‘They want a reason to get off the lounge’: How the Australian cinema industry is winning back moviegoers
In 2019 – pre-COVID – the Australian cinema industry made over a billion dollars at the box office and since the effects of the pandemic, the battle to get people back to the movies has waged on.
It’s fair to say that 2023 Universal Pictures blockbusters, Barbie and Oppenheimer – or Barbenheimer – kickstarted cinema’s comeback, as both films brought in a record $31.4 million in ticket sales following their same-day releases last July. Barbie has since gone on to break $1 billion at the box office, while Oppenheimer came close to that figure, but swept this year’s Oscars winning a stack of awards including Best Film.
Appearing on the latest episode of Mumbrella’s one-on-one podcast, Universal Pictures ANZ director of marketing, Suzanne Stretton-Brown, said originally she was concerned that the same-day releases could hurt the other.
“In theory, they were competitors, right? Even though [they’re] very, very different and had different audiences,” she said.
