By Anthony D’Alessandro

SATURDAY AM: While the theatrical marketplace is starving for big movies post strike, Apple Original Films‘ $200M pick-up of Matthew Vaughn’s Argylle isn’t cutting it, with a $16.5M opening, C+ CinemaScore, and 3 stars on Comscore/Screen Engine’s PostTrak.

At the end of the day, this multi-supporting actor and actress ensemble isn’t provoking people to drive in their cars to cinemas.

Yeah, yeah, that’s where tracking saw it. But we need to finally come clear and say it. Ready? Despite Apple being a $2.87 trillion company, and able to shell out for these $200M (or, in some cases, $150M-budgeted) movies like Napoleon and Killers of the Flower Moon — make no mistake, dollar for dollar on the motion picture P&L sheet, these are losses, and in some cases, they don’t have the ancillaries that other movies, do, ala foreign TV.

In the cases of Napoleon and Killers of the Flower Moon, there’s a small transactional home entertainment window. Furthermore, if Apple isn’t going to get hurt on this 35% Rotten Tomatoes critical movie, then Universal is in its distribution deal. Read on.

“How does Apple get away with not being dinged?” is what I’m often asked by several industry sources when it comes to the tech company playing in the fields of box office.

On one hand, there’s something to be thankful for on behalf of exhibition that the streamer is embracing wide theatrical. Then again, the overall marketplace is at $59M this weekend for all titles, -27% from a year ago. We certainly don’t want Apple to abandon theatrical. However, how long can this reign of $150M-$200M under-grossing movies continue? That’s the question. Will Apple ultimately belt-tighten after this string of uber expensive movies? Who makes an R-rated $200M movie? Because at the end of the day, every corporation wants to profit.

The defense has been that these movies, i.e. Argylle, Killers of the Flower Moon, and Napoleon are brand plays for the service, trinkets to drive global subs to Apple TV+. One film finance source told me that despite these movies being textbook bombs, to Apple, they’re advertising costs. Witness the ten Oscar nominations and 200 accolades (per Apple boss Tim Cook) for Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon, and the anecdotal claim that the movie is “the most popular movie across streaming platforms” despite the fact that it hasn’t appeared in the Nielsen streaming rankings yet.

Are these movies spurring Apple consumers to buy Apple products? Because I think that the products were selling themselves just fine before this content spending came along. Cook boasted recently that Apple Services, the division that includes Apple TV+, is up 11% to $23 billion in the latest quarter, with Apple TV+ subscriptions over a billion.

Streamers such as Apple and Amazon who are playing in the theatrical space realize they need it to eventize their movies, and reportedly, more than profit, are looking at other diagnostics as benchmarks of achievement, i.e. subscriber churn on the streaming site, and how a movie translates into sales on the site (which is specific to Amazon).

But to say that these big tech congloms like Apple and Amazon ($1.78 trillion) are Teflon to losses is further from the truth. Amazon just laid off hundreds in its Prime Video and MGM divisions. Remember the Jason Ropell and Ted Hope administration in Amazon movies division? Their mandate was to make taste-making, awards-worthy fare, just like Apple’s (though at significantly smaller budgets), and they did with such Amazon 2x Oscar winners like Manchester by the Sea.

Then there was the $80M period movie The Aeronauts, starring Felicity Jones and Eddie Redmayne, which was made and intended for Imax, but got short shrifted to a truncated short window theatrical release and pivot to Prime Video. At the end of the day, it was decided that that the administration’s output wasn’t profitable or sticky enough for the brand. The point is: Don’t tell me tech companies don’t look at bottom lines.

As far as Univeral, I hear it’s a distribution deal in the sense that they get around an 8% fee of the box office. Chances are, Uni isn’t going to collect that. I hear Universal is on the hook for 50% of this $80M marketing campaign (which has Vaughn’s heavy fingerprints on it), and that the studio collects back what it’s owed in marketing from the box office before it collects a distribution fee. All these Apple distribution deals work differently. In certain cases, some studios get a guaranteed distribution fee, even if the movie buckles at the B.O.

For Vaughn, that’s the lowest CinemaScore of his career to date, arguably. He’s going to be fine: His Marv-financed Argylle, then sold it to Apple for $200M. The filmmaker self- finances and then sells his movies, which has been his practice with The Kingsman movies, the first two films acquired by 20th Century Fox for, respectively, a $100M+ apiece.

Mostly guy-leaning here at 52% to females 48%. Mean over 25 at 40% were the majority who bought tickets and gave Argylle a 73% grade. Women over 25 at 38% followed and graded the PG-13 action movie at 78%. Diversity demos were 53% Caucasian, 20% Latino and Hispanic, 12% Black and 10% Asian.

Imax and PLFs are repping 42% of Argylle‘s weekend so far, with the movie playing in the West, Mountain, South and South Central. AMC Lincoln Square in NYC is the highest-grossing cinema in the nation through Friday with close to $50K.

Fathom Event’s fourth season of The Chosen is in the No. 7 spot after a $1.75M Friday, on its way to a $3.5M opening at 2,248 theaters.

FRIDAY AM: After a few weeks without any studio wide releases, Apple Original Films’ Argylle via Universal is hoping to entice moviegoers back, but it won’t be in a big way. Thursday night’s previews for the Matthew Vaughn-directed PG-13 action movie made $1.7 million, which is below the $2.4M previews clocked by Amazon MGM’s The Beekeeper a few weeks ago. That movie posted a $16.5M opening, so any hope that the $200 million-budgeted Argylle will get to that $20M-plus that some exhibitors were seeing — I don’t think so.

Argylle was booked at 3,100 theaters last night and has all the cinema upcharges this weekend of PLF and Imax, etc. Reviewers at 34% on Rotten Tomatoes already are screaming “don’t go.” This despite the fact that the $200 million MARV-Cloudy production has an all-star cast of Henry Cavill, John Cena, Oscar winner Ariana DeBose, Grammy-winning pop superstar Dua Lipa, Emmy winner and Oscar nominee Bryan Cranston, Emmy winner Catherine O’Hara, Sofia Boutella and Marvel’s Samuel L. Jackson.

Meanwhile, Fathom Events’ Season 4 of The Chosen did an estimated $1.4M at 2,236 theaters; that’s for episodes 1-3. Episodes 4-6 hit on February 15, while episodes 7-8 debut in theaters February 29.

While Beekeeper was beaten by Paramount’s Mean Girls in their respective third weekends $6.9M to $6.6M, the Jason Statham movie ruled over the Plastics in their second weeks, $9.2M at 3,337 to $8.9M at 3,544. Beekeeper‘s domestic running total stands at $44.1M, Mean Girls at $62.3M.

Following Mean Girls, Warner Bros’ Wonka was third for the week with $7.1M at 3,014 theaters, and a running total of $196.3M. Man, it has to cross $200M this weekend.

Sony’s Anyone But You, booked at 2,885 theaters, ended its Week 6 with $6.4M and a running total of $72.7M.

Illumination/Universal’s Migration at 2,970 theaters ends Week 6 with $6M, and a $102M running stateside cume.