Hollywood is gearing up to strike back against streaming services and the pandemic with a flood of superhero movies over the next 18 months.

The US film industry has faced near obliteration as cinemas shut down for months, many permanently, ratings for the Oscars plummeted, and the Golden Globes was cancelled over a lack of racial diversity.

In 2020, box office takings in North America came in at just $2.1bn (€1.8bn), down 80pc from $11.3bn in 2019. So far this year the take stands at less than $500m.

For many US cinema operators it has spelt catastrophe. Those that paid the price included Pacific Theatres, which operated 300 screens in California including the Cinerama Dome on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood. Its concrete geodesic dome has been featured in movies such as Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.

Pacific Theatres announced last month it was shutting all its cinemas for good. It said: “Despite a huge effort that exhausted all options the company does not have a viable way forward.”

The ArcLight Hollywood cinema is also not reopening. Across the United States, 64pc of cinemas are now open and some in Hollywood have expressed optimism that the industry can recover, especially with such a raft of delayed releases already in the can.

The first big Hollywood film to come out in socially distanced cinemas this year — Godzilla vs Kong — has performed better than hoped, and grossed nearly $100m at the box office since its release in March. But fears remain that audiences will not return in full.

In a bid to break the decline, studios plan to pump out a rapid succession of superhero extravaganzas that will be best experienced on a big screen. There will be at least 16 such movies between this summer and the end of 2022.

It all kicks off just after the July 4 holiday with the release of Black Widow, starring Scarlett Johansson, which cost Disney over $200m to make.

Disney will need it to gross $400m just to break even as ticket sales are split with cinemas. “No pressure,” said Paul Dergarabedian, senior media analyst at Comscore.

“Maybe superheroes will come to the rescue. Those movies are going to be important in bringing audiences back.”

The slew of superhero blockbusters includes Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, The Batman, Spider-Man, Doctor Strange and Thor sequels and Morbius, starring Jared Leto and the British actor Matt Smith. In addition, this autumn will see releases of the long-awaited Top Gun sequel starring Tom Cruise, and the delayed next James Bond film.

Hollywood is also looking to China, where cinemas are faring better than in the US. Marvel will launch its first Chinese superhero this year in Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings. 

© Telegraph Media Group Ltd 2021

Sunday Independent