‘Barbenheimer’ craze has Hong Kong film fans dressing up to watch summer blockbusters back-to-back
- Social media hype, viral memes about Hollywood films Barbie and Oppenheimer spark a fun phenomenon
- Cinema operators note the buzz, but grumble that the industry has been slow to recover from pandemic
Hong Kong movie-goers have leapt headlong into the “Barbenheimer” phenomenon, getting together, dressing up and heading to the cinema for summer’s most hyped blockbusters.
The films could not be more different. Greta Gerwig’s Barbie is all pink, fluffy fun about the iconic doll, whereas Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer is a serious three-hour epic about the scientist who helped create the atomic bomb.
Call it extreme viral marketing or the impact of social media, but the same-day opening of the two Hollywood films sparked countless memes and led to the word “Barbenheimer” being coined, along with suggestions to watch both one after the other.
Hong Kong cinema operators noted the buzz and early box office takings, but grumbled that the phenomenon was no silver bullet for their industry’s slow recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic.
Among those who joined the party in Hong Kong was university student Muhammad Nauman Qureshi, 20, who went with six friends to watch the two films back-to-back after seeing the memes online.
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“I thought it was a really fun thing to do,” he said. “You see it everywhere – on Instagram, on YouTube – everyone is advertising this and it is just a funny thing to do.”
The Hong Kong permanent resident and four of his friends took things further by dressing up for the occasion, wearing dark formal outfits for Oppenheimer and pink for Barbie.
“I think it is nice having a once-in-a-while type of thing like ‘Barbenheimer’, but we do not have to keep doing it,” he said.
Bartender Joshua Collett, 25, and his girlfriend, university student Valerie Yuen, 22, watched both films on opening day, July 20.
Collett, a Singaporean and Hong Kong permanent resident, said although he had seen films back-to-back in the past, it was not something he did often.
“But there was a big hype train around the two giant films coming out in the summertime, two big directors and filmmakers. Overall, we had a really great time,” he said.
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Like others, the couple did not only dress up, but also had a coffee and a cigarette before Oppenheimer, as a nod to the chain-smoking physicist, and relaxed with margarita cocktails before Barbie.
“We made it an experience, instead of just going to see a movie,” Collett said.
Both films proved massively successful overseas according to data provider BoxOfficeMojo, with Barbie earning US$162 million (HK$1.3 billion) in the North American box office over three days from July 21, smashing the previous US$146.3 million opening weekend record for the year held by the The Super Mario Bros. Movie. Oppenheimer raked in US$82.4 million
In Hong Kong, Oppenheimer took HK$18.14 million (US$2.3 million) between July 20 and 25, outdoing Barbie, which earned HK$9.8 million, according to data from Hong Kong Box Office Limited (HKBO).
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Both, however, were eclipsed in earnings by Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One which was released on July 13 and made HK$49.1 million as of July 25.
The Hong Kong Theatres Association, representing 59 out of 63 commercial cinemas in the city, expected the “Barbenheimer” phenomenon to boost ticket sales over the summer, but lamented that it was not enough to help the troubled sector.
Chairman Timothy Yuen Yin-man said the trend, buoyed by good reviews for both films, would encourage people to watch both films.
But it could not fix the industry’s “unsatisfactory” recovery following the pandemic.
HKBO data showed local box office takings from January 1 to July 25 this year dropped by almost a quarter to HK$922 million from HK$1.226 billion in 2019, which meant only a 75 per cent recovery to pre-pandemic levels.
“For a movie to make tens of millions in the box office, it is already very good, but a marketing effect like ‘Barbenheimer’ will only help us make around 10 to 20 million more,” he said.
“We are missing HK$304 million in sales, an amount which is absolutely not something that the ‘Barbenheimer’ effect can bring back.”
The association said there were two factors behind the drop in business even after Hong Kong lifted the last of its pandemic restrictions in March – there were fewer popular films, and the pool of cinema patrons had shrunk with the wave of emigration from the city.
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Ticket sales spiked with the launch of “Cinema Day 2023” in April, part of the government’s “Happy Hong Kong” campaign. Cinema patrons bought about 222,036 tickets costing HK$30 each for movies screened on April 29.
Asked if the event should be held again, Yuen said cinemas would be open to the idea, but cautioned that repeated offers could reduce their appeal.
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Cinema-goers dress up for 'Barbenheimer' in Hong Kong
He said the industry would instead focus on other ways to earn income, including sales from concessionary stands, advertisements and venue rentals. They were also exploring the use of cinemas as venues for small-scale performances.
But for the industry to bounce back, what mattered most was the quality of the films.
“If there are no good movies being released, anything you do would be useless, even if tickets are as cheap as HK$20 to HK$30,” he said. “The audience is very smart.”
