With the Sydney market emerging from lockdown, the national box office got a 72 per cent boost last weekend, despite the absence of major new releases.
IF speaks to Dendy Icon group CEO Sharon Strickland, Hayden Orpheum Picture Palace general manager Alex Temesvari, and Palace Cinemas head of marketing Alex Moir about how they have navigated the past few months and what the road ahead looks like.
As long as people get back into the habit of going to the cinema and exhibitors can put trailers in front of them, the NSW independent sector should recover "quite well", according to Independent Cinema Australia president Scott Seddon.
Amid very few new releases, school holidays are thankfully providing welcome foot traffic for exhibitors, with almost every title getting a boost at the box office last weekend.
It was déjà vu at the box office last weekend, with the same three titles leading receipts:
'Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings', 'Free Guy' and 'Paw Patrol: The Movie'.
Disney's 'Free Guy' was pipped at the post by Warner Bros.' 'The Suicide Squad' on its opening weekend, but the Ryan Reynolds-starrer's second outing proved the film has legs, even in a disrupted market.
With audiences emerging from lockdown in South East Queensland, Cairns and regional Victoria, DC/Warner Bros.' 'The Suicide Squad' held no. 1 at the box office, narrowly defeating Disney's new sci-fi, 'Free Guy'.