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Source: CNBC
Over the past couple years, the month of October has started to go from one of the less lucrative times of the year for the domestic film industry to a time where the most unlikely of films can break out and earn big bucks. The month has historically been used as a time for studios to release any number of their various horror films, taking advantage of the Halloween season that lasted until the very end of the month. However, such works often had lower budgets than the much more expensive blockbusters that often came during the summer or holiday seasons, so for the most part, little was needed to turn a profit, and for the most part, little was exactly what these films earned. All of that began to change though in the last few years of the 2010s, with 2018’s “Venom” proving to be a surprise hit and 2019’s “Joker” performing even more impressively with a worldwide gross of over $1 billion. This trend of October being a time for unexpected blockbusters came to a brief halt in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but quickly bounced back a year later. In fact, October 2021 proved to be so successful that it’s done better for the box office than any month since the beginning of the pandemic.
Between October 1st and October 31st of this year, the domestic box office received an overall revenue total of around $637.9 million from ticket sales, making it the highest grossing month of the year so far. In doing so, it has surpassed July of this year, which previously held this title with an approximate gross of around $583.6 million. In an ordinary year, the idea of October being a more profitable month than July, the very middle of the summer blockbuster season, might sound absurd, but in a time when the pandemic still lingers over much of the country, anything is fair game, and studios couldn’t be happier to see such success. “Though this is likely an anomaly that will perhaps never be repeated,” notes Comscore senior media analyst Paul Dergarabedian, “the 10th month of the year has now shown that it can indeed provide a great home for blockbusters of any size or genre type.”
October 2021’s box office revenue may pale in comparison to the years 2018 and 2019, which earned domestic totals of $832.1 million and $789.5 million respectively, but even disregarding the pandemic, it’s still a remarkable total for a month that isn’t usually considered to be a lucrative time for the box office. In fact, it’s more than what was made during this month in 2017, when the domestic box office earned $569.8 million, showing just how much the month of October has changed in regards to being a desirable time to release a major blockbuster, even during the time of a pandemic.
Having opened at the beginning of the month, “Venom: Let There Be Carnage”, the sequel to the 2018 superhero film, proved to be the most successful of the films released during October, having so far earned a total of $190.4 million at the domestic box office. Following close behind is “No Time to Die”, the final installment of the James Bond franchise to star Daniel Craig as the lead, with around $133.3 million and counting. In addition, “Halloween Kills”, the follow-up to the 2018 “Halloween” revival, has so far made $85.9 million, more than expected given the film’s availability on the streaming service Peacock. Then there is “Dune”, the highly anticipated science fiction epic from director Denis Villeneuve; with a gross of $69.3 million and growing at the domestic box office, the film has been deemed just successful enough for a sequel to be greenlit, one that is expected to come out in theaters in just under a few years.
With these new totals, the year’s domestic box office has reached an overall gross of $3.1 billion in its first ten months. While this is 66% lower than what had been earned up to that point in 2019 (before the start of the pandemic), it is 45% higher than what had been earned up to that point in 2020, signalling that the box office is slowly, but surely on its way back to making something of a full recovery. In fact, one theater chain in particular, Cinemark (the third largest in the nation) recently reported that it received its highest monthly earnings this October since the beginning of the pandemic, more than double what it had earned in May. “I am thrilled that we have reached a new milestone within the industry’s recovery, delivering our best monthly box office performance since the reopening of our theatres,” states Cinemark CEO Mark Zoradi. “Congratulations to our studio partners for creating must-see big-screen content with something for everyone.”
As impressive as October 2021 for the domestic box office, there’s a very good chance that what it has done will pale in comparison to what’s to come during the rest of the year. The final two months of 2021 will see even more major releases that are expected to take in a great amount of ticket revenue; November will see the debut of “Eternals”, the next film to be part of the long-running Marvel Cinematic Universe, as well as the long-awaited sequel “Ghostbusters: Afterlife” and the Disney animated musical “Encanto” among many others. December, meanwhile, will offer films that are arguably even more highly anticipated, including the Steven Spielberg musical “West Side Story”, the sci-fi sequel “The Matrix Resurrections”, and possibly the single most hyped movie of the entire year, the superhero sequel “Spider-Man: No Way Home”.
While some are still wary about the current state of the nation, most box office analysts have expressed great optimism about what is to come during the rest of the year. “We’ve been through several of these stress-test periods throughout the year, and there will be more to come during the holidays and winter,” claims Shawn Robbins of Boxoffice.com. “Vaccines for young children remain crucial in the long term. All in all, though, theater owners and studios should be very encouraged by the string of recent box office hits and what they signal for the new year around the corner.” The pandemic may not be over as of yet, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t anything for the film industry to look forward to in the upcoming months.
