showstopper, “One Battle After Another” are all doing their part to not only perform well. This success is a reminder that audiences continue to desire new narratives — but those narratives need an inviting entrée that inspires people and grabs their attention.
In “After the Hunt,” Julia Roberts takes on the role of an overworked college professor. At the same time, Keanu Reeves plays a well-meaning but bumbling angel in “Good Fortune.” Even these great stars have had trouble enticing audience members into the theaters. The challenge is not just the performances, but the reception of non-genre films as a whole.
The film industry is increasingly competitive. For a modest film to succeed at the box office, everything must align perfectly: excellent reviews, engaging trailers, substantial online buzz, and low competition from other films. The truth is, even well-known stars can hardly catch an audience without this synergy working for them.
Last year, movies such as “Ticket to Paradise,” with Julia Roberts and George Clooney, prospered during the fall semester. In the same vein, “Hustlers,” starring Jennifer Lopez, had a small but successful start as well. The reality of today’s trend is that audiences are both increasingly leaving theaters and gravitating towards completely different forms of entertainment. Influencers and YouTubers are the new movie stars and pop singers. Many of today’s youth no longer dream of becoming movie stars or singers.
As franchise brand names have replaced individual stars as primary drivers of ticket sales, the question arises: Can movie stars still guide audiences into stories that might not otherwise interest them? Leonardo DiCaprio’s long career has served as a perfect example for this power. He has drawn millions to vastly different stories simply by appearing in them. Even his new smart growth project will have an uphill fight against changing audience tastes.
This collapse in cinema admissions for major movie stars paints a powerful picture of a dramatic shift in audience tastes. The magic of Hollywood A-listers seems to be wearing off as audiences gravitate toward fresher experiences and ways of telling stories. The box office landscape continues to change at an accelerated pace, shocking even seasoned industry veterans as to what might be around the next corner.