AMC lost money in the final quarter of 2023, though not as much as Wall Street anticipated — thank goodness for Taylor Swift! Still, time to break glass and bring back Nicole Kidman.
The AMC Theatres “We Make Movies Better” ad campaign first launched in the fall of 2021. Unlike nearly every other commercial ever, Kidman’s went viral. They came to YouTube for magic.
On Wednesday, February 28, AMC Entertainment chief Adam Aron said three “30-second versions of the highly acclaimed original pre-show advertisement will make their theatrical debut” in March. The first version begins on Friday, March 1, he continued, adding that AMC “will rotate in a few new versions in the coming months on a rotating basis.”
So these aren’t really new spots, just new versions of the original one. The “We Make Movies Better” theme remains, as does the point: AMC Theatres has the best tech and amenities.
Here’s the OG spot:
The original ad was such a hit, AMC re-upped Kidman as brand ambassador in 2022.
Billy Ray (“Captain Phillips,” “The Hunger Games”) wrote the spot; he and Kidman worked together on 2015’s “Secret in Their Eyes.” Ray and Kidman worked with producers Jeff and Tim Croneweth on the over-the-top welcome back; at the time, theaters were seriously suffering due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The first draft of the spot took 15 minutes to compose, Ray told Variety in 2022, with only a few more minutes for revisions. And yet, Ray says it is without question the most widely viewed material he has ever written.
“It’s been seen by hundreds of millions of people,” Ray said. “I started to notice on Twitter, like, ‘Whoa, people are tweeting about this. That image of Nicole is everywhere.’ Someone on Twitter was wearing a T-shirt with the image [of Nicole] and the line ‘Somehow, heartbreak feels good in a place like this.’ I ordered 10 of them.”
Ray believes the ad resonated “because people need movie stars. And people need movies. And they didn’t realize how much they missed those two things until they got to go back. Something about Nicole as a representative of that. She’s such a pure movie star.”
Kidman can currently be seen in theaters in “Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom.” The December 22, 2023 DC release is winding down its theatrical run, with has not exactly been a big success.
