So there’s this movie Centurion that opened last week in the U.S., but it’s being shown in only eighteen theaters across the country.
What is the purpose of this? How can it do well when it is showing in only a handful of places? Are they hoping it will take off (it’s getting pretty good reviews on IMDb so far) and then they can “open wide”? Does that fact that it has already been shown at a bunch of film festivals and has been opening in countries around the world since the spring have anything to do with this?
One of the requirements for Oscar consideration is that the film have a theatrical release. I’m guessing that goes for most other major awards as well.
For foreign films, it’s a calculated strategy to reap the most money with the smallest investment by releasing the film in a handful of choice locations, usually metropolitan areas that are more likely to go to arthouse fare. More theaters means more prints, which are expensive to generate. A wide release means hundreds of prints, so unless a film has a broad appeal (and foreign and indie films rarely do), opening wide is a surefire way to put yourself into a very deep financial hole. Of course, if the film is a hit–positive word of mouth, high per-screen average–then they might consider going wider in small, incremental stages. But with so much competition vying for those screens, a smaller or foreign film would be foolish to open Big unless they have an ace in the hole (big star, proven franchise) that will help insure a big opening weekend–because make no mistake: if you don’t open big, you’re toast.
If the reason is solely for Oscar consideration, they need to show in only one theater, I believe. If they’re opening in 18, it’s because it’s a small independent production and they want to build word-of-mouth before risking a larger opening. (If word-of-mouth is bad, they won’t go wide at all.) The biggest success with this strategy is probably My Big Fat Greek Wedding, which started with a small limited release in a couple dozen theaters, and went on to gross more than $200 million in the US alone.
Actually, that was the norm back before Jaws. Maybe not just 18 theaters, but a small number of theaters in major cities (usually New York and LA). The idea was to get some word of mouth and good reviews out before going into a widespread release. Sometimes even big name films would play a week in New York before going anywhere else, then slowly trickle into theaters across the country in wide release.
Someone decided to start with a wide release in the first weekend, one reason why it’s hard to find good movies for adults these days.
This is exactly why Charlie Chaplin’s Limelight (1952) did not win its Oscar for Best Original Score until 1973, the current record between original release and Oscar win. The first time around, it failed to play in Los Angeles for one week, due to Chaplin’s political difficulties at the time. When it was rereleased in 1972, it did.
Centurion has also opened in Bangkok, in one cinema. But we hear it’s a crap film and so won’t be watching it.
I watched *Centurion *on TV last week. HDNET Movies had it for a one-night only sneak preview. I think you can pay to watch it On Demand, too. But don’t–it’s not worth it.
It’s not god-awful, but it’s not very good either. It feels very much like a direct-to-video release. I did have fun spotting some of the D-list actors that I’ve seen before, like “Mickey” from Doctor Who, the girl from the last Bond movie, and the girl from the story-within-the-story of V for Vendetta.
Just because it’s released before the word of mouth gets a chance to spread, doesn’t mean you have to go see it before the word of mouth. Even flops generally last two or three weeks in the theaters, and if it’s such a flop that it doesn’t even last that long, then it’s probably one of the ones you didn’t want to see anyway.
My point was that to bring in a big crowd, you need to advertise a lot of flashy action. Movies are marketed by trailers, TV ads, and hype these days. In many cases, they want to get you into the theater before the word of mouth kills them. You have a single weekend to make a big splash or you lost money on a film.
Going back to the 30s, films were promoted differently. It was stars, newspaper ads, critical opinion, and word of mouth. Most prestige films were released on one or two big theaters in a city (like Radio City Music Hall), played a week to get the critics and word of mouth going, then started moving to smaller houses – and more of them – each week.
When I went to see 2001: A Space Odyssey in New York, it had just opened in one theater – Loew’s Capitol. It played there exclusively for at least two months. Then, it started moving to other theaters and spreading out. There was a similar pattern in other cities, so it’s quite possible that the first week it was out it was in only 18 theaters.
No big-budget SF film would ever be released that way today, but that was the norm back then.
I wonder if this was intended as a straight to DVD release. I remember reading ages ago (the late nineties) in Billboard that sometimes straight to video releases would actually get limited theatrical releases solely as promotional tools. Even then, direct to video releases had a terrible reputation. Just by having very brief releases in a few theaters, audiences were though much more likely to consider the video a “real movie”.
Could it be a test to see what response or reviews it will garner? I suppose they could use test audiences for that, but unless it’s changed in recent years, I know that cinemas at least used to turn all of the ticket money over to the studios, while they made their own money off of the snack concessions. If a movie’s not going to bring in a lot of people, then a lot of the actual cinemas could lose money, never mind the major studios.
No, they are not free, they are actually kind of expensive comparable to a real print. Their biggest savings comes from the lack of shipping costs.
The limited release strategy is done for several reasons.
Several have been mentioned. Oscar consideration. Attempt to garner good reviews or word of mouth. The film may only appeal to certain markets.
Also the ‘studio’ releasing the picture may be a ‘specialty’ studio and they simply don’t do the national release ‘thing’.
There is a database that the distributors use that has film grosses for about 30 years in it by theater. So you can look and see which were the top theaters for a certain type of film. (foreign language, rated r, action) and you may say, well if I do these 18, I stand to make X amount of dollars. I’m happy with that.
Actually I just checked and it says that is is available ‘on demand, and on xbox now’ so that’s why it’s only in 18 theaters.
The list you see most often is movies ranked by total gross income, so releasing in a lot of theatres is important for that.
But another list, one that is very important to the theatre owners when deciding which movies to book for their theatre, is the per theatre list, which reports the average income per theatre that is showing the film. So if you pick a small number of theatres in locations where your specific movie is likely to do good, and spend a bit on advertising in those areas, you can make your movie turn up high on the per theatre list. And that will attract the attention of the theatre bookers.
If it’s “in major cities” then it’s probably hedging it’s bets to see how it does before a possible wide release. Or it may be a film that is doing very well overseas but isn’t expected to vibe with American audiences, so it is given the minimal possible run they think they can get away with without it getting embarrassed.
If it’s just in L.A., or just in one or two random theaters than it’s probably an “obligation showing”. Either whatever minimum showing it needs to be nominated for some award, or whatever minimal showing it needs in order for the studio to get out of paying actors/directors with contract stipulations that say they get paid extra if the film doesn’t get shown in theaters (that’s what happened with “Feast”).
Could you expand on this please? A digital “print” is just a file right? How could there be any cost to duplicate it besides the electricity to run the computers?
I used to work in theatrical distribution. (for Paramount Pictures and for a small studio called IDP)
While working at IDP in 2008 I asked the Print Manager about it and he told me they cost about the same as a standard print. He didn’t elaborate but they are not ‘just a file’ they are not a DVD. I think the people who invented the file type charge a fee to have the movie put into that file type. Since these are the same people who make their money off of printing ‘hard copies’ of movies, you don’t think they are going to slit their own throats on the physical print end by selling the digital conversion for nothing do you?
The Print Manager, btw, is the person who buys the prints and works with the labs that produce the prints and frequently has to watch the movies again and again, usually with the cinematographer or director of photography. (DP) The DP and/or the Director and perhaps the Producer all approve the prints before they are mass produced and sent out.