Written By: Charlotte Millman
While it is missing the award-winning soundtrack from its 1986 predecessor, Top Gun: Maverick (2022) brought Hollywood out of the “Danger Zone,” and took economists and Hollywood officials’ breath away.
When pandemic struck, movie theaters were forced to shut down. This shutdown had major implications on the economy. Firstly, people began spending their money on streaming services and on-demand movies. The demand for these streaming services increased at the same time that demand for entertainment in general increased. As people stopped going to work and going out to socialize with friends, they needed things to do to fill their time. At the same time, more streaming services entered the market, the most notable being Disney+ (Bacon, 2020). As supply and demand for these streaming services increased, streaming subscriptions increased by 57% globally and 51% in North America (Conviva, 2020). Because of this high demand and user reach of streaming services, studios started selling their movies to streaming services in order to profit from their movies despite the theaters being closed. As Variety Magazine reported, “‘You sell to a streamer, or you die in a theater,’ says Schuyler Moore, an entertainment industry lawyer with Greenberg Glusker. ‘Pick one,’” (Rubin, 2020). As an alternative option, studios delayed the release of their movies (Faughnder, 2021).
The latter is what Paramount Pictures opted to do with the predicted blockbuster, Top Gun: Maverick. The film’s original release date was set to be in July 2019, but it had to be pushed back multiple times for a variety of reasons, at first related to the production timeline and later due to COVID-19 (Williams, 2021). Ultimately, the film was released in May 2022 after being delayed five times, almost three years since its planned release date (Williams, 2021). Paramount Pictures was adamant to push back the release of the movie far enough that it would be able to be screened in theaters rather than being sold to streaming services. While multiple streaming services wanted to purchase streaming rights from the Top Gun: Maverick team, they were always denied. Tom Cruise, the film’s star and co-producer, was the leader in this cause, adamantly refusing permission to premiere his movie anywhere but the big screen. Even after the movie was eventually released, Cruise continued to back up this decision. In an interview on Jimmy Kimmel Live, Cruise said, “People have been asking for the movie for 34 years; what’s a couple more years? I would have held out for ten years. Look, the film is made for the screen…” (Jimmy Kimmel Live, 2023).
It was true, in fact, that many decisions went into making this film perfect for the big screen. The film was shot using IMAX-certified Sony VENICE 6K full-frame cameras (Mendelovich, 2019). This specific camera has an aspect ratio of 1:5:1, which is nearly the same as the IMAX aspect ratio of 1:43:1, making the VENICE perfect for adapting movies for IMAX screens. These cameras spent most of their time in-air, filming real pilots and actors inside of the US Navy’s F/A-18 Super Hornets. The Navy charged the crew $11,374 per hour. In the end, the total amount of aerial footage that Top Gun: Maverick acrued throughout the entire production process was over 800 hours (Fighter Pilot Podcast, 2022). Resultantly, the team spent about $9.1 million on aerial footage alone. This bank-breaking number must have been reason enough to get the film on the big screens. Most people do not have IMAX screens within their own homes, so this must have reassured the Top Gun: Maverick production team that the delay of their movie was the right economic decision.
Once the film was released, major economic changes began to occur. By May 2022, movie-goers were finally comfortable returning to theaters again. After Top Gun: Maverick opened in theaters, the film “pocketed $1 million per day in North America for 75 consecutive days,” (Daniell, 2023). This consistent box office revenue re-sparked the movie theater industry, bringing in a consistent source of income for theaters that had not had moviegoers for two years. In fact, legendary director Steven Spielberg commended Cruise at the annual Oscars luncheon in 2023, saying “You saved Hollywood’s ass and you might have saved theatrical distribution. Seriously, “Maverick” might have saved the entire theatrical industry,” (Guerrasio, 2023).
Due to the tremendous amount of support and critical acclaim for the film, according to Box Office Mojo, Top Gun: Maverick grossed a whopping $1,495,696,292 in box offices. This landed Top Gun: Maverick the title of “the biggest box-office earner since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic,” and the thirteenth highest-grossing film of all time (Guerrasio, 2023) (Box Office Mojo). This revenue poured money into the economy that had been suffering for months. Small family-owned theaters that were close to shutting down were able to stay open, and money was being pocketed and released into the economy for more spending.
After months of stagnant in-home movie viewing, the release of Top Gun: Maverick made people excited to go to the movies again. With the promise of high-intensity flying scenes where the footage was actually filmed in-air and a built-in fan base from the original Top Gun (1986) film revved up after 35 years of waiting for a sequel, movie-goers did not want to miss this film in theaters. The timing of the release also helped, as it ended up being released on May 27, 2022 which was Memorial Day Weekend, a time of much patriotism for many Americans who could find it on theme to attend a movie about military action and bravery. While not all Top Gun fans agree that “Maverick” was the better film, everyone can agree that it was a major proponent of bringing back audiences to the movie theaters.
References
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Daniell, Mark. “Steven Spielberg Was Right: ‘top Gun: Maverick’ Saved Hollywood | Toronto Sun.” Toronto Sun, 25 Feb. 2023, torontosun.com/entertainment/movies/steven-spielberg-was-right-top-gun-maverick-and-tom-cruise-saved-hollywood.
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Faughnder, Ryan. “Streaming Milestone: Global Subscriptions Passed 1 Billion Last Year.” Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Times, 18 Mar. 2021, www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/business/story/2021-03-18/streaming-milestone-global-subscriptions-passed-1-billion-last-year-mpa-theme-report.
Guerrasio, Jason. “Steven Spielberg Proclaims to Tom Cruise He ‘saved Hollywood’ with ‘Top Gun: Maverick.’” Business Insider, Business Insider, www.businessinsider.com/steven-spielberg-tom-cruise-top-gun-maverick-saved-hollywood-2023-2#:~:text=saved%20theatrical%20distribution.%22-,%22Seriously%2C%20%27Maverick%27%20might%20have%20saved%20the%20entire%20theatrical,the%20legendary%20director%20told%20Cruise.&text=It%27s%20hard%20not%20to%20argue,vital%20jolt%20to%20movie%20theaters. Accessed 15 Oct. 2024.
Hermanns, Grant. “Tom Cruise Defends Top Gun: Maverick Being Delayed over & over Again.” ScreenRant, 25 Feb. 2023, screenrant.com/top-gun-maverick-release-delays-tom-cruise-defense/.
Mendelovich, Yossy. “Top Gun: Maverick – Six Sony Venice Cameras inside a Fighter-Jet Cockpit.” Y.M.Cinema Magazine, 19 Dec. 2019, ymcinema.com/2019/12/19/top-gun-maverick-six-sony-venice-cameras-inside-a-fighter-jet-cockpit/.
Rubin, Rebecca. “Streaming Salvation: How Studios Made Bank Selling Movies to Netflix and Amazon during the Pandemic.” Variety, Variety, 10 Dec. 2020, variety.com/2020/film/features/hefty-streamer-deals-covid-pandemic-theater-shutdowns-1234848687/.
Shayo, Lukas. “How Top Gun: Maverick Left 800 Hours on the Cutting Room Floor.” ScreenRant, 11 Jan. 2023, screenrant.com/top-gun-maverick-unused-footage-amount/#:~:text=%22%5BWe%20shot%5D%20800%20to,added%20up%20to%2027%20cameras.
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Williams, Jordan. “Why Top Gun: Maverick Needed to Be Delayed (Again).” ScreenRant, 2 Sept. 2021, screenrant.com/top-gun-2-delay-2022-good-reason/. Top Gun: Maverick Needed to Be Delayed (Again).” ScreenRant, 2 Sept. 2021, screenrant.com/top-gun-2-delay-2022-good-reason/.