What Hollywood Can Learn from Barbenheimer

The simultaneous release of Barbie and Oppenheimer sparked the double-feature event "Barbenhemier," and led both films to big box office successes. At the time of writing this, Barbie is poised to cross $1 billion worldwide in two weeks of release; Oppenheimer is quickly approaching half a billion dollars while boosting IMAX theaters to record profits. 

It's ironic that both Barbenheimer turned out to be such a big success; the 2023 summer movie season has been a sobering lesson in how movie theaters are overstuffed with film offerings right now – and yet, the release of two big films in the same week worked out spectacularly well. 

So what can Hollywood actually learn from Barbenheimer? Let's break down three big takeaways: 

1. One Genre Does Not Run Things

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The superhero and/or action genres have been the dominant films at the box office for many years now – but anyone who knows the movie industry knows that trends must inevitably change. 

We may be still a ways off from declaring that superhero movie franchises are dead, but it's definitely become apparent in the last few years that moviegoers aren't going to just show up for every single big action and/or superhero movie that gets dangled in front of them. 

Barbenheimer was a double-feature offering of a comedic satire film (Barbie) and a three-hour historical drama built on dialogue (Oppenheimer). Neither of those films really offered anything that viewers come to see from Marvel, DC, Fast & Furious, or John Wick; but all those franchises put out films this year, and Barbenheimer seemed to be a bigger deal than any of them. Clearly, modern "blockbusters" can come in many genre forms. 

2. Every Moviegoer Is A Fan of Multiple Things

Hollywood loves to boil its customers down into data points and demographics. The amount of research and study that goes into finding out who will watch what, and who enjoys what, is actually silly: If Barbenheimer has taught Hollywood anything, it's that every moviegoer is multi-faceted. Oppenheimer wasn't just carried by male viewers; Barbie wasn't just boosted by girl parties: the double-feature hype brought a considerable amount of viewers into theaters for both films. 

Real people are complex, and each person's tastes span a variety of genres. That's a key detail for Hollywood to realize, as it helps to prove the third and final point of this... 

3. Counter-Programming Is Actually Viable Marketing

Because every moviegoer enjoys a varied range of film genres, Hollywood needs to re-think how best to sell their products to them. Summer, in particular, has become a long stretch of action, adventure, and superhero movies, with little other fare to break it all up – and 2023 may be later looked at as the moment when that overcrowding finally hit the wall. 

Barbenheimer seems to have been particularly successful because it offered not one, but two, promising detours away from the Fast & Furious, Marvel, DC, John Wick, Transformers, Indiana Jones, and Mission: Impossible of it all. In the past, having odd-pair movies released on the same day has been a novelty of counter-programming, mostly used to make jokes. The joke is now on Hollywood, as Barbenheimer's counter-programming release strategy became marketing gold. 

So now that Hollywood understands that moviegoers' have varied tastes, it's time to look at yearly release slates in a different light and plan more weekends where very different sorts of movies can work in tandem to drum up business.