The tastes of moviegoers are constantly changing. Nowhere was this more apparent than in 2017. 2017 was a major turning point, to say the least. Star Wars: The Last Jedi vaulted to the top of the charts, overtaking the top-grossing movie for roughly three-quarters of the year. Disney's Beauty and the Beast became the first movie of 2017 to cross $1 billion worldwide. 2017 left both studio heads and creative executives scrambling to come up with new ways to chase those box office dollars. It has been six years, and much has changed, showing how the winds of box office success are never a sure thing.
Updated September 3, 2023: Fans of film history will be glad to know this article was recently updated by Amanda Minchin.
2023 is very much a sequel to 2017. Both years had an original Christopher Nolan movie set during World War 2, a Guardians of the Galaxy movie, a new Spider-Man movie, a Fast & Furious film, a remake of a beloved Disney Renaissance film, and a film from James Mangold where an actor plays his iconic role for one last time. We've decided to dive back and pick out the most interesting trends that developed among audiences during that time and how much has changed since then.
Pixar Begins To Rethink
Buena Vista Pictures Distribution
Pixar released two films in 2017. The first was Cars 3, which opened on June 16, 2017, and the second film, Coco, opened on November 22, 2017. Neither film cracked the domestic top 10, but Coco came close as it brought in $807 million worldwide, while Cars 3 brought in $383 million worldwide.
This certainly was down from 2016's Finding Dory, and while the studio would ride high in the following years with sequels in 2018's Incredibles 2 and 2019's Toy Story 4, the studio has faced a difficult decade coming into 2020. Onward was released one week before theaters shut down due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and the following three original films went straight to Disney+. Lightyear was the studio's first bomb, and while Elemental had a disappointing opening weekend, it has had an impressive run so far, grossing $469 million worldwide, beating Cars 3.
While Pixar certainly still draws audiences, the days of the studio being able to turn properties like Ratatouille, WALL-E, and Up seem to be gone, and 2017 could be where this started. Coco certainly is the last time one of their original films was a major box office draw.
R-rated Films Continued Their Box Office Resurgence
Two whole R-rated movies, meanwhile, landed in the domestic top 10 in 2017. The It remake (#6, $327 million) blasted past the long-standing record held by The Exorcist to become the highest-grossing horror movie ever at the time. Logan (#9, $226 million) followed shortly behind.
2017 also marked the first year since 2003 that there have been two or more R-rated movies in the top 10 at the box office. 2003 actually saw three R-rated films do particularly well - The Matrix Reloaded, The Matrix Revolutions, and Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines. With the exception of The Hangover trilogy, most of the R-rated hits in the intervening years had been one-off anomalies, like The Passion of the Christ, American Sniper, and Ted.
In addition to the massive success of both IT and Logan, other R-rated hits like Get Out ($175 million), Girls Trip ($115 million), Fifty Shades Darker ($114 million), Baby Driver ($107 million), Annabelle: Creation ($102 million) and Kingsman: The Golden Circle ($100.1 million) all surpassed $100 million at the domestic box office.
In 2023, Oppenheimer became one of the highest-grossing R-rated films of all time, while horror films continue to do well at the box office and are among the few sure things.
Many Sequels and Reboots Were Dying Out
Compared to the year prior, nearly half of the Top Ten highest-grossing pictures of 2017 were released in the summer months. Wonder Woman (#3, $412 million), Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (#4, $389 million), Spider-Man: Homecoming (#5, $334 million) and Despicable Me 3 (#8, $264 million) were the biggest hits of the summer. This came as no surprise to any box office analysts since they're all either sequels or based on popular brands.
The bigger shock, however, was that so many other projects that once thrived at the box office fell sharply off track. Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales ($172 million), Cars 3 ($152 million), War For the Planet of the Apes ($146 million), Transformers: The Last Knight ($130 million), and Resident Evil: The Final Chapter ($26 million) all posted franchise-low domestic grosses. High-powered movies based on hit franchises like Power Rangers ($85 million), The Mummy ($80 million), Alien: Covenant ($74 million), Baywatch ($58 million), The Dark Tower ($50 million), Rings ($27 million), CHiPs ($18 million) and Flatliners ($16 million) all failed to make a dent.
Two of the Biggest Filmmakers Get Their Start in 2017
Two of the biggest filmmakers working today are Jordan Peele and Greta Gerwig, and both made their feature film debuts in 2017. Both went on to have their films nominated for Best Picture at the Academy Awards the following year.
Peele directed Get Out, which opened in February 2017 and on a budget of just $4.5 million, brought in $255 million worldwide and earned rave reviews. It was a rare horror film that general audiences and critics agreed about. Meanwhile, Gerwig's Lady Bird (her first solo film as she co-directed 2008's Nights and Weekends with Joe Swanberg) had a budget of $10 million and grossed an impressive $79 million worldwide. This was a case of a smaller Award-centric film gaining positive word of mouth and earning a respectable box office intake like they used to.
Peele and Gerwig's careers are very similar, as both released films in 2019. Peele's Us and Gerwig's Little Women had bigger budgets and were also box office hits. Their third film had a much bigger scope as Peele's film Nope was released in 2022 and hyped up the use of IMAX cameras. Meanwhile, Gerwig's 2023 film Barbie has become the biggest movie of the summer and is now the highest-grossing film in Warner Bros. history. 2017 launched the careers of two of Hollywood's biggest voices and modern-day auteurs.
Strong Autheur Voices
Building off of Gerwig and Peele, a common element of many of the biggest hits of 2017 was they were all coming from unique auteur voices. Whether it be the failure of cookie-cutter remakes or the rise of R-rated fare, it was quite clear that audiences were looking for something different... even if that something different was part of an existing property. Many of the biggest films franchise films, like Rian Johnson's Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Patty Jenkins' Wonder Woman, and James Gunn's Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, were clearly the work of their specific directors.
Filmmakers like Taika Waititi's Thor: Ragnarok or James Mangold on Logan got to truly express themselves within the realms of comic book films and took their characters into new genres and tones. Meanwhile, filmmakers like M. Night Shyamalan, Edgar Wright, and Christopher Nolan were used as major selling points for their films Split, Baby Driver, and Dunkirk, respectively, and it paid off. Meanwhile, strict studio-controlled films like The Dark Tower and Justice League failed to connect with audiences, and they bombed. Whether it be the failure of cookie-cutter remakes or the rise of R-rated fare, it was quite clear that audiences were looking for something different... even if that something different was part of an existing property.
Yet Hollywood has yet to learn this lesson fully. Studios still appear to be afraid to let filmmakers have full control. Even after the success of Oppenheimer and Barbie, it is clear the lesson is not going to be to invest in filmmakers with unique visions and instead learn the wrong lessons.
Marvel Remains King
2017 marked the first year three Marvel Cinematic Universe movies were released in the same year - Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, Spider-Man: Homecoming, and Thor: Ragnarok. Each solidified a spot in the top ten worldwide box office for the year at numbers 8, 6, and 9, respectively.
This certainly helped Marvel Studios build themselves up as the biggest franchise in the world, and from 2018 to 2019, of the six films they released, only one (Ant-Man and the Wasp) did not gross $1 billion. This is certainly why some people say Marvel Studios is dropping off despite many of their films ranking in the top 10. Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumia certainly was a disappointment, but Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 was a hit.
That is the most interesting film to examine as there was a Guardians of the Galaxy film in 2017 and 2023, and both were released on the same day, May 5. This is because due to James Gunn being fired and then rehired from Marvel Studios, there was a much longer gap in the release window. Yet Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 has grossed $845 million worldwide, which is only $18 million below Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2. Now a bad drop, all things considered.
DC is a Mixed Bag
While the MCU has had a steady stream of box office hits, their biggest competitors, DC, are a different story. Like Marvel, DC also released three films that year, but one, The Lego Batman Movie, was out of continuity. It was still a box office hit, grossing $311 million worldwide. Wonder Woman was certainly a massive hit for the studio, grossing $821 million worldwide, and outgrossed every MCU film. The film also received positive reviews and is regarded as the best entry in the DCEU.
Meanwhile, Justice League, released a few months later, was a box office and critical disappointment. Due to massive reshoots, bringing $657 million did not make it a hit and instead was outgrossed by every MCU film. This would begin a downward spiral for the DCEU to now in 2023. Every film they have released in 2023 has disappointed at the box office and is now set to be rebooted. This certainly was the point where audiences knew they couldn't truly trust the DC brand.
Original Movies Made A Comeback...and Sadly Never Recovered
2017 was one of the last years where it appeared that an original film could truly make it. Films like Get Out, Lady Bird, Baby Driver, Girls Trip, and Dunkirk all proved to be box office hits. One of the year's biggest surprises was the indie hit The Big Sick, which put up $421,577 domestically in its opening weekend from just five theaters. It eventually expanded to 2,597 theaters nationwide over the following weeks and stayed in the top 10 for two more weeks, ultimately earning an impressive $42.8 million in its wake.
In 2023, there were some cases of impressive limited-release runs, like Wes Anderson's Astreoid City, or recent films like Theater Camp or Bottoms, but the market has shifted drastically. It is harder to get audiences to go out to the movies, and thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic, audiences have gotten used to being able to stream films at home sooner. Many wait for the film to arrive on PVOD or on Netflix, so these films are given shorter theatrical windows. They are not given the chance to become surprise box office hits or grow their legs over the coming weeks. Oppenheimer has been the sole exception, and that is just because it has a name like Christopher Nolan to draw in audiences.
What Does All This Mean For Movie Goers Today?
2017 may feel like nearly a decade ago (and soon it very well will be), but that doesn't make it any less impactful to the landscape of today. Interruptions from a global pandemic aside, trends from 2017 have continued to influence the box office of today. Superhero and Star Wars films may be on the downslope, but those with a new story to tell are still hanging in there. Adapting pre-existing material is still all the rage. Thanks in part to streaming, there are more international options than ever. There might be an influx in low-budget and Indie films due in part to the Writers and SAG-AFTRA strikes preventing major studios from resuming production.
While audience resurgence is at an all-time high, it has yet to reach 2019 pre-pandemic numbers. If 2017 has taught us anything, it is the power of the consumer to influence the market... maybe not today or tomorrow, but over the next few years to come. Now's the time to root for the movies you want to see more of by investing in a ticket or three.