Fest Track On Sirk TV Print Coverage: CINEMACON 2024 [Caesars Palace - Las Vegas, Nevada] - Part I

CinemaCon always function on the business of how movies work but also how the pendulum swings in different directions. The texture of the strikes now in the rear view mirror hasn't quite come to bear in terms of the texture of new product (though this might be in the context come next Spring).

Opening Night The progression was slightly muted in cetain ways with the absence of any talent on opening night to support the screening of Universal's "The Fall Guy". Ryan Gosling was in NYC preparing for next week's hosting of "Saturday Night Live". Director David Leitch and his producing partner were in Australia getting ready to launch the film there. "The Fall Guy" was filmed mostly in Sydney. Of course there was a big splash at the Cinemacon Universal presentation last year with Gosling, Emily Blunt and Leitch on hand plus a full stunt team so the groundwork had undeniably been set before. The film launches on May 3rd and had a successful launch at SXSW. The afterparty for opening night like last year was held at the Omnia Nightclub in Caesars Palace with a newly renovated terrace overlooking the Strip.

Prior to the opening screening in the Palace Ballroom, NATO CEO Michael O'Leary moderated a discussion on the importance of mid-budget movies with a panel that included Lisa Bunnell (President Of Distribution at Focus Features) & Elissa Federoff (President Of Distribution at NEON Rated). The questions ranged on how to get people into the theater for mid-range but also how to both pick and engage people for such films. The challenge, first stated by Bunnell, is that it is harder to get talent to agree to promote films while stlll moving the needle to make the films theatrical. She states "The Holdovers" as a great example when it works. She also pointed to the success of "Immaculate" which NEON distributed. Federoff states that "Immaculate" worksin addition because Sydney Sweeney was behind it having loved the script but also being a producer. Her point is that there needs to be quality and not quantity. The path that she sees in many ways to procuring TV stars into cinema stars. Sweeney had already started to make that transition but was a good example.

Bunnell continues that it is giving time to let something build. This is of course a 2-sided street because the influence and encroachment of PVOD is always lurking. Bunnell then related that "Poor Things" would not have worked if it had gone out on 3000 screens at the inset. But also sometimes risks have to be taken. She said there was no data to support making TAR but that she was happy it was made and considers it one of Cate Blanchett's best performances. Bringing in new audiences is also about making what was old new. Federoff states that NEON bringing back the original "Old Boy" (a 20 year old title) for a week run allowed those who wouldn't have been able to see it originally get that theatrical experience. Bunnell says while they don't deny the audience influence, they also embrace what she calls the "elderverse". She says they also try to go slow so they don't lose runs. One of her suggestions to the exhibitors was maybe doing a speciality day on Wednesday for a couple screenings. Federoff says they did a $6.66 Wednesday promotion for "Immaculate" to get people in to watch the film because she understands for many moviegoers there can be price resistance.

State Of The Industry & Crunchyroll Presentation With Noovie changing up some of their pre-show elements to include sports and some visual elements like OceanX, some of the consistent players are trying to bring in a new sense of distinctive content. The addition of the new "Behind The Screens" segments made by NATO to highlight dustributors are quite engaging and could be used in cinemas. During opening night, one that was highlighted was Stuart Cinemas in NYC which is the first cinema there owned by a Black Latina. Another one shown in the first day and a half was the Heinweiser Drive-In in Illinois which was about to be sold for condos or development unless someone came in and wanted to keep it a drive-in. These segments, made with good production value by FilmFrog, really give a sense of what maintaining the theater experience is all about. Chris Johnson who runs Classic Cinemas in Illinois was given the Marquee Exhibitor award. It was presented by his son who, though visibly nervous, talked about his father cleaning out the bottom of a new acquisition property in his early teens. It made sense later on as his father (the grandfather by extension) did own the theater. But over the years, Chris Johnson has built up his theaters, still small. He states though that the studios and distributors have given him the time of day which has meant the world to him. His mother and father passed recently so they could not be there to see him get the award. His son and daughter are not going to into his business but he says it is still all about legacy.

Before that Toho CEO Hiro Matsuoka came out to celebrate 70 years of Godzilla after the success of "Godzilla Minus One" and the current success of "Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire". He related the beginnings back in 1950 when one of the original creators has encountered some fisherman who had developed some radiation sickness when the hydrogen bomb tests were done in the Bikini Atoll. That influence and then a person in the office who had a gorilla nickname combined with another creature basis to come up with name Godzilla. MPA CEO Charles Rivkin spoke after Matsuoka and gave a more interesting point of attack against piracy, even mentioning one site by name. He cited two entities that are helping combat this in the Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment and the Trusted Partner Network but went one step further in saying that they are going forward in trying to get Congress to pass a Site Blocking Law to combat the illegal movie sites. He showed some data that indicated that we are one of very few established nations not to have such a law in place. Granted the biggest question becomes that of 1st Amendment rights. However he says that these movie sites are causing a loss of 1 billion in revenue for theaters. If people cannot get it this other way, this will also push them back to the theaters. This was something he admits was attempted back in 2012, three years before he took the position. However the landscape has changed immensely since then.

NATO CEO Michael O'Leary also bridged alot of these discussions by bringing into perspective the Independent Theater Owners Coalition which encompasses many of the mom and pop cinema chains. Their head recently was able to hold meetings with some of the studio partners to help foster discussion and collaboration (which O'Leary had mentioned was a major theme of the week). O'Leary also carried out in an afternoon a press tour through the trade show which highlighted both bigger vendors and a couple smaller ones. Dolby, Barco and Coca Cola where among the major stops with enhancements by Barco [HDR], Dolby [Vision & Atmos] and Coca Cola (Expanding Freestyle, Spiced Coke and Icee Freestyle]. Other quick highlights included the Zinc Group (who was responsible for the viral Dune II buckets), Sweet Robo (automated vending machines for treats like fresh cotton candy) and Buddy's Kitchen (which creates craft style small sandwiches but in a quick creation/no kitchen set up)

in lieu of approaching their feature film slate, Sony Pictures decided to dedicate their opening morning presentation slot to Crunchyroll, their anime platform which merged with Funimation. Anime, of course, has always been a draw to the youth but in many ways had been relegated to the niche market with a breakout happening every now and again. With "The Boy & The Heron" winning the Oscar for animated feature over the likes of "Elemental", the anime movie market is building and it is easier to deliver dub and high resolutionnprints than ever before, especially from overseas. Mitchel Burger, formerly of Funimation and now with Crunchyroll discussed with distributors why this appeals to the moviegoing demographic and has a built in social media component. He showed single scenes and new trailers from the sports themed anime movies: "Haikyu: The Dumpster Battle" and "BlueLock: Episode Nagi" which deals with competition for high school volleyball and soccer respectively. "Overlord: The Sacred Kingdom" was more fantasy based with a context of mythology. The final piece was "Spy x Family: Code White" which comes out in less than two weeks and had been promoted via theaters already. Crunchyroll showed the first ten minutes of the film to establish a sense of the characters.

By Tim Wassberg