Chapter 778: Far From Optimistic

During this awards season, many films mounting an Oscar campaign opened with a limited release. It was a standard Oscar campaign strategy, though in the old Hollywood, limited screenings served an even more important purpose: guiding distribution.

Decades ago, major theater chains across North America had already established differentiated programming. For producers, beyond being a necessary step for marketing and media strategy, limited screenings played a vital role in shaping and executing distribution plans. By analyzing data from those initial screenings, a studio could pinpoint a film's target audience, decide whether it could cross over into the mainstream market, determine the ideal screen count, and tailor distribution partnerships with various theater chains.

Today, however, with highly developed media and the lightning-fast reach of the internet, limited screenings have had very little to do with the distribution strategies of wide-release films—a shift that began in the 1990s.

Mention limited screenings nowadays, and the first things that come to mind are arthouse films and award contenders.

For an arthouse film, opening on only a handful of screens keeps the audience tightly controlled, drawing only dedicated enthusiasts into theaters during the initial stage. That makes it easy to generate stellar word of mouth—a major reason arthouse films generally enjoy such high ratings.

No one could deny that when two films were of comparable quality, the fewer people who saw one, the higher its ratings tended to be.

Award contenders and commercial blockbusters were two completely different beasts with utterly distinct marketing and distribution strategies. Word of mouth, media coverage, and critics' scores carried immense weight for any film chasing awards.

Limited screenings also gave films that did not want a wide release before the new year a chance to compete for an Oscar. To qualify for that year's Oscar race, a film had to be released before the new year—one of the most basic requirements for an Oscar submission.

More than building word of mouth, that was the single biggest reason Gravity opened with a limited release. Time was simply too tight. The prints Warner Brothers needed to ship across North America were not all ready yet, leaving them no choice but to roll the film out in limited screenings across a few of the most prominent cities in North America first.

Simply put, for a film like Gravity that was about to launch into a massive wide release, limited screenings held little real meaning.

Limited releases were now almost exclusively the domain of low-budget independent films.

Duke, for instance, had closely studied a textbook example of this approach: Crouching Tiger, Hidden Tiger. Through questionnaires collected at pre-release screenings, the distributor already knew the film could not be pitched directly to the mainstream market upon release. Instead, they targeted a small niche of genre enthusiasts, locking them in as the first wave of core viewers.

That initial rollout was tiny, playing in only a dozen or so theaters across the entire United States. Though technically an official release, compared to its gradual expansion and eventual crossover into the mainstream market, it functioned much like an "advance limited release."

Using glowing word of mouth from that first batch of genre fans and impressive per-theater box office averages as publicity, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Tiger slowly and methodically expanded its target audience and screen count. It marketed specifically to Chinese and Asian communities in North America, booking theaters near neighborhoods where those groups were concentrated, before setting its sights on mainstream North American moviegoers and rolling out advertising across relevant media outlets.

Ultimately, through an ultra-long theatrical run, it pulled in over 100 million dollars at the box office in North America.

That approach obviously did not suit Gravity.

Starting December 26, Gravity opened in a limited release across 50 theaters in North America. For a film directed by Duke, packed auditoriums were practically a given; it brought in $1.68 million on its very first day, with a per-theater average exceeding $30,000!

That came as no surprise. Not only did the film have a short runtime, but every screen in the limited release was a massive IMAX auditorium.

Unlike summer season commercial tentpoles, a film released during the awards season had to market its critical reputation if it wanted to make a mark at the Oscars. For Warner Brothers, however, that was routine work they handled every year, and since the quality of Gravity more than held up, word-of-mouth marketing was effortless.

"Gravity depicts outer space in an utterly magnificent way, breaking ground on par with Avatar." — New York Times

"Words cannot describe the breathtaking visual presentation of this space opera; its full effect can only be captured in 3D inside a movie theater." — Los Angeles Times

Across 66 media outlets in North America, Gravity earned a sky-high average score of 93!

Rave scores were one thing, but the sensation surrounding the limited screenings was another. Starting December 27, even on weekdays, many of the limited-release theaters across North America were selling out, keeping per-theater averages running at peak levels.

By December 31, the day the Oscar Executive Committee mailed out nomination ballots to nearly 6,000 members, Gravity had already grossed more than $7 million in North America through limited screenings alone, boasting a five-day per-theater average as high as $140,000.

That same Friday, December 31, Gravity concluded its limited run and expanded into wide release across North America, hitting 4,120 theaters.

Thanks to the massive word of mouth and anticipation built up during the limited screenings, the film exploded at the box office on Friday, easily sweeping up $27.65 million.

More importantly, even after expanding into wide release, the acclaim for Gravity did not suffer any sharp drop-off.

Theater audiences polled by CinemaScore gave it a 93% approval rating and an average grade of "A+." On IMDB, 38,775 users rated it 9.4, while the audience approval popcorn index stood at 92%, and 77 media journalists on MetaCritic awarded it a stellar average score of 91.

While audience word of mouth mainly guaranteed a film's box office legs rather than helping much in the awards race, a review by Frank Pierson in the New Year special issue of Vanity Fair hinted at which way the wind was blowing.

"Gravity achieves tremendous innovation and breakthroughs in both form and content—within the space film genre, bringing a vision to life through such brand-new cinematography, visual effects, and 2D-to-3D conversion technology is an absolute first in cinema history."

"It delivers an unprecedented viewing and emotional experience—something thoroughly new from top to bottom. Building on the creation of a whole new world, this film goes a step further by pulling you right into the scene; the 3D IMAX effects make you feel as if you are floating there yourself."

"This experience is distinctly different from what I felt watching Hubble Telescope 3D and International Space Station at the museum theater. First, there is the difference in genre: the movement of the virtual camera creates an intense subjective immersion that a documentary simply cannot provide. At the same time, it is experimental, pioneering, and inspiring—to me, much like seeing Pulp Fiction for the first time, the value of Gravity lies in proving that 'a movie can actually be shot like this.' On that point alone, given its extraordinarily high level of execution, Director Duke Rosenberg belongs in the ranks of the cinema masters."

"Gravity will serve as a massive inspiration for all future space films and even other genres. Its form and content are unified to a remarkable degree—many critics argue that the story is thin, but in my view, that is merely a knee-jerk reaction to encountering something completely new."

"For several hours after watching this film, I could not offer any comment because I simply did not know how to evaluate it—that was my honest reaction. Given such a premise, the current scope of the story is just right. From a traditional standpoint, the plot looks simple, yet because of its formal breakthroughs, the film itself packs an enormous amount of information. Viewers have to process a flood of audiovisual and mental input. When a new fusion of form and content emerges, we too should adjust and find a new angle from which to view and appreciate this film."

"To me, therefore, Gravity is a 'brand-new' film from the perspective of cinema history. Nor can I draw any further conclusions about it yet, because its influence on the films that follow has only just begun."

Although a fair number of viewers who saw the film gave it negative reviews, when it came to commercial cinema and the mainstream market, Duke's box office draw was undeniably immense. Over the past few years, the "Duke fanboy" crowd had steadily grown in both numbers and reach, to the point where some media outlets called him the first director in history to command a superstar-level fanbase.

The 3D effects in Gravity were truly outstanding, and that alone was enough to draw huge crowds into theaters.

On the second day of its wide release—New Year's Day 2011—the box office in North America climbed again, taking in $28.54 million for the day. Even though daily receipts saw a slight dip the following day, the film still pulled in $25.77 million.

Without a shred of suspense, Gravity easily claimed the first weekend box office crown of 2011 in North America, posting a dazzling $81.96 million haul.

Combined with the earnings from its earlier limited screenings, Gravity had already raked in $89.06 million from North America.

What was more, Gravity faced no competitors of the same caliber in this release window. An opening week that lived up to every expectation, paired with stellar word of mouth, was more than enough to guarantee an exceptionally steady box office run going forward.

Neither Duke nor Warner Brothers had much to worry about regarding the film's commercial performance. While maintaining sufficient market promotion, they gradually shifted their main focus toward Oscar public relations and lobbying.

Even though Duke, Penny Kalis, Scarlett Johansson, Nancy Josephson, and Warner Brothers had put in plenty of effort beforehand and won the backing of a heavyweight School member like Frank Pierson, the outlook was not optimistic at all.

The late release date of Gravity was an objective factor that could not be ignored, and it only made the Oscar campaign harder.

"We missed out on a whole string of precursor awards..."

In the sitting room of the Eye-Shaped Villa, Penny Kalis frowned. The situation was indeed far from optimistic. "This has caused a series of negative effects for our word-of-mouth marketing, especially for Best Actress. Natalie Portman has practically swept Best Actress across all the precursor awards."