Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on cinema
The COVID-19 pandemic had a negative effect on certain films in the early 2020s, mirroring its impacts across all arts sectors. Across the world, and to varying degrees, cinemas and movie theaters were closed, festivals were cancelled or postponed, and film releases were moved to future dates or delayed indefinitely. Due to cinemas and movie theaters closing, the global box office dropped by billions of dollars, streaming saw a significant increase in popularity, and the stock of film exhibitors dropped dramatically. Many blockbusters originally scheduled to be released by mid-March 2020 were postponed or canceled around the world, with film productions also being halted. This in turn created openings for independent cinema productions to receive wider exposure.[1]
By March 2020, the Chinese film industry had lost US$2 billion, as it had closed all its cinemas during the Lunar New Year, a period that typically sustained the industry across Asia.[2] North America saw its lowest box office weekend since 1998 between March 13–15.[3]
The highest-grossing film of 2020 was the anime film Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – The Movie: Mugen Train, which earned $503 million worldwide.[4] It was the first time since 2007 that the top-grossing film of a given year had earned less than $1 billion and the first time a non-American film was the top-grossing film of the year.[5] In 2021, the worldwide box office showed signs of recovery, with a 78% increase in revenue over 2020.[6] Despite the presence of pandemic restrictions in some jurisdictions, the December 2021 release Spider-Man: No Way Home quickly became the highest-grossing film of 2021, the sixth highest-grossing film of all time just over a month after its theatrical release, and the first film since 2019 to earn more than $1 billion worldwide.[7][8]
Scheduling[edit]
Awards[edit]
Three award ceremonies were held after the coronavirus became widespread: the 10th Magritte Awards on February 1, the 45th César Awards on February 28, and the 43rd Japan Academy Film Prize on March 6. The Japanese Academy Prize ceremony also took place on March 6, however, the ceremony was conducted without any guests or journalists.[30] The 14th Seiyu Awards cancelled its live ceremony scheduled for March 7 in Tokyo and instead broadcast the winners on Nippon Cultural Broadcasting's internet radio program.[31] The 40th Golden Raspberry Awards were initially intended to take place as planned on March 14,[32] however, it was ultimately cancelled. The ceremony's winners were announced on their YouTube channel on March 16.[33]
The International Indian Film Academy Awards, planned to take place on March 27, were cancelled,[10] while the Italian Academy's David di Donatello ceremony was postponed from April 3 to May 8.[34] The American Film Institute's lifetime achievement ceremony to honour Dame Julie Andrews was pushed back from April to the summer.[35] The 2020 Platino Awards were also postponed.[36]
The Academy Awards and Golden Globe Awards modified their eligibility criteria for their 2021 editions, as they usually require that a film be screened theatrically for a minimum length of time. The Hollywood Foreign Press Association mentioned that films released via non-theatrical means (such as digital) would be eligible if they were scheduled to have a "bona fide theatrical release" in Los Angeles after March 15 (with a cutoff date to be determined).[37][38][39] The Best Foreign Language Film award would similarly offer eligibility for films originally scheduled for a theatrical release in their country of origin between March 15 and a date to be determined.[40] The 93rd Academy Awards would also allow films released via password-protected or transactional video on demand to be eligible if they were originally scheduled to have a theatrical release. Once cinemas had sufficiently resumed operations, the requirement that a film be screened for at least a week would be reinstated. In addition to Los Angeles, eligible screenings would also be allowed to take place in one of five other major U.S. cities.[41][42]
On June 15, it was announced that the Academy Awards would be pushed back by two months, from February 28 to April 25, so that the cutoff for eligibility could likewise be extended from December 31, 2020, to February 28. The Academy Governors Awards and Scientific and Technical Awards were postponed indefinitely. The British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) subsequently announced that it would follow suit and postpone the 74th British Academy Film Awards to April.[43] On June 22, the Golden Globe Awards were also delayed from early-January to February 28, 2021 (filling the Academy Awards' former date).[44] The Screen Actors Guild Awards were also postponed from January 24 to March 14.[45]
With the delay of the 2021 Grammy Awards to March 14, citing the surge of COVID-19 cases in California, on January 13, 2021, the SAG Awards were delayed once again to April 4. SAG-AFTRA criticized The Recording Academy for not respecting the scheduling of other award presentations.[45]
In Canada, the pandemic shutdown forced the cancellation of both the 8th Canadian Screen Awards[46] and the 22nd Quebec Cinema Awards.[47] Both programs ultimately announced their winners through virtual livestreaming with the Canadian Screen Awards presenting film winners on May 28,[48] and the Quebec Cinema Awards presented on June 10.[49]
The Omicron variant, which had particularly affected Los Angeles and New York City in the U.S, led to further disruption of the awards season in January 2022. The 27th Critics' Choice Awards were postponed to March 13, 2022, the same day as the 75th British Academy Film Awards, while the 49th Annie Awards were delayed to March 12, and the 79th Golden Globe Awards were held under strict COVID-19 protocols with only HFPA beneficiaries in attendance. The ceremony had already been downsized into a non-televised event due to boycotts of the organization by media companies and creatives (including its regular broadcaster NBC) over the lack of diversity among its membership.[a]
Festivals[edit]
Many festivals and events were cancelled or postponed. Postponements included the Thessaloniki Documentary Festival, originally set to begin on March 5, 2020, and rescheduled for June 2020;[57] the Beijing International Film Festival, planned for April 2020 was postponed indefinitely;[58] the Prague International Film Festival, moved from late March to sometime later in 2020; the Bentonville Film Festival, set for April 29 – May 2 was moved to August;[34] the Istanbul International Film Festival, set for April 10–21 was postponed to a later date in 2020;[59] and the Tribeca Film Festival.[14] The Cinequest Film & Creativity Festival, a two-week festival in March, experienced low attendance during its first week and postponed its second week to August 2020.[60] The 20th Beverly Hills Film Festival scheduled for April 1–15 was postponed indefinitely.[61] The 38th Fajr International Film Festival, scheduled for April 16–24 in Tehran, was postponed with plans to then organize the event in late spring.[62] The 2020 Metro Manila Summer Film Festival, originally scheduled for April 11–21, was also postponed after the decision to place Metro Manila (the epicenter of the COVID-19 pandemic in the Philippines) was announced, however, it was later cancelled.[63]
Canceled events included the Swiss International Film Festival and Forum on Human Rights, planned for early March;[57] the Red Sea International Film Festival, which was to be held for the first time in March 2020;[10] the March 2020 South by Southwest (SXSW), which would have included film screenings;[64] the 2020 BFI Flare: London LGBTIQ+ Film Festival;[65] Nickelodeon's 2020 Slimefest festival;[66][67] Qumra, the Doha Film Institute's international directors' conference; Hong Kong Filmart, a large film market event; the National Association of Theatre Owners' CinemaCon 2020;[68] and Lille's Series Mania television festival.[34] The 22nd edition of Ebertfest and the 44th edition of the Cleveland International Film Festival were cancelled.[69][70] New Jersey's global film festival, Garden State Film Festival, scheduled for March 25–29, cancelled their in-person Asbury Park-based festival, however, it proceeded with the original schedule in a real-time live-streaming online format.[71] The 55th Karlovy Vary International Film Festival was canceled and postponed to 2021; its organizers later announced plans to hold an unofficial "54 ½" edition in November,[72] but it was cancelled due to the reinstatement of restrictions in the country.[73]
The 2020 Cannes Film Festival sent out invitations on March 6, despite France implementing limits on public gatherings beyond its scheduled dates; the Cannes Television Festivals Canneseries and MIPTV chose not to run, however, with Canneseries rescheduling for October and MIPTV canceling its event.[10][74] On March 19, 2020, the Festival de Cannes announced that it could be held on the scheduled dates, from May 12–23. Several options were considered in order to preserve its running, the main one being a simple postponement, in Cannes, until the end of June-beginning of July 2020.[75] At the time, Cannes' main venue had been converted into a temporary homeless shelter.[76]
Some festivals, including Tribeca, SXSW, ReelAbilities, TCM Classic Film Festival, and the Greenwich International Film Festival created new online programming in lieu of having an in-person festival.[77] The 2020 Toronto International Film Festival planned to proceed at least partially online;[78] on July 30, TIFF programmers announced a much smaller than normal lineup of feature films that would be screened at drive-in theatre venues and online.[79]
Within the industry, it was suggested at the time that after the pandemic had been contained and major events rescheduled, the less-important business events and festivals might be permanently removed from industry calendars, to allow more important events to happen in an effort to ease finances of the industry as it entered a recession brought about by coronavirus-caused losses.[80]
The Tribeca Film Festival and YouTube worked with several international partner film festivals to launch We Are One: A Global Film Festival, an international online festival of films screening for free on YouTube between May 29 and June 7, 2020.[81]
Due to the unprecedented interruption of film productions caused by the pandemic, the Locarno Film Festival in Switzerland asked directors, including Lucrecia Martel and Lav Diaz, to select films from the festival's 74-year history for a retrospective that were screened online and in physical locations.[82][83]
The Toronto International Film Festival announced that it would make "masks optional" once attendees were seated for film screenings. The actions were criticized for creating a potential superspreader event as the social nature of the festival was expected to increase the risk for COVID-19 transmission.[84] It reversed the decision within 24 hours, citing a surge of new cases in Ontario.[85]
The Oceanside International Film Festival screened virtually online in August 2020.[86]
The Tribeca Film Institute, a fundraising and educational non-profit, suspended operations on September 1, 2020, due to "uncertainties surrounding our new reality." The Tribeca Film Festival, which operates under the same parent company, continued to operate.[87]
The Horrible Imaginings Film Festival extended their usual three day event to seven days for virtual screenings in 2020.[88]
The Provincetown International Film Festival and its associated non-profit laid off its newly hired CEO and eight other staff members in 2020 due to the pandemic.[89]
The San Diego International Film Festival, held in October 2020, screened both online and on drive-in screens.[90]
In September 2021, it was announced that a person with COVID-19 attended several screenings at the 2021 Toronto International Film Festival. Films affected included Dune, Bergman Island and The Humans.[91]
The San Diego Women's Film Festival held their last event in 2021 and folded into a "Women's Series" at the San Diego International Film Festival due to infrastructure issues created by the impact of the pandemic.[92]
Streaming services[edit]
At the onset of the pandemic, the BBC noted that the popularity of streaming services could increase, especially if more people were isolated at home,[287] with The Guardian suggesting that non-blockbuster films may be sent to streaming more quickly than anticipated after release to capitalize on this market.[10] The 2011 film Contagion moved up from being the 270th most-watched Warner Bros. film in December 2019 to become its 2nd most-watched film in 2020 (by March)[10][288] and entered the top 10 on iTunes film rentals,[289] ostensibly due to the similarities its story bears to the outbreak.[10][288][289] The stock of Netflix increased in 2020 by March 12. The platform had released its original docuseries Pandemic: How to Prevent an Outbreak at the end of January 2020.[94] Disney+ went live in India on March 11 via its domestic service Hotstar, eighteen days before it was set to, though Disney's shares had fallen by 23% on March 9.[94]
Insurance[edit]
In various trade publications and media outlets, insurance brokers from Front Row Insurance Brokers Inc. provided commentary on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on cinema, and specifically on film production insurance.[290][291][292][293] COVID-19 made film production insurance more difficult to obtain for many productions. Many insurance companies added "communicable disease exclusions" to these policies,[294] meaning that the film insurance would not cover losses caused by COVID-19. The only film insurance solutions offering COVID-19 coverage came with very high premiums; much higher than productions were used to paying (pre-COVID).[295]