From A Rough September To A Tough October: The Movies Are Playing An Insiders’ Game

deadline.com:

Predictions are always a hazardous thing. And I truly hope this one is wrong. But it sure looks like the movie box office, disastrously low in September, will be stuck on the bottom again this month.

September is rarely a great month for ticket sales, but last month is better left undiscussed. Putting aside the first Covid year, 2020, when theaters were mostly closed, this year’s September take, about $319 million, was the worst in recent memory.

The monthly total was down more than 13 percent from last year’s, and was less than half of the month’s box office in 2019. It ranked as the lowest since 1996, when ticket sales were just $303.6 million, according to the numbers so conveniently sliced and diced by Box Office Mojo.

And that’s without adjusting for ticket price inflation. Adjust the numbers, and this September’s performance, led by some $41.5 million in monthly sales for The Woman King, was actually much worse, matching low points in the 1980s, when the month was treated as a dumping ground for the unreleasable and a convenient receptacle for summer spill-over.