Collider’s own Steve Weintraub recently chatted with Tom Hanks about his upcoming western News of the World (in theaters on Christmas Day). And during the conversation, Steve asked about Hanks’ thoughts on the state of theatrical moviegoing (since News of the World will first be released to theaters) and where he thinks we’ll go from here. And Hanks answered in an extremely articulate, thoughtful way, that you can read or watch. He has clearly been through it all and understands the business like few others and his thoughts are extremely illuminating.
“Even in Los Angeles, it’s a bit hard to go to the movies, isn’t it? You’ve got to drive, you’ve got to park, you’ve got to be there at a very certain time. I love the Arclight. There’s one in Hollywood and one close to where I live. There was a theater that was charging $27 a seat, so people would bring you nachos. They didn’t even have a snack bar that you could stand in line for, you had to pay $27,” Hanks began. “And you had to order from somebody, which means as you’re watching Rocketman, as I did, somebody comes by and says, ‘Can I get you some more cheese on your nachos?’ I said, ‘No, man, I’m good, I’m trying to watch the movie I paid $27 for.’ There is this reality of the viability of exhibiting movies that has been based on the desire for people to see the movie.”
Hanks continued: “In New York City, where I am now, it’s one of the easiest places to go to the movies. You can decide to go to the movies and be in the theater a half hour later. You can walk to one. There’s enough screens around, when the movies are open, of course, that you can go off and have a plethora of choices. Even if those choices might be the 12 movies that are playing nationally at any given time.
“This goes a long way to say that a sea change was due, anyway. It was coming. The fact is that there … I don’t want to take up too much time on this answer but let me tell you this story,” Hanks said. “When I was a kid and the ABC Sunday Night Movie played the first half of David Lean’s Bridge Over the River Kwai in pan-and-scan, in 1.33, with commercials, I was still convinced Bridge Over the River Kwai was one of the greatest motion pictures I’d ever seen. It was as primitive a display as possible. It might have even been in black-and-white. I don’t think we had a color television the first time I saw it. And you had to watch the second half on Monday night, a school night. That didn’t take away from my enjoyment of Bridge Over the River Kwai. I didn’t even know that there was limitations on it.”
Hanks draws a comparison between himself watching Bridge Over the River Kwai on a crummy TV and the current state of the industry: “Now, of course, with Netflix and all of the streaming services, we have the ability to watch a movie any time we want to on our couch. If the movie is really great and engaging you can still come away from that experience thinking, That is one of the greatest motion pictures I’ve ever seen. I experienced that recently with Chernobyl, the five-part thing. I said, “That was one of the greatest motion pictures I’ve ever seen.” It comes across with other films as well. Will movie theaters still exist? Absolutely they will. In some ways, I think the exhibitors, once they’re up and open, will have a freer choice with what movies they choose to play. I’m no Cassandra when it comes down to this, but big, event motion pictures are going to rule the day at the cinemas.”
All of this brings us, in some way, to News of the World. (It’s probably also worth mentioning that the Pinocchio movie he’s doing with his Forrest Gump director Robert Zemeckis will debut exclusively on Disney’s direct-to-consumer streaming platform Disney+.) “News of the World might be the last adult movie about people saying interesting things that’s going to play on a big screen somewhere,” Hanks said. “Because after this, in order to guarantee that people are going to show up again, we’re going to have the Marvel Universe and all sorts of franchise movies. And some of those movies are great. You want to see them writ large because actually watching them at home on your couch might diminish them somewhere, somehow in their visual punch.”
In conclusion, Hanks said: “But the sea change that has been brought by COVID-19 has been a slow train coming. I think there’ll be an awful lot of movies that will only be streamed and it will be fine to see them that way because they’re built and made and constructed for somebody’s pretty good widescreen TV at their home. There will be other movies that are going to be playing in that window. People will, in fact, I think, flock to them in order to see them on the big screen while they have the chance. But without a doubt we are actually into the big curve of change that I think has been due ever since people first had the ability to pay for video on demand, although you could argue ever since the VHS cassette tape was introduced in a cheap way, this has been across the horizon.”
We’ll have more from News of the World before it debuts in theaters on Christmas Day.