The rather muted response of our IMAX to the NFLX miss tells us something.
You would think if streaming growth has slowed dramatically people are returing to theaters.
That is not happening.
IMAX CEO Richard Gelfond told Yahoo Finance that he doesn't expect COVID-19 disruptions to "cause a big negative for the year." Instead, he insisted a big risk for 2022 is studios' lack of faith in the theatrical release model.
"During 2021, [studios] took a lot of movies and put them on day-and-date streaming and as a result of that they didn't have good box office performance," the CEO explained.
Gelfond added that, even on the streaming side, the numbers showed that "people didn't sign up for streamers for movies...the model of selling simultaneous streaming didn't work."
Still, the metrics of comparing a streaming view to a movie ticket are puzzling to experts, and it's been difficult to measure success in this hybrid environment.
"We don't have very much insight into streaming numbers and, even what we do see, it's not remotely comparable. So in terms of how these movies are profiting or not profiting, the water is very muddy right there," Shawn Robbins, chief analyst at Box Office Pro, previously told Yahoo Finance.
The analyst added that it's tough to pinpoint the impact that a simultaneous streaming release has on box office figures./////
VERDICT- STREAMING IS HERE TO STAY.
MOVIE THEATERS ARE CLOSE TO BEING A THING OF THE PAST....