For the weekend in the United States and Canada, “Dead Reckoning Part One” played on 4,327 screens and was No. 1, with premium-priced IMAX and other large-format venues contributing 37 percent of ticket sales. “Based on exit poll ratings and recommendations, which were out of this world, this was the best-received ‘Mission’ yet, which speaks volumes about the viability of the franchise,” said Chris Aronson, Paramount’s president of domestic distribution.
Mr. Aronson made several other glass-half-full observations, including that, over the first five days, “Dead Reckoning Part One” was comfortably outperforming the franchise’s previous chapter, “Fallout” (2018), in most countries overseas.
Astoundingly, given its cost (about $15 million) and low-wattage marketing campaign, “Sound of Freedom” placed second, taking in $27 million from 3,265 standard screens, for a two-week total of $86 million. The horror film “Insidious: The Red Door,” a similarly low-budget offering from Sony Pictures, finished third, collecting $13 million, for a two-week total of $58 million.
“Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny” (Disney-Lucasfilm) epitomized a problem that Hollywood has encountered this summer with franchise spectacles, trundling along behind the top three with about $12 million, for a three-week total of $145 million ($302 million worldwide).
That’s a lot of money, but not nearly enough for a movie that cost at least $400 million to make and market. Since box office revenue is split roughly 50-50 between studios and theaters, “Dial of Destiny” would need to be performing more than twice as well for Disney to make money.
Domestic ticket sales total roughly $5 billion for the year, down about 20 percent from the same period in 2019, the last year before the pandemic severely disrupted moviegoing. And franchise sequels are part of the reason for the decline. Decades of being pumped for profits have left some of these properties with threadbare tires.
The third “Ant-Man” movie, the 10th “Fast and Furious” chapter, the fifth “Indiana Jones” installment and the 12th (“Shazam! Fury of the Gods”) and 13th (“The Flash”) films in the DC Extended Universe have all disappointed, certainly in comparison with their costs.
“In general, audiences are interested in more, more, more of the same, until they start getting satisfied and excited about the next thing,” Mr. Gross, the box office consultant, wrote in his Sunday newsletter.
Source: | This article originally belongs to Nytimes.com
