i dunno, id try to get a few releases, maybe not Black Widow or some other top tier shit, but hundreds of movies get released every year. i could probably get some of that cheddar and if i was the only game in town and i provided a safe environment for customers i could roll 3 or 4 releases across ten screens and social distance people all around. i bet many would love having an almost private theater experience for themselves. i could make that shit work, at least enough so i could cover operating costs and stay in business.
nobody gonna buy into mass streaming services. it would have to be multiple services bundled into one, then they may as well call it cable tv.
There will probably be a lot of reorganization in the short term in the way the studios and TV networks do business. I wouldn't be surprised to see more streaming services attempted and I wouldn't be surprised to see more consolidation between the major studios in the next decade. I think the result is going to be a model for selling movies at a price that is commensurate with a movie's budget. Disney is poised to sell Mulan at $30 on top of their Disney+ sub fee. I can see the price going even higher, $40 or $50, for their big tentpole movies like Avengers and Star Wars. Then at the other end, you can have low budget stuff like comedy and rom-coms for $15 or $20. Overall we'll probably see movie budgets take a slashing and a big chunk of that will be the pay for actors and directors. I don't think theaters are going to completely disappear in the short term, but there will be far less of them, and they will get better terms from studios.
One other comment - moving to a digital model is going to put more emphasis on the international markets for the studios to capture revenue. So expect the China pandering that the studios do to get kicked up another few notches.
its not gonna be something they could stop. not with everyone having a 1080p or 4k quality camera in their backpocket with a mostly empty theater to record whatever. new video downloader websites pop up every day and most of them are based outside of the US. good luck squishing every single one of them. more will be up the next day though. and even if they somehow stopped all the piracy. its not going to bring back all their revenue. people will just watch whatever they already pay for at home.
My hope is that the govt or someone steps in to prevent studios from owning these distribution chains (there may already be regulation preventing that, similar to how they won't let car companies just buy up all the dealerships). I'd prefer theaters go back to being owned by independent companies/people/groups rather than these massive chains, that they become more of a niche experience like they used to be.
