The Year in Review:
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The cinema landscape felt very familiar and very unfamiliar in 2023. There were some incredible moments, breakout hits and major wins, and there was again massive uncertainty, changes, and challenges. The slow start to the cinematic year was followed by an amazing summer which included the Barbenheimer cultural moment intertwined with industry strikes and shifting film releases. The impacts of these varied wildly depending on which theater seat you sit in.
As a movie-goer, I saw more than 40 movies at a theater. My Top 2 films were OPPENHEIMER and AIR. These were my favorite movies of the year. I saw OPPENHEIMER three times in the first four days. Once at a trade screening, once with my wife and friends, and once with my son and a friend. It is what cinema is about. It’s everything you build the cinema experience for and the ultimate showcase of how powerful a great auditorium can be. It simply cannot be replicated or replaced. AIR just fits me. When Matt Damon and Ben Affleck are on, they are great. Add Viola Davis, Jason Bateman, Chris Tucker, and Chriss Messina to this great story and put that in front of a guy that loves sneakers, the sneaker sub-culture, an entrepreneur, marketing and brand guy. I now incorporate Nike’s 10 Principles into my daily life. As a movie-goer, 2023 gave us a lot to experience. It showed that the movies I love or you love or movies we didn’t love was a matter of choice, preference, and our own experiences. The movies that I saw opened my eyes to new worlds and perspectives. And once again, my choices had nothing to do with what some random critic said the movie had to be. That was how awesome of a job filmmakers brought to us in these great stories of 2023.
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As an entrepreneur and film marketer, I’m not sure what I expected and that’s what I got. First and foremost, the team at FilmFrog is incredible. They do incredible work. They treat everyone with humanity, they attack challenges with enthusiasm, and they do really cool shit. That is what made 2023 so powerful. Business is great when the box office is up but it is a desert during the lulls. It is a lonely place and everyone feels it. We’re always looking ahead but at the same time executing on the week. I cannot underscore the sheer velocity of campaigns. It takes a group of people who love movies, willing to work tirelessly and fearlessly. We have also ventured into new territory working on projects that will come to light… or to the big screen in 2024.
As an exhibitor with Cinema Lab there were definite peaks and lulls. Exhibitors are the last mile and direct connection between Hollywood and movie-goers. We are the ones actually interacting with the guest and seeing the emotions on the guests faces. We hear the laughter, screams and we see the tears, jumps, and scares. We also clean up those messes – HA!! Exhibition continues to be a challenging business but there is so much joy in it. Our two operating theaters could not be more different - The Village in New Jersey and The Cañon in Colorado. BARBIE was by far and away the top movie at The Village while SUPER MARIO, BARBIE and SOUND OF FREEDOM were closely the top three films at The Cañon. I love that there are films for everyone but not every film has to be for everyone. Our role as exhibitors is to curate the best content for the screen at all times and with only 5 and 4 screens at our locations, we have hits and misses. Hopefully, more hits.
The 2023 movie year was the year of BARBIE. It’s that simple. BARBIE brought something forward that will change and stick with exhibition for a long time. We are a culture of going out and interacting. From Memorial Day through Labor Day, you could not escape BARBIE. The events, brand collaborations, social and traditional media. Pink takeovers, and people of all ages dressing up to be part of the BARBIE-world. The impact is that going to the movies is great on its own but BARBIE in theaters influenced culture. This phenomenon will try to be replicated over and over in years to come. We talk about eventizing movies all the time, but nothing has taken over and will carry over like BARBIE.
I think the biggest thing I’ve learned this year is that we’re not in the movie business. We don’t make movies. We’re in the cinema business. We’re stewards of exhibition. People have been experiencing movies in cinemas for 100 years and will, I have no doubt, be experiencing movies in cinemas for the next 100 years. We’re carrying the torch, along with so many other dedicated people, for this period of time. It is important. It is important to provide a great place for these worlds to come to life. In a place with no distractions that immerses you to the point where you feel the emotion. It’s visceral. There is a sense of pride and honor to be able to do this. On any given day, I can fight like Rocky, be as cool as Bond, put all my chips on the table like Mike McDermott, create some magic like Harry Potter or be a business counterculture rebel like Phil Knight.
We will see you at the movies in 2024.