Movie theaters in Wisconsin are seeing significant revenue gains in 2026, thanks to an Italian plumber in outer space, a rebellious group of children’s toys and a resurgence from Gen Z audiences and filmmakers.
Milwaukee-based Marcus Theaters announced that it recorded the highest revenue of any June in the company’s 91-year history, including record concession sales and the highest box office revenues for the month of June since 2019.
The nonprofit arts organization Milwaukee Film is seeing movie attendance up about 20 percent so far this year at its two independent theaters on the city’s north side.
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Both companies credited the June 19 release of “Toy Story 5” as a major box office success, along with blockbuster horror hits “Obsession” and “Backrooms,” which has connections to Oshkosh.
“The Super Mario Galaxy Movie” remains the highest-grossing film of the year so far, bringing in over $1 billion worldwide since its April 1 release.
Milwaukee Film executive director Susan Kerns told WPR’s “Wisconsin Today” that 2026 has been an important boost as the industry continues to climb back from the challenges it has faced since the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We have many more movies this year coming out of Hollywood that people want to see,” Kerns said. “It’s been just a tremendous year, really a rebound year for movie theaters.”
Her organization has found success generating interest on its own by mixing in screenings of classic films that audiences want to rewatch on the big screen, but she said theaters have less control over whether the latest new movies will draw out record-breaking crowds.
“Sometimes the online discourse takes on a life of its own around a film,” Kerns said. “If there is a film that comes out of Hollywood that everybody thinks is going to be great and just does not perform the way they think, there’s not a lot that the theaters can necessarily do to drive those audiences.”
She credits Gen Z audiences as one of the driving forces that is prioritizing the in-person theater experience rather than waiting for a movie to be released on a streaming service to watch at home.
UW-Milwaukee associate professor and director of film studies Jocelyn Szczepaniak-Gillece is seeing the same trend with her students.
She told “Wisconsin Today” that she thinks it’s a response to the type of isolation that young people are feeling with digital technology.
“What we’re lacking is this experience of being together with others and getting to have a defined immersive aesthetic moment with strangers that we might not necessarily ever interact with otherwise,” she said. “That is a really wonderful and often actually kind of profound experience, and I think young people are really starting to recognize that.”
Still, the theaters have to provide this eager audience with movies they actually want to see, and Szczepaniak-Gillece thinks filmmakers are doing a good job keeping up with Gen Z trends.
Hollywood continues to successfully tap into nostalgia with strong sequels like “The Super Mario Galaxy Movie,” “Toy Story 5” and “The Devil Wears Prada 2.”
But Szczepaniak-Gillece also sees important lessons in the surprise success of new horror films like “Backrooms” and “Obsession.”
Both movies were made by directors in their 20s who got their start making media with low-cost tools and putting them on YouTube.
“They have this kind of training in media that appeals to people of their generation,” she said. “When they make that transition to the big screen, they’re speaking the language of young people in a way that perhaps older filmmakers who trained more in typical industrial type programs, maybe they don’t quite have access to that same kind of communication that these younger horror directors have.”
Szczepaniak-Gillece and Kerns both expect the hot start to 2026 to continue throughout the rest of the year, with high expectations for upcoming films like “The Odyssey” and “Spider-Man: Brand New Day” this summer followed by “Dune: Part Three” and “Avengers: Doomsday” this winter.
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