Under-R-rated
Expletive-laden scenes filled with sequences of graphic violence might be playing out between some movie producers in Hollywood this year, as our friends at Axios recently reported that R-rated movies have pulled in just 14% of the box office revenue in 2022 so far. That's the lowest count of any of the last 27 years, according to the latest data from The Numbers.
Jordan Peele’s new horror Nope is the only R-rated flick to hit the $100m+ domestic milestone so far this year, while 9 PG-13 movies have already achieved the same feat.
Violence in the streams
Although there have been some recent standouts like American Sniper, Deadpool, and Joker that have pulled in some very respectable numbers, distributors are increasingly looking to move their more-mature offerings away from theatres entirely and into the world of streaming. Many independent production companies and distributors, who tend to proffer a healthy portion of the R-rated films released each year, had to pivot to straight-to-streaming as a result of the pandemic — and it seems quite a lot have stayed there ever since.
When adjusted for inflation, almost all of the highest grossing modern R-rated movies are now 10, 15 or even 20 years old. The golden age of kids sneaking in to see the latest R-rated blockbuster smash could well be a thing of the past.
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