The Color Purple (2023) – a musical film based on the stage musical of the same name (which is based on the 1982 novel that was later adapted into the 1985 film…) was released to great commercial and critical reception on Christmas Day 2023, earning $18 million (2nd highest Christmas day opening of all time domestically). However, it suffered a big drop the following weekend, only earning $13 million the whole second weekend, and totaling only $45 million total for the entire first week. Given the budget of $100 million, this does not bode well for the film’s success.
What happened that the movie is faltering at box office?
The Color Purple did not need a remake
The original movie was a classic that resonated with its audience, and still holds up today from a directing and visual standpoint. Given that it was released in 1985, it is still contemporary enough that having a remake – especially in the form of a musical – would feel redundant. It is taking the gamble that fans of the original would want to even see it in musical form.
A similar scenario happened with the West Side Story remake that released in 2021. It got rave reviews but disappointed heavily at box office and left a small footprint. This is arguably because again, the original West Side Story was a classic that still holds up, and still visually looks great (it was shot in color, after all…). And any changes in the new version were probably not significant enough to bring people out into theaters in late 2021.
As a result, this meant that the audience that was interested in seeing the film may have been a narrow audience that showed up early.
Post-Covid audiences
Post-Covid audiences seem to be much more picky about what they go to see. Many dramas, and even superhero movies have been struggling at box office the past few years. It remains to be seen whether this is a lack of audience interest as a result of viewer habits changing (getting used to staying at home waiting for the movie to enter streaming services unless it is a summer event film), or if it could even be other factors at play such as the economic struggles making people more frugal with their money. It is interesting to wonder whether The Color Purple would have done better had it released in say, 2019.
Verdict
Hollywood needs to find a way to balance their preference of sequels/remakes with having original ideas. Obviously metrics may show that having an already established brand may help with audience interest and box office returns – but they cannot rely on remaking stories that already arguably did not have to be retold. This article isn’t a critique of the movie by any means – it is more so to discuss the recent phenomena that is occurring in Hollywood. The biggest movies of 2023 were Barbie and the Super Mario Brothers Movie. They were not sequels, but they were based on popular franchises, each getting their first big-budget movie releases.
One may also wonder if this is an unfixable issue – are certain genres just not going to inspire audiences to race to theaters? Throughout history, media has changed with culture. the same way pure album sales have declined and very few artists can sell millions in pure albums, perhaps it can be true that the film industry is becoming the same way. Only certain genres or brands can really drive people to the movie theaters, and for many other movies, they will struggle to do the same barring any strong originality and critical reception.
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