Movies haven't been doing well lately, to put it mildly, and lots of films that were supposed to have wide appeal failed to bring people at the cinema. The most famous ones being superheroes movies, whose main demographic is young white men. So, imagine the smug cooming if a movie made for black women would not only buck this trend but would also save cinema everywhere, proving once and for all that white men are useless and that diversity films are the way to the future...
The dream came close with The Color Purple, a movie about suffering black women (and faith, but no one on the internet mentions this). It had a great start at the boxoffice, with really high critic and audience scores and a great opening day, so soys all over rejoiced Tbf for the movie, it seemed that it was genuinely liked by it's target audience, older religious black women, and had good sales during Christmas, but as soon as the religious fervour died down and the movie had to rely on the general audience for legs... it started dropping badly to put it mildly.
CP/TCP - The Color Purple
OW - Opening Week/Opening Weekend (mostly probably the later since the movie hasn't been out for a week yet)
OD - Opening Day
Early reactions before the movie was out in the theatres
this isn't a remake.
It's an adaptation of the stage play.
It's not a remake it's just a remake!
This is a lesbian movie
They better NOt brush off the lesbian aspect of the film.
Apparently the main character of the book finds Jebus due to her lover, but the past movie ignored this and made them friends
Reddit is absolutely obsessed with this lmao
Even with the whole Spielberg brushing off lesbian aspects in his film version?
What about the lesbian s*x chud?
It's a current year movie about black women after all
Uhhh with all the remakes and reboots that have happened in the past years I'm positive this isnt a race thing😂 black people are not the test subjects if this is one of the few remakes of black films in a sea of remakes of fantasy, horror films, etc.
Yeah, i said remake of a masterpiece
It being a masterpiece has not stopped decades of remakes of other masterpieces. This is no different. And at least it's a musical.
You also said black people being test subjects of remakes which is objectively untrue based on the decades of remakes.
The argument keeps going after this and moves on to what movies are actually masterpieces
BOT
4th comment of the thread, a good start
What part of "Film of the Tony winning Musical" did you not read?
C'mon, man. You've legit just made the same (very condescending) post three times. Use the multiquote button or just make the post once.
Movie was just announced and BOT users are already attacking each other over it
Yeah this will be a big hit. Look at that cast and everybody loved the original.
The cast is some literally whos and the black mermaid Oh and Oprah is a producer or something if anyone still cares about her
This is really going to be big. Press tour is going to be crazy.
Same person... this thread has like 7 pages in total and most mildly popular movies go into at least the 20s, so there were already some signs pointing to the future disaster...
A grand opening and a great success!
Here's a whole comment section where redditors jerk themselves raw over this movie potentially getting a perfect score
(Again, tbf it did get a really good score, an A. Problem was the movie's niche audience - black women were the only ones who watched on the same day and gave the movie a great score but the general audience who came later was less impressed. Which is also why the movie has both a mixed and a really good reception. It's also why word of mouth isn't going to save it. It would have been a hit on a smaller budget but Hollywood must Hollywood I guess )
Lol only on Reddit would anime be used to explain the lineage of A Color Purple.
Finally Halle Bailey is in a movie that won't let down her talent.
this is her first WB movie but the fact she can sing, write her own music, write music for a film, act, & has gp appeal is something getting more rare and rare nowadays. i'm rooting for her to get a good push in 2024-2026, WB or Disney need to make her huge. she's definitely one of the newer celebrities to deserve it.
Redditors are still simping hard for BLM
Just say it's a black movie. My grandma and grandpop and all of their church folks will be taking off their Sunday hats and rushing to the theaters to see this. I'm tired of people using “niche” to diminish the black dollar. We're coming out and we're going to make it a hit. Period.
It's a black movie with a not advertised but significant L plot ...
Opens strong but has no legs after Sunday
What a plausible wet dream for you, for obvious reasons. I would block, but I appreciate you're not hiding your micro aggressions and are at least openly an L and an R.
No, we'll make it a hit you'll see!
It seems whoever was saying the movie was getting mixed reception was lying because it's at 88% right now off 34 reviews. The top critics scores is 95%. And the average score is 7.3/10.
Sometimes it pays to be patient
As a white man I really love black people, so inspiring and brave!
People really need to stop overestimating how much internet shit spills over in the real world, this is a bubble and nobody outside of it cares.
Movies don't flop because some internet weirdos are enraged, they flop if their whole audience is disinterested, but it's easier to blame a few annoying neurodivergents than face reality.
Same old argument about the Black Mermaid, if you're feeling nostalgic go read it
A musical about misery and a lesbian lead, who would thought the public would eat this up?
I've noticed a few users here trying to downplay it for this reason lol.
Can't have a gay musical with a black led cast winning the holidays
Well the public is apparently not eating it up
True, chuds need to remember that Oprah is still cancelled
Yes! This is well said.
Only black women can feel such deep emotions and recover from them, truly magical creatures
The movie is about a black woman who gets repeatedly r*ped by her father and then forced to give birth to the resulting children and who later discovers Jeebus and heals. Clearly the movie isn't deep enough if the two main protagonists are just being friends and helping each other get over their trauma or whatever, they MUST lick each other's coochies too
BOT
Holy shit at the reactions frommlast night premiere. This will be big.
Same guy from before, unfortunately tulpa'ing this movie's success into existence is not possible
(there are also critics reactions on the same page and they are all impressed )
Would not be shocked if this outgrosed Aquaman and Wonka based on ticket sells for all 3 movies
It will not in fact outgross Wonka
Sorry I'm a bit out of the loop on this one. What is this movie again and why it seems so popular?
This is what happens when you only pay attention to "geek" movies and geek actors...... Soer of shocked this explanation was necessary.
Kinda shocked that some poster on an international forum doesn't know all the random art slops featuring a minority group that culturally exists only in America, what gives?
So this movie beating up Wonka is BOT's cope of choice for some reason. I guess they have some vaguely overlapping audiences since they are both musicals but still, one is a family friendly colorful adventure and the other is about a lesbian r*ped by her father
This is so facts. Like after Empire, she should have been in everything, but her team was like "no" because?????????????????????
This generally happens only if the actor is too difficult to work with
Yeah, she deserves better. Uncle Sam is a little b-word and needs to stop taking 50% of what we make. I remember people were also going after Margot Robbie because she dared to make money from Barbie. People just assumed she kept all that.
Wow, I wonder why rich people are demonized on the internet, like what started it? Also why are taxes on large profits so high, I can't figure it out!
Her issue isn't Uncle Sam or splitting costs with her team, she's done many interviews about this, her main issue is that black actresses don't make the same amount as their white counterparts and despite being an Emmy and Oscar nominee she still has to audition, for example she had to audition and fight for this role in The Color Purple. Most of her white counterparts get offered roles, they dont have to stay on the audition circuit. She also said she had to fight for Danielle and Fantasia's team to ask for a fair amount from the studio.
White actors are all getting roles without even looking for them unlike strong black wahmen who have to go to auditions and shit
Oh, sounds interesting...
Too bad The Color Purple will also collapse after Christmas
Ehhh TCP and Aquaman have two different target audiences. I don't think one will exploit the other
Casuals that would otherwise go to Aquaman by default will go to TCP. I realize those aren't Aquaman's core but so few people care about a superhero movie that's already dead that it will get hurt by ANY competition.
I'm sorry but looking at Aquaman's target audience, I don't expect a bunch of 18-24 year old white guys to choose TCP default over Aquaman 2.
Oh yeah, Color Purple is such a wide pleasing blockbuster, everyone will want to see it
Remember the user above that predicted a $25m opening day, now they are talking about $16m
There's no way it does only $16M. Nearly every showing in my area is like 80-90% full with even a few sellouts.
i mean your local area isn't necessarily representative of all of USA and CAN
Reality starts to sink in
Can't wait for people to pretend that this number is bad actually. Totally not gonna be obnoxious and irritating no siree
Too bad that number wasn't higher, it's not like it's making much money now
Okay but even multiple people on this forum have reported similar things regarding this movie. Don't get me wrong, $16M is still a good number, especially for a film of this kind, but I expected closer to $20M, especially after watching walkups help Aquabro and Migration exceed projections.
Those are movies you can actually watch on Christmas tho
.... did anyone suggest it wouldn't get to $100 m dom?
A couple people in the tracking thread did this week. But there's been some fairly odd rhetoric about it in that thread that isn't reflective of the general opinion of the boards, for sure.
Those definitely are out of touch. TCP got to be some fanboys superhero movie to have that terrible legs. But it is not, TCP is a freaking Oscar player that opened during award season. That alone can give you some Oscar bump.
If the wolf of Wall Street get 100m with just 9.2m OD, and a freaking C+ cinemascore, TCP should get there with an eyes closed. It is 95% rated by audience which should at least translate to A cinemascore.
Stop predicting numbers in bad faith chud
It's fair to say that a $16 million OD Christmas movie missing $100m dom is unprecedented.
There is 0% chance TCP misses 100M with a 16M+ OD.
Never say never!
The WOM was good, unfortunately middle aged black women isn't exactly a large demographic
Just to be clear I never said TCP is gonna miss 100, I am just saying it is possible.
I gotta be honest, I don't get why you'd even bring this up before Cinemascore was up.
To be fair, he only mentioned that in this thread after another member said it was impossible TCP wouldn't reach 100M DOM. So, you should complaint to that member for bringing this up before Cinemascore was up.
The quote Charlie specifically made was in response to Clay's reasonable explanation that it was to pre-emptively shut up people who've been weird in the tracking thread, who Charlie proceeded to defend and then say it could miss 100 without any sign of that.
Clay may want to prevent a weird discussion, but he is just opening the door to that discussion by bringing up that topic. Charlie was only answering him with his own analysis.
Honestly, I just don't understand why you tried to call Charlie out for his answer. Maybe you don't like Charlie's analysis that TCP reaching 100M DOM isn't absolutely certain, but he didn't bring the topic out of nowhere on this thread (as Clay bring the topic first).
I explained it about as good as I can that deciding to defend those types of posts in the thread and genuinely try to argue that missing 100 million was doable pre-Cinemascore (Which a bunch of other people called out and agreed was just weird) is odd.
No, only positivity for black woman movie!
True, broadway musicals are a really good predictor for the general audience and not at all a nice and unironically privileged hobby
If it does follow the same path as The Woman King, then that is still $180,000,000+ in America
TCP's OD being on christmas throws that comp out of wack, though I'm still hoping it can reach that.
Then why bring up The Woman King in the first place? If it follows Dreamgirls, then it still gets to that number.
Not sure what's so hard to get...
I answered the poster by stating that while the best outcome would be for the film to break out to other demos, that's not a guarantee, and Woman King is a recent example of a film with excellent reviews and audience reception that still didn't manage to draw more demos to it
Of course that doesn't mean TCP will go that way, and Dreamgirls is an example of the opposite - all I said was that being excessively skewing to one demo is not necessarily a good thing, because it's possible those other demos just never come throug
And if the same percentage stays consistent for The Color Purple as it did for The Woman King, then it still gets to $180,000,000+. So, what is so hard to get about that?
Ok...let's try this one again. Yes, Woman King did do 10x its OD, but its OD was a regular friday, not christmas day, which boosts business considerably...
I don't really get if you don't get my point or you're just trying to get some weird gotcha moment on me
This isn't some sort of projection on the legs, merely a statement that there is no guarantee of a film breaking out of its demo into spectacular legs regardless of reviews and reception
TWK had spectacular reviews from both critics and audience with a much-coveted A+ cinemascore, but ended up having rather normal legs
The sudden crash and burn
The movie was a star for a total of one day, immediately after Christmas it started dropping hard. Most posts here are after Color Purple had 2 massive drops, and in less than a week it dropped 80% from it's opening day - an absolutely horrendous performance. Today most movies had a mostly flat performance, even Aquaman dropped only 3% since yesterday, The Color Purple? 15%. Obviously, all good mood turned into crying and coping.
Oh, you know exactly why
The African-American story portrayed here doesn't resonate/interest people outside of America
At least some people are reasonable...
"A movie aimed at the adults performs worse when adults at work" - wow, seriously?
Some less so
This seems to be the chosen cope among redditors
If we lived in a world where films 'need' to be for everyone, we'd only ever have superhero movies.
If you're demographic is that narrow maybe think twice before approving a hundred million budget
Depends on streaming deals, tax credits and other such factors. Each episode of House of the Dragon cost $20mil for a $200mil budget and it's not going to make a single ticket sale.
Big budget films should be criticized but I don't think spending $100mil for a prestige piece is a bad business decision, it just won't be frontloaded with cash.
Ah, this "argument" again. The budget may very well have done more on its own as an investment vehicle or invested in a different film - aka an opportunity cost. I'm not sure how much it'll do on VOD either because it is burning out its demand.
I think it's more than fair to say that this performance is not good.
This is the exact same argument you'll hear about The Woman King, which also flopped, even if /r/boxoffice refuses to admit it even today
This comment speaks volume about Reddit demo. "Older women" cut off point = 35 years old? When I think about "older women" it's 50+, and they're reading airport romance.
hate to break it to you but the classic Hollywood demo cutoff of young vs. old is age 25 (four quadrant system)
Redditor knows nothing about how film business works yet still takes time to write angry messages about various -isms
a VERY limited lens and view on the world my friend. Especially when OP said a movie would only appeal to a specific gender when the movie appeals to a mass community rather.
That's why the movie is a blockbuster right?
Exactly, 2nd highest Christmas Day opening ever, it's amazing!
Still not looking good for a clean hit lol
Second moron joins the argument
This doesn't bode well for the conversations about salary that have been surrounding this movie
Lmao don't let BOT hear this
They can and they did. They just rushed to see it on Christmas. The problem is people outside of the demo doesn't care.
I disagree I think access to movie theaters in underserved areas is a real issue and is a part of why it doesn't have legs https://www.indiewire.com/features/general/african-american-communities-lack-theaters-ava-duvernay-twitter-1201980590
this is a 6 year old article
This movie is flopping because of racist cinema deserts in the hood
White people really don't care to see movies with non white people in it seems
As a non american I really don't care about black culture movies
BOT
Jat was right about Color Purple missing 100 lol. Never should have brought it up!
This thing has a $90m budget, so below 100 would be a disaster. Even if it crosses 100 it would still be bad, since it needs to reach the $200m mark to start making profit. Even if the black audience and their allies will repeat view this movie, without the general and the international audience it doesn't have much chance to break even.
It's also the only time people actually still talk about the Marvels.
Capeshitters are eternally seething
(There's even an article about this phenomenon if anyone wants even more reading material: https://episodicmedium.substack.com/p/week-to-week-saying-the-marvels-bombed)
This movie better have really good legs among the black community otherwise it bombs But what are the chances of black men turning up en masse?
More like The Woman King, b/c it's not breaking out from 25+ Black women, no matter how good it is...here, I was hoping that group would at least drag their families and friends, but that dragging seems limited (the 25 and under males number was a big warning sign that it was mom and grandma without the grandkids)...
Yeah, no young black man will want to see the story of a black woman rebuilding her life after giving birth to fer own brothers no matter what grandma says
2 musicals at once really did split the musical audience down the middle, b/c while Wonka is winning December, it's still not getting close to what some folks hoped for a big breakout.
Color Purple never stood a chance to overtake Wonka. Come on, it's the winter holidays, the most cheerful time of the year for most people, who would ruin their time with their family over yet another trauma porn movie? "Alright guys, we have three movie choices this year: watch an older family classic, watch a funny new movie like Wonka or... an incestuous black lesbian corrective r*pe movie So which one will it be?"
I-it's not a bad performance at all! Even if it's fricking budget is $90m
oprah will tell her fans to buy it on digital/physical and it'll be okay in the long run. but yes, since it likely isn't making more than 150 million its a flop/bomb
Mother of all copes
These numbers may be what gets me to finally quit the boards. It just isn't any fun anymore.
Speak for yourself, seeing every movie collapse has been really entertaining
Mayos ruin yet another good thing! Mayocide now
The general audience is even more fragmented than before.
Unironically, casting a black lead was less controversial two decades ago than it is now
Unless it's a superhero (BP, Spider-Verse) or supernatural horror-esque (Get Out), white people don't really show up for "Black" movies. Personally, TCP always seemed so distressing to the point where I didn't want to see it either.
White people will accept black actors in 'neutral genres' like action, superheroes and horror, but will avoid black actors in plots or stories that revolve around black lives and experiences
Identity battles sure are less funny now, right?
It's kinda hard for me to believe CP having more male appeal than Woman King
lets not go there
Why do they keep bringing up that award like it matters? No one cares what awards musicals get. Also just because the musical got an award doesn't mean the movie is good
: Jesse what the heck are you talking about
: Hop off the crack bro
Girls have Moana themed bday parties to dress like her. Big reason why Frozen was such a hit is that girls loved to dress like Elsa cause that was so pretty. Nobody wants to dress like The Marvels yet Feige was bragging about discarding CM's sexier costumes in favor of...that thing. Then he multipled that thing whatever it is (potato sack?) by 3 and bombed worse than The Flash. No crack, just common sense. Look around, see how people dress and what they find pretty and put your characters in it. But fair enough, back to BO.
I know you've been here for like years but are you permanently stuck at 14?
You need to move on.
After a suspension, our resident problematic fave is back in full force with all their pent-up anger.
"fave"?
I was about to move some posts around to make a new thread, but before I do that....yeah Valonqar please do not post sexist garbage like this. I truly doubt the world needs women to dress ultra super sexy and have giant chests in order to find success in the movies. And if that is the case, we have a bigger problem in our awful patricarchal society, and it's a pity that you are encouraging this.
Please keep your hand out of your pants, or greater repercussions will come your way. You're an adult, so act like one. I hate that I have to wake up to this utter trash and that I even have to explain that this type of garbage shouldn't be on the forum, but I guess I can't expect too much from some of you. Ohhhhhhhhhhhh well.
Saying hot women attract more viewers is sexist on BOT
Major reason wonder women 1 was a smash hit is cause guys found gal Godot hot as heck in her outfit.
This goes for you too mister. We don't need this stuff on the forum. Period.
I mean people like looking at attractive actors look at Barbie who dress well...Ken and Barbie. People really liked how they looked. If Margot and gosling didn't look so attractive or dress so well i think it wouldn't have been as popular.
I feel like when people think it is weird I post on an online box office forum, this is what they're imagining.
That people watch movie for eye candy ?
There is an important difference between characters looking good and characters being hypersexualized. I'm not sure Hollywood (or some people in this forum) knows the difference.
Alright, about to move this into the Numbers/Data forum. But as a reminder once again to people, when I, or any other mod, ask you to stop something, you stop. No hesitation. No stammers. No ifs. No ands. No buts. No nothing. Please listen to the staff, or else more repercussions head your way. Thank you. :)
Come on guys, take me seriously for once : )
Color Purple can still technically make money, but it will need very good sales over lots of weekends for it. If black women love this movie to the point where they will watch it repeatedly or it starts to gather audience from other demographics it will be relatively fine (considering that movies that actually make money are an exception now). This weekend will be decisive for it. Don't hold your breath tho
Bonus:
Fun fact: The Marvel's Wikipedia article is currently protected because someone keep changing "the film became Box Office Bomb" to "the film is a Box Office Disappointment".
Lmao
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This is a musical?
With a positive religious aspect?
Musical theater enjoyers () won't like that because it will only remind them that they're going to heck.
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Why are there so many musical movies lately?
This has to be an elaborate Hollywood financial fraud scheme.
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Hollywood is desperate to find a new golden goose. Superhero movies, CGI slops, remakes and nostalgia baits have all started to fail at the box office and Hollywood is allergic to actually making good movies so they constantly try to find new slop mines.
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Tie in movie to toys and video games have been doing well though.
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But they involve a lot more work than just adapting a book or a musical, they need to actually think about the plot
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What confuses me is that you'd think the writing would be easier. It costs nothing to develop writing skills, unlike making billion dollar CGI slopfest visual effects. Why is it so hard for them to find anyone who can write worth a darn? Is it because of women?
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Adapting a book means the plot is already finished, they only need to change some details. Adapting a game means you need to think about how everything would work on the big screen, how to portray game mechanics or what endings or characters to pick - it's not difficult but it's more work. And toys don't even have a story attached most of the time, so they have to come up with one.
Most writers nowadays are young and come from upper middle class backgrounds, they have literally nothing to do with lower classes and probably never really struggled in their lives. But they are still very insecure because they realize they never really earned everything in their lives on their own, so they refuse to listen or learn from others in the profession. So the plots or characters they can come up with are very limited. Add the social pressure they face from their peers to be always mindful of identity politics and they limit themselves even further
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Nepotism, unions, and a decade of low rates. You have like 3-5 levels of management and writers that are completely incompetent, having been carried to their positions by a decade in which it was impossible to not make money in movies. Can't replace them because of the guilds either, even if you had anyone smart enough and with enough balls to try fixing it.
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Think about th writing?
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The real question is why are all the musicals hiding the fact that they're musicals in their advertising? Both this and the Mean Girls musical really need to show they're not just remakes, but they're purposely hiding the aspect that makes them more than just remakes.
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Test audiences don't like musicals.
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How do we trick people into liking what we're making?
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Free popcorn and soda during the test screening obviously.
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They did it with Wonka as well.
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Remember Musicals? Remember Doris Day? Remember every guy on the backlot running a train on Kathy Hepburn? Remember raping Corey Feldman? Remember all those teenagers in ice-cube-filled bathtubs with their kidneys cut out?
Hollywood remembers...
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Mind helping my memory out?
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I think i got Katherine Hepburn mixed up with Jayne Mansfield (who may have given Howard Hughes chlamydia as a result of her bow-legged ways).
Katherine was a massive cute butch.
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I dont know who that is.
Also i mistook katherine hepburn for audrey hepburn. Still tbf.
the mansfield chick, too. Just with a rubber, i guess.
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It's a religious musical with a lesbian theme, so both groups will be disappointed. Don't know what they were expecting here
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I personally liked the gospel song about a woman shoving her face into another woman's vagina while she was making noises like “Musaahhswazv slllluyuurrp ujjgfffg skuurrrp sluuuuro gggyufff hm spofg dslurp”
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