Parent power is paying off big time for Hollywood

For more than a decade, Hollywood had been in the era of the super­hero, but over the past 12 months a new saviour of the box office has emerged.

Gru, Lucy and Gru Jr in Despicable Me 4.

For more than a decade, Hollywood had been in the era of the super­hero, but over the past 12 months a new saviour of the box office has emerged.

Family films have roared back from a pandemic slump and made almost $US7bn ($11.2bn) in 2024, fuelled by a series of hits aimed at parents and children.

The year’s biggest movie, Pixar’s Inside Out 2, has made $US1.7bn worldwide since its release in June. A month later, Despicable Me 4 grossed $US968m, and Moana 2 was released over the American Thanksgiving holiday in November, shattering holiday records in North America with a $US225m opening.

The Broadway adaptation of Wicked, another film aimed at families, has made $US634m worldwide. Mufasa: The Lion King, a prequel to the 2019 live-­action version of The Lion King, recovered from a slow start after its release before Christmas and has generated $US327m in global box office receipts. Sonic the Hedgehog 3, based on the video game character, was also released before Christmas and has already grossed $US211m worldwide.

The string of successes caps a remarkable turnaround for a genre that appeared in trouble.

Filmgoing suffered during the pandemic, but family films were hardest hit. Parents were reluctant to expose their children to crowded spaces, and studios released animated movies on streaming services, training families to watch the biggest releases at home.

Experts track the change in fortunes to the 2023 blockbuster The Super Mario Bros Movie, and the recovery has been supercharged over the past 12 months.

David Gross, who runs the film consultancy firm Franchise Entertainment Research, said family movies were likely to have made about $US6.85bn in 2024, the highest since 2020.

“Watching a movie at a theatre is still the premium experience of that story and, for the studios, the most profitable. Studios had to reorient audiences back to theatres, and they’ve done that.”

For Mary McNamara, a culture columnist and critic with the Los Angeles Times, it’s a bonding experience. “In the movie theatre, you’re seated together and experiencing the same thing. It’s magic,” she said.

“And you can do it with your kids and your parents, so now you have a multigenerational experience. Those are becoming rarer.”

The Times