2024 Mid-Year State of Cinema Report: Kids Movies & Sequels Pave the Path Forward for Cinema
225M Tickets Were Sold in the First Half of 2024
The year 2024 is off to a solid start despite some lingering effects from the Writers Guild and Screen Actors Guild strikes that impacted the back half of last year. 2024 should wind up being an incredible year at the box office.
In this analysis we are only looking at titles that were released in the first half of the year so that a holiday release in late 2023 isn’t swaying results. While dollars are important, the true test of a box office is the number of tickets sold. And an impressive 225 Million tickets were sold in the first half of 2024.
Every title helps to create an overall box office success. But in many past years, the top 25 titles garner the biggest percentage of the overall take. The first half of 2024 is no different. The top 25 titles took 86% of total admissions (78% in 2023). This year, the top 10 titles represented slightly more of the overall take (63%) compared to last year (57%), perhaps as a result of fewer titles available due to the lingering strike impact.
Four out of the top 10 movies this year have been kid-targeted titles. This year, the top release for the first half of the year was Inside Out 2 (in the first half of last year, the top release was also a kid-targeted movie, Super Mario Bros.).
While the top 10 blockbuster hits significantly contribute to box office success, a diverse range of films is also crucial for a thriving industry. A well-rounded content calendar that includes titles from all kinds of genres such as Action Adventure, Horror, Sci-Fi and Romance creates a box office that keeps on ticking week after week.
So far this year, the box office has had great success with Godzilla X Kong, Dune, and Planet of The Apes—all strong-performing Action Adventure titles. In the family-friendly space, Inside Out 2, Kung Fu Panda 4, IF and The Garfield Movie all performed wonderfully. And Bob Marley: One Love—a Biography, Drama Music film—rounded out our top 10. These movies all delivered over 6 million admissions each with most bringing in well over 10 million admissions.
Movies Attract a Wide Variety of Demographics
The beauty of the box office is that movies attract a wide variety of demographics. There are usually enough titles available to keep everyone engaged. The biggest audience at the movies in the first half of this year were Adults 18-34, driven by younger women. This is not surprising considering the #1 movie is Inside Out 2. From January 2024 to the end of June 2024, 30% of the audience was made up of women 18-34, with men 18-34 coming in next at 23% for a combined 53%. That’s not to say that other demos weren’t also going to the movies. 23% of the audience were under the age of 18, and 8% were over the age of 55. This proves yet again that cinema has a broad-based appeal.
Family-friendly Fare is Always Going to Help Spur the Box Office
The MPAA rating of a movie matters. These ratings, designated by the Motion Picture Association, are assigned by a voluntary board of members. Family-friendly fare is always going to help spur the box office to success. Kids rarely can go to a movie alone, so for every couple of kid tickets sold there’s usually at least one adult ticket purchased as well.
However, in the end, the most tickets were sold to PG-13 movies with that MPAA rating receiving 40% of all tickets sold in the first half of 2024. Though PG is not far behind at 37%.
2024 Has Had Five More PG-Rated Movies than 2023
So how do the top 10 titles break out by MPAA rating? While we mentioned that 4 of the top 10 were kid-targeted movies, one would think those would all be PG-rated movies, but in fact two were PG and two were PG-13. Compared to the same timeframe last year of the top 50 titles, 2024 thus far has had five more PG-rated movies, and five fewer PG-13 movies.
The common theme among the top four movies is that they are family-friendly titles. This type of content tends to bring in the most demographically diverse audience. It’s no surprise that the profile of a PG and PG-13 movie is spread out over a larger net. Though you can see from the chart below that PG titles have a larger percentage of children than any other movie.
A note on G rated movies: very few movies are rated G nowadays. Even the simplest of kid-targeted titles often have a PG rating attached to them.
The R-rated titles are appealing to the younger, adult demographic and more than half of the audience to R-rated movies is made up of 18 to 34-year-olds, and those are driven by men 18-34, most likely in part to the success of Bad Boys: Ride or Die.
Inside Out 2 Out-Delivered the Average PG Composition of Females 18-34 by 5%
Inside Out 2, the #1 movie of the year thus far, was rated PG. It had an unusual crossover appeal within the kid demographic because it brought in both ends of the demo. It was great for young children, but it was also on the 13-year-old’s watch list since it was a popular title from their younger days. Even older teens got in on the action. It's interesting to look at the profile of Inside Out 2 and compare it to the average of PG movies. This movie really resonated with younger adult women. Perhaps they were bringing their children, but there were also showings of the movie that had more adults in the audience than kids! It out delivered the average comp of females 18-34 by 5%.
It's the Variety of Titles That Helps Keep the Box Office Thriving
While the top 10 titles do make up a chunk of the box office, it's the variety of titles that helps keep the box office thriving. Titles such as The Beekeeper, Argylle, Unsung Hero and Ordinary Angels were films that delivered over 2 million admissions.
Not every movie has to be huge to be a success for the industry to perform well. On individual weekends we can see surprise hits from limited release titles such as The Lord of The Rings Trilogy (released for just 3 days) and Star Wars Episode 1: The Phantom Menace. The draw to see these movies in the original way they were designed should not be overlooked. These are titles that are only out for a few days, but we see the impact the events around these re-releases of the classics can have on the overall box office week in and week out. These re-releases often appear in our weekly top 10 rankers.
And despite people thinking that streaming will be the death of cinema, we are seeing that they can actually work hand in hand. For example, The Fall Guy premiered on the big screen on May 3rd and within a few weeks it had made its way to streaming, yet it was still showing up in the top 10 of movies for a few more weeks. Even after being made available on streaming within just 2 weeks, nearly 7 million tickets were sold at theaters. Clearly, there is a specific demand for the unique movie theater experience.
So what’s in store for the remainder of 2024?
The second half of the year is already well on its way. Deadpool & Wolverine premiered as the highest grossing R-rated movie in history. It surpassed the $1 Billion mark in just 3 weeks.
The rest of the year is full of incredible titles that will continue to bring audiences to the movie theaters. There will be something for everyone amidst these anticipated titles: Transformers, Joker: Folie a Deux, Smile 2, Wicked, Sonic The Hedgehog, Mufasa: The Lion King to name just a few. And since doing this report we've seen incredible turnout for Alien: Romulus, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, and more.
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