Marvel Studios' Black Widow - Official Teaser Trailer

I think you're putting a negative spin on it. For a movie to make almost $90 million dollars at a time when I think at least 1/3 of the theaters are still closed (or only allowing limited seating), I think that's a huge hit by any measure:

Box Office: 'Black Widow' Poised to Capture $87.8 Million Debut - Variety

As the article says, it's the biggest movie hit of 2021 so far, even bigger than F9 (which to me was a terrible, stupid, lunkheaded film). At least you have to have a brain to follow Black Widow and understand the number of characters, the level of treachery and betrayal that went on in their lives, and the complications of the years of identities and so on that they all went through. This is a pretty complicated story, particularly given that it happens right after Captain America: Civil War and before the Avengers: Infinity War movies.

The numbers I'd like to know are, how many people were as nutty as we were to spend $29.95 and watch it in 4K Dolby Vision on Pay-Per-View? My partner and I figured, eh, two tickets + parking plus a Slurpee... we're already well past $30 at that point. Besides, I'm still waiting for the Grove Theater to reopen in our neighborhood. (BTW, note that in the case of the pay-per-view, Disney/Marvel gets to keep 100% of that money and not share it with a distributor or a theater.)

 

Saw Black Widow at a movie theater last night.

Preface: I am not a huge fan of superhero/Marvel type stuff. I like some. But mostly I am looking for character development or pathos (or self awareness), and the CGI and combat not nearly as much.

So I like Jessica Jones (first season especially), the Batman trilogy, Deadpool, The Boys--stuff like that.

Black Widow? It was OK. The backstory and family (present day) stuff was interesting. Some of it was just silly (sister on sister combat) and the end game CGI/fight stuff was pretty generic.

Liked it, didn't love it. Was I glad to see my first movie in a real theater in at least a year and a half? Sure.

 

We did the $29.95 Premier Access. It was a heck of a lot cheaper for us than a night at the theater for a family of 5. Plus, we can watch it as often as we want.

 

Add me to that list of nutty people! I thought the film was pretty good, nice to start having some blockbuster type entertainment again.

 

Y'know it works out cheaper if you eh... watch it for free... Disney doesn't need your money.

 

Saw the movie on Friday. I liked it and it worked as a standalone movie regardless of it being a Marvel movie.
There was more action and fighting than I care for in a movie of any kind, but it worked surprising. Some movies with excessive fight and action scenes screen time can ruin a good story/movie imo, through here it didn't ruin the movie.
I will say my expectations were that they would have made a movie not about the character and would just been a movie with BW, and in it put some agenda lectures, which they didn't do I felt.

In any case did anyone notice when they were showing all the Widows in the world that after many faces and fast moving at that, the last of showing them there were 4 and it was sorta stopped/slowed as dialog was going. My question is, in top right or 2nd to right top of the 4. One of them looks like the actress in Loki who works at the TVA and was the one who basically caught him, brought him in with what ever other TVA were with her, and I'm not talking about the judge actress who is like identified as the manager of the whole operation (TVA). It could be it just looked like her or her face is used an there is meaning, but if there is I wonder what for. I haven't seen this pointed out as an easter egg, so any who bought the movie and are hip to that stuff, chime in on thoughts of if that is TVA agent or if not the actress at all. Again it's when BW is in D's office and the only time the faces pause or stayed in frame long enough it's at end of showing all the Widows in the world.

Cheers

 

Disney actually released the Disney + # and it's $60,000,000 for opening weekend. At $30/each that's 2,000,000 orders.

 

I don't have a problem being an honest guy and paying to see a high-quality 4K Dolby Vision version at home. I know there's illegal streams and files out there, but it ain't gonna be done right. And it's more risk and trouble than I want to go through.

Do you have a link?

 

If you have a Costco near you and you don't live in NY/NJ/CA, they are clearing out AMC movie tickets for 4/$11.97. Family of 5 for $15 (assuming you don't pay for popcorn ). The tickets are good at any AMC (except NY/NJ/CA) for any standard showing, even new movies.

 

Saw the movie in our local theater. Thought it was good. The action will keep you on the edge of your seat. You just need to remember you’re watching a movie and to enjoy it for what it is and suspend your belief. I certainly didn’t understand the fight between the two “siblings”.

 

Another win for Marvel, and for me personally it was great to be back in the theatre. Picked a 5pm showing with a literal handful of any other people in the room. I think the fact that it veers a little towards 007 is lampshaded by Natasha literally watching a Bond flick towards the beginning of the movie. I love that franchise too so no complaints here.

Also, Yelena making a perfect example of Nat's superhero landing in the hallway and immediately noping out of it was hilarious.

 

Thanks.

 

If you add in the streaming revenue, then it's the MCU's 10th biggest opening weekend, and top 5 of the non-team-up movies, out of 24 movies. That's about what I would've expected it to open with theatrically pre-COVID. So it seems like the box office landscape is still far from back to normal, which isn't a good sign for theaters. Losing half your potential revenue on one of the biggest releases of the year is a major problem. I'm guessing a large chunk of the streaming revenue was from people who would've purchased that option even if COVID didn't exist. And that's the big concern for theaters, if people change their habits on a permanent basis. So far, it seems like Jungle Cruise later in July will be the last movie Disney sells online the same day as the theatrical release. Getting the theatrical exclusive window back will certainly help theaters. Clearly people were excited about this movie and not content to wait three months for it to be added to Disney+.

 

These are some key points in Deadline's analysis of the box office as it relates to Disney+. The fans came out to the theater for the movie in larger proportions than casual moviegoers and families did. I would attribute it to sheer economics. A family of 3 or more can save money by buying the Disney+ access as compared to going to the theater. They don't care about the quality they see it in like fanboys or movie buffs do. I would also guess that some fans who would've seen it twice instead went for Disney+ so they could watch it multiple times over again.

So the total revenue potential for the movie has to be impacted somewhere along the line. Most people buying it for $30 are doing it because they would've spent more at the theater. Of course, if the total money spent is 40% less, that only hurts theaters as Disney would've gotten 60% of the theatrical gross. So it's really theaters who have to stick up for themselves here, and stop playing ball with the same-day streaming releases. And then home video revenue will continue to be impacted by all Disney+ subscribers having the movie for no additional charge in three months anyway.

Deadline's quotes:

‘Black Widow’ Catching $40M+ Friday On Way To Potential $90M+ – Deadline

...there was a low family turnout here with parents at 10% and kids at 13%, to the general audience’s dominant 77%.

On a pure theatrical window, the Friday-to-Saturday declines for F9 and A Quiet Place Part II were, respectively, -25% and -22%; and Black Widow drops 41%...

Disney is shrinking the pie. The Disney+ factor will likely hurt the tail of Black Widow‘s box office legs and long-term ancillaries. Hollywood has built a fantastic business model in getting audiences to buy the same piece of IP twice. Now with Black Widow‘s availability on Disney+, you’ve just killed a window, or at least shortened the life of that window’s revenues.

 

I wonder how much piracy factors into these VOD premieres.

 

Reported on numerous sites, here's the Hollywood Reporter story.

‘Black Widow’ Box Office Spins Record $80M U.S. Opening – The Hollywood Reporter

 

I saw it today in 3D. Excellent 3D. I forgot how GOOD theater 3D is... I never thought about it once. The glasses disappeared. They WERE really good 3D glasses. I noticed that right away. Very clear. They must not HAVE BEEN RECYCLED!!! What a diff. Honestly, I put them on (over my regular glasses) and thought: "Well, these are nice. " I'll have to remember to pack my own pairs and grab theater recycled ones. I should have taken those! I told my friend I wanted to see ScarJo's posterior in full 3d. As Stan said, enuf said.


Anyway, the film was okay (glad I didn't pay $30 for it. Bwahahahahhahahahahahhahahaahh! Suckers!! I saw it for $9 and I wouldn't watch it again. LOL.)

 

The film opened fun, semi-realistically and then quickly descended into "Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine." I think Scarlett Johansson did a good job (and delivered the 3D goods). I laughed at the silly family dynamic and the "Red Giant" or "Russian Goliath" or whatever was fun. He's the best thing in the movie. Ray Winston is not. I love Ray Winston but he got WAY outgunned as a villain by Kenneth Branaugh in "Inception." And, wait, speaking of "Inception" people will say that had a ridiculous plot but controlling the world with sexbots is not? LOL.

 

I just can't understand the public's continued obsession with the Marvel movies (or the superhero genre in general).

Lately, whenever I watch an American movie in general, I check out early on because it's just cliché after cliché.

As an example, 'A Quiet Place 2' is currently heavily advertised in Japan. I'd never heard of it, so I looked up the first 'A Quiet Place', read the grand reviews, and it seemed interesting enough, so I decided to watch it. I found it a waste of time as it was just the Tom Cruise "War of the Worlds" plus an M. Night Shymalan movie. Not a single unique idea in the entire film, a dull plot, and yet it garnered fabulous reviews and big money. I don't get it.

I like sci-fi and I grew up with Marvel comics. It's not that I dislike the genre -- not at all. I enjoyed the first Thor movie, for example. I thought that was charming.

Anyway, this is kind of where I am now that we're at the five-millionth Marvel movie since 'Blade'. Why watch another one of these, exactly? I saw one Avengers film and it was an utter piece of crap. And it made a gazillion dollars. All the Spider-Man movies are garbage. The X-Men franchise had a few decent ones, I guess, but the latter few were abysmal.

I've noticed that while I enjoy lots of TV dramas these days, I get little or no satisfaction from any American movies anymore.

Basically, I'm a miserable bastard.

 

I watched it tonight on Disney+. I suppose it says something that even watching it at home on TV, I was still exhausted at the end, like I usually only am at a theater. However, I did not think it was a great movie. Too many things just didn't add up, and the climactic action sequence at the end was so over the top I could not suspend disbelief. Florence Pugh stole the show though; she had many of the best lines, and Yelena's critical attitude toward Natasha was definitely a highlight.

 

You might as well say "why read another one of these, exactly?" about the comics. They've been around longer and are still going.

 

Agree with all of the above.

 

I sympathize with your position (I also thought A Quiet Place was nothing special, and your point about it being War of the Worlds + Signs is well taken). I tend to agree that US studio filmmaking is at a low ebb of creativity right now with the emphasis on marketable "properties" rather than stories, and a lot of severely workmanlike filmmaking.

That being said, I think it's disingenuous to wonder (especially in a thread about Black Widow) why people care about Marvel movies or get excited by them. The problems with the "Marvel Studios" films are well known by now -- they are often shot in a flat, competent-but-not-creative fashion, their villains are often cardboard, they are formulaic, etc. But within their very strict formal conventions they have been dealing with a lot of very timely themes, and generally in a pretty sensitive fashion, with terrific acting and dialogue.

People like these movies because they like the characters, and see their own struggles in them, that's it.

As for fatigue with superheroes, well, the way I see it, superheroes have just taken the place of musclebound '80s action heroes or Western heroes in the '50s or Luke Skywalker types in the '70s or what have you in our moment. People--human beings--have always loved stories about special people touched by the gods or by destiny and imbued with special abilities, and having to deal with exaggerated versions of the struggles faced by "normal" people in the audience. Basically all human literature deals with this theme.

And that basic idea is a broad canvas onto which a wide range of ideas can be projected. For example, Avengers: Endgame was essentially a story about regret and coming to terms with failure, and I think it handled that in a way that's not far removed from the likes of an ancient Greek tragedy.

A lot of the people who complain about superhero stuff because it's coming at the expense of "serious," "small" stories of human interest don't realize that the very idea that "small" stories has a very short history. It's only since the 19th century or so that anyone has cared about stuff like Sunrise. Literally all the literature in virtually all human cultures for the 4,000 years before that is essentially Superman stuff.

 

This in particular. Yes, you could argue comic book movies have been a thing since 1989's Batman. So, 3 decades?

How long were Westerns all over TV and movies?

 

It goes back a little further than that, to Superman in 1978 and its '80s sequels. Those first two Superman movies really do establish the template for virtually all the ensuing comic book movies, much more so than Batman.

What's funny about this situation is that the 1978 Superman movie marked the return of that kind of story to screens after a long hiatus, going back to the Adventures of Superman TV show and the Buster Crabbe serials of the '30s and '40s. What captured the imaginations of popular audiences in the intervening years? Why, westerns, of course!