Repeat moviegoers help Hollywood eke out a slightly better 2025

LOS ANGELES – Let’s start with the good.

Movie theatres in the United States and Canada sold an estimated US$8.9 billion (S$11.4 billion) in tickets in 2025, a 2 per cent increase compared with a year earlier, according to the Comscore data service.

That was no small achievement given the staggering number of seats that went unsold in months like October, when one film after another (The Smashing Machine, Tron: Ares and Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere) fizzled in wide release.

Cinemas also got smarter about catering to the people who still show up. The number of “habitual” moviegoers – people who see a film in a cinema at least six times a year – increased 8 per cent, according to American trade group Cinema United. Growing membership programmes like AMC Stubs A-List, Regal Unlimited, Cinemark Movie Club and the resurrected MoviePass added momentum.

And some movies connected with audiences to an unexpected degree. Studios started one colossal new franchise (Minecraft) and revived another (Lilo & Stitch). Originality also showed signs of life, with Sinners, F1: The Movie and Weapons making the year’s top 20 ticket-selling list. No purely original movies (not based on a prior work) made the cut in 2024.

For an industry struggling to maintain its relevance in the face of sweeping changes in consumer behaviour and technology, even small improvements like these matter. Only a few years ago, when the Covid-19 pandemic forced many cinemas to close for long periods, it was an open question whether moviegoing would survive at all.

Now, for the bad and the ugly.

For the most part, dramas and comedies continued to flatline. The carnage included the poorly reviewed Ella McCay, which was written and directed by Hollywood legendary film-maker James L. Brooks. It cost an estimated US$60 million to make and market and has collected about US$4 million in North America since its release on Dec 12. (Studios and cinemas split ticket sales roughly 50-50.)

Studios used to give cinemas an exclusive window of about 90 days to show new movies. That changed during the pandemic, when movies started to become available for digital rental or purchase after as little as 17 days. This eviscerated the incentive to watch movies in cinemas – especially dramas and comedies, which play just fine on living-room televisions.

To sell a substantial number of tickets, non-franchise films seem to need otherworldly reviews. Rotten Tomatoes scores below the 80 per cent positive range rarely cut it any more, analysts say.

“It now takes something truly special to break through with original stories,” said Mr David Gross, a film consultant who publishes an influential newsletter on box-office numbers. “In addition to quality, moviegoers want stars and spectacle.”

He pointed to films like Marty Supreme, a period sports drama starring white-hot actor Timothee Chalamet that has taken in a strong US$37 million since arriving in wide release in the US on Dec 25.

Directed by American film-maker Josh Safdie, Marty Supreme had a Rotten Tomatoes score of 94 per cent positive as at Dec 31. The movie cost US$65 million to make and tens of millions more to market.

Marty Supreme contributed to a burst of year-end moviegoing, with audiences also responding to The Housemaid, a thriller based on a popular book (US$54 million over its first 12 days), and David, a faith-based animated adventure (US$56 million over its first 12 days).

The mega-budget Avatar: Fire And Ash was easily the No. 1 movie at North American cinemas over the Christmas holiday. The sequel has taken in US$242.1 million since arriving on Dec 19.

The problem? In 2023, Avatar: The Way Of Water collected US$317.4 million over the same period. That is a 24 per cent slide from film to film.

Avatar is not the only Hollywood franchise in apparent decline. Others include Jurassic World and the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The SpongeBob Movie: Search For SquarePants has sold about US$44 million in tickets since arriving on Dec 19, down 58 per cent from results for The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out Of Water over the same number of days in 2015.

In part because of weaker results for franchise films, total yearly ticket sales in North America remain roughly 22 per cent below totals for pre-pandemic years. Foot traffic is probably down even more because cinemas have raised ticket prices since then.

Is it time for Hollywood to concede that a lot of moviegoers in the US and Canada are never coming back? That movie theatres have permanently lost 20 per cent of their customers? Some analysts say yes.

And things may be about to get worse.

Warner Bros., which supplied more hits to cinemas in 2025 than any other studio, has agreed to sell itself to Netflix as part of an US$83 billion deal. If the purchase goes through, Netflix has indicated that it will experiment with shorter periods of theatrical exclusivity for releases from the studio. NYTIMES