Went the Month Well? The Movies of the March 2024 Box Office

After a depressing first two months of disappointment for box office-watchers this year hopes revived somewhat with Dune, and then after that the arrival of Kung Fu Panda 4, Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire and the latest Godzilla movie.

Just how well have these movies done?

The second Dune film has, after a month in release, grossed $252 million domestically. Given the release of the first Dune film amid the pandemic, and the fact that Dune's complex and fairly dark source material is less a simple crowd-pleaser than most sci-fi spectacles, it has been thought excellent. Still, the exultation over such a reception reminds one that the standard is not what it used to be, when more would have been expected from movies such as this.

Thus does it also seem to go with the others. Ghostbusters 4 seems likely to finish well below $150 million--a performance paling next to that of its predecessors (inferior even to the much-maligned 2016 remake of the original film).

Kung Fu Panda 4's gross, which has broken past $150 million (it stands at $152 million as of its fourth weekend), but will not get much past it, similarly leaves it the series' weakest in real terms. If the 2016 third film's gross was $143 million, adjusted for today's prices it would not be much short of $190 million. (It is also worth remembering that this movie was a success mainly on the basis of tripling its domestic gross internationally, in part by outearning its U.S. gross in the Chinese market then burgeoning for Hollywood. By contrast there is no prospect of this movie quadrupling its domestic gross globally this time, compounding the significance of the domestic take.)

Godzilla seems more promising--but again, it has had an $80 million domestic debut, suggestive even in a positive scenario of a close in the vicinity of $200-$250 million, making it another Dune-like earner at best. However, especially if one takes inflation into account, its gross seems likely to be no better than 2014's Godzilla or 2017's Skull Island in the end, and like the lot not quite first rank blockbusters of the ever more elusive billion dollar club (like last year's Easter weekend release, Super Mario Bros.).

All of this sufficed to make this March's box office gross healthier than what was seen in last year's post-Avatar 2, pre-Super Mario Bros. dip, but it seems notable that it still left this March with a mere 63 percent of the pre-pandemic average for the month (its $753 million better than last March's $638 million, but comparing poorly to the $900 million+ they averaged in current dollars, the $1.17 billion they averaged in real, inflation-adjusted dollars). The result is that it seems to me fair to take March as, if an improvement on prior months, also proof that franchise films remain a tougher sell than they used to be, and in line with the fact the American box office seemingly stabilized at a level well below what we saw pre-pandemic. Going by 2022 and 2023 I would say the range of what we can expect from here on out is an annual box office in the vicinity of 50-65 percent of the 2015-2019 average, with this year showing little sign thus far, or in what can be expected of its later releases, of making the top end of that range. This is all the more in as I expect April will see another dip, and disappointing as the summer of 2023 was (especially prior to Barbie and Oppenheimer saving the season in its last weeks), this summer looks weaker still--such that its opening with a movie titled The Fall Guy seems all too likely to seem "on the nose" before too long.