Imax big screens have passed $600 million in global box office receipts so far this quarter, says CEO Rich Gelfond, noting that it’s still early in September (Q4 runs through end of the month) and “our best quarter ever was in the mid-three hundreds.”
That was in the third quarter of 2023.
The company is on a roll and “I think it’s really the beginning,” he said at the Goldman Sachs Communacopia media conference touting Imax’s terrific run with Universal and Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey, an overall box office recovery and the company’s ability to leverage various revenue streams from global ticket sales to Imax installations to, more recently, popcorn buckets.
“When we looked at our slate for the year, I was the most bullish person in the company on The Odyssey.” Imax’s previous record for a single film was $230 million in global box office receipts for Avatar‘s initial run. “Keep in mind, that’s on 1% of the screens in the world. And today, we’re knocking on the door of a half a billion dollars. How many films do a half a billion, let alone an Imax only?”
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Imax splits the box office take with movie theaters and sometimes studios depending the structure of the exhibitor deal, getting about 18 cents on the dollar.
The slate ahead includes a range of diverse studio films along with sports, music (Oasis concert coming) and local language fare. Imax released 120 pieces of content last year.
For the rest of this year and beyond, Gelfond touted, among others, good tracking on Sony’s Resident Evil, and Dune: Part Three, where tickets went on sale a few weeks ago. “If you stopped today, which is three months in advance of the film’s release, it would be one of the most highest pre-sales in our 60 year history.”
From Netflix, David Fincher’s The Further Mis-Adventures of Cliff Booth starring Brad Pitt debuts with an exclusive two-week Imax theatrical window on November 25, as does Narnia: The Musician’s Nephew by Greta Gerwig in early 2027. The Thomas Crown Affair from Amazon MGM directed by and starring Michael B Jordan follows in March. Sony’s four Beatles movies start rolling out in 2028, with Joseph Kosinski’s Miami Vice ’85.
He said the company is looking to a wider variety of film fare to drive brand loyalty. “As much as I still believe in superhero movies … I don’t think there’s anything so unique about [them] that says, wow, I’ve got to see this in Imax. And, to some extent, we’ve seen over the last few years, that some of that has run its course.” The goal is “for people to say, ‘What’s playing at the Imax theater?’ And I’m not saying we’re there yet, but I think … momentum is clearly happening.”
Fandom is showing up in merch, which is becoming a new focus after a test putting out 2,500 Imax popcorn buckets on sale “and within 90 minutes they were gone. And we kept putting more on sale and couldn’t keep up with the demand. “When you look at our plans for 2027, we’re going to lean into merchandising.”
Asked if he’s concerned about industry consolidation, Gelfond said “our primary relationships are with filmmakers. So, wherever the filmmakers end up … they’re the ones that we’re really talking to about the content.”
“We’ve built this business over 60 years and we have the relationships … Those relationships with the filmmakers are not going anywhere.”
Meanwhile, he said, studios are recognizing that Imax helps drive global box office, and streamers that it boosts streaming calculus, as per Apple’s F1 by Kosinski, and Phil Lord and Christopher Miller’s Hail Mary for Amazon MGM.
He called Warner Bros. “a great partner and said, “We’ve talked many times to David Ellison and Paramount where if [the merger] does happen, they’re going to certainly ramp up their Imax productions. We have a terrific relationship with [Paramount]. We’ve done the Mission Impossible movies, Top Gun: Maverick.”
He said Imax has been using its growing cash position to expand its network. “Our old model used to be, [exhibitors] would put up all the money and we would license our technology. Then we went more to a joint venture model, where we take a bigger percentage of the box office, but we put up more of the capital … And since they’ve been doing very well, the paybacks have been even better than we modeled.”