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Pop icon Taylor Swift is looking to extend her cultural reach to cinemas this weekend, through the event cinema release of Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour.
Opening in 651 UK-Ireland venues through Trafalgar Releasing, the film is a 168-minute recording of three Swift gigs from the SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles in August 2023, as part of Swift’s ongoing tour playing music from across her career.
It is the latest concert film from UK- and US-based director Sam Wrench, a former competitive slalom skier who has also directed BTS: Permission To Dance on Stage – LA and Billie Eilish Live At The O2.
Swift’s significant popularity means The Eras Tour could challenge all-time event cinema records in the UK and Ireland [‘event cinema’ is a term used to describe broadcasts of live and recorded entertainment excluding traditional films].
The highest-grossing event cinema film in the territory is currently National Theatre Live’s Prima Facie, a recorded broadcast of the stage play starring Jodie Comer, which made £5.5m in summer 2022.
Amongst concert films, the top title is Michael Jackson’s This Is It, with £9.8m from 2009, the year the singer died. That film is categorised as a documentary and not an event cinema release, although it shares attributes with The Eras Tour.
Korean pop favourites BTS have had three concert event cinema releases in cinemas, each of them grossing over £500,000, with Permission To Dance On Stage – Seoul: Live Viewing leading the way with £899,127 in March 2022.
Many UK-Ireland cinemas have organised special promotions for The Eras Tour, hoping to recapture the spirit of Barbenheimer from earlier this year.
Odeon Cinemas has set adult tickets at £19.89 in a nod to Swift’s album 1989, and children’s tickets at £13.13 in reference to the singer’s favourite number.
Vue, which is also starting its all-ages Super Saver tickets at £13.13, has broken its record for presales for a music concert event.
Competition
Looking to benefit from busy cinemas due to Swift, Paramount has two major releases out this weekend. Family animation Paw Patrol: The Mighty Movie makes its full debut, having begun previews two weekends ago on Saturday, September 30.
It broke into the top five on the first of those weekends with £988,526, and has over £1m in the bank already.
It is the second film created for cinemas about the group of canine law enforcement, after 2021’s Paw Patrol: The Movie, which opened to £2.4m and ended on £8.8m. Both are directed by Cal Brunker, whose other credits include 2013’s Escape from Planet Earth.
Paramount also has Adam Deacon’s crime comedy Sumotherhood, a sequel to 2011’s Anuvahood, also starring, written and directed by Deacon. That film opened to £536,818 and finished on £2.1m.
The films are parodies of the urban genre of cinema that includes Menhaj Huda’s 2006 Kidulthood (£454,319 total) and Noel Clarke’s 2008 Adulthood (£3.3m) and Brotherhood (£3.7m).
Deacon, who won the Bafta Rising Star award in 2012, appeared in Kidulthood and Adulthood. He subsequently had a well-publicised feud with Clarke, who himself had his Bafta for outstanding contribution to British cinema suspended in 2021 following allegations of abuse, bullying and sexual misconduct, which Clarke denies.
Lionsgate is starting Thaddeus O’Sullivan’s UK-US comedy-drama The Miracle Club in 362 cinemas. Starring Laura Linney, Kathy Bates, Maggie Smith and Stephen Rea, the film follows a group of women from the Irish village of Ballygar, who want to win a pilgrimage to the sacred French town of Lourdes.
The Miracle Club debuted at Tribeca Film Festival in June this year, going on to play Ireland’s Galway Film Fleadh in July. It is an eighth feature for Irish filmmaker O’Sullivan, and a first since 2018 documentary Citizen Lane.
Smoke signals
Conic is starting Smoke Sauna Sisterhood in 37 cinemas across this week. Debutant Anna Hints’ Estonian documentary won the world cinema documentary – directing award at Sundance in January, and is Estonia’s entry for the best international feature prize at next year’s Oscars.
The film follows a group of women who gather in a traditional Estonian smoke sauna, where they share intimate secrets and regain strength through communion.
Limited releases this weekend include Lisa Mulcahy’s Irish feature Lies We Tell, a Galway 2023 premiere, in 21 cinemas through Break Out Pictures; Raoul Peck’s Amazon Studios documentary Silver Dollar Road, distributed by MetFilm; and American Psycho director Mary Harron’s Daliland starring Ben Kingsley as Salvador Dali through Kaleidoscope. Cosmic Cat has further screenings of Muta’Ali Muhammad’s documentary Cassius X: Becoming Ali, which started in 91 Vue cinemas on Thursday, October 12.
Swift is not the only event cinema release in cinemas this weekend: Unique X has a live broadcast of KSI vs Tommy Fury, the boxing match between the social media star and cruiserweight fighter, in 20 cinemas.
Repertory titles include a 4k restoration of Martin Scorsese’s 1973 crime classic Mean Streets in 149 cinemas through Altitude; and, on the day of its title, Sean S. Cunningham’s classic 1980 horror Friday the 13th in 496 cinemas through Park Circus.
Horror titles dominate the holdovers in the lead-up to Halloween, including last weekend’s number oneThe Exorcist: Believer for Universal and Lionsgate’s Saw X.
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– Armessa Movie News