February and March BOX OFFICE | Spring RELEASE SCHEDULE | Pandemic | March 11 to 13, 2022 weekend
Moviegoing where we are now, box office charts and commentary
The current weekend: March 11 to 13, 2022
There are no new wide releases this weekend, so a few general points —
1) February and March moviegoing
- After a soft January, February box office in No. America returned to the approximate levels we saw in the fall and year-end — down by one third, or a bit more, compared with 2020. The variety of movies that attracted audiences was a positive (Uncharted, Dog, Death on the Nile, Jackass, Scream, Marry Me). Before that, Spider-Man kept business afloat, with some help from House of Gucci, and at a lower level West Side Story and King's Man:
- March is going to be quiet — there are no new wide releases this weekend, two horror films next weekend, and one studio movie at the end of the month (The Lost City). Batman will carry the month.
- Looking ahead, April picks up with Sonic the Hedgehog 2, Marvel's Morbius launch, Ambulance, Fantastic Beasts 3, and a handful of genre pics. Then summer starts in May with Marvel's Doctor Strange 2, Downton Abbey 2, and Top Gun 2. As noted before, if moviegoing reaches a level that’s down -20% from 2019 levels before the end of the year, that would be a very good result.
2) The number of wide releases
- By count, the release schedule remains thin. There were 16 wide releases in January/February (normally there are 22 to 25). Currently, there are 24 wide releases scheduled for March/April/May (there will probably be several late additions) — normally there are 38 to 39. But the April and May titles are strong and they are more consistent from week to week, which is what we've been missing:
3) Pandemic
- The drop in new Covid cases during the last two months has been impressive (down -96% from the recent peak in January), and it continues to fall. No new serious variant has emerged during this time. The improvement happened during the in-door winter season, with relatively few restrictions on public gatherings.
- According to the CDCP/NY Times, 65% of all Americans are now fully vaccinated, and there have been 79.4 million cases, which is 24% of the U.S. population (assuming there were no repeat cases — certainly there were repeats, but we don't know how many). With reasonably good immunity now, moviegoing should strengthen later in the spring and summer: