Is the ‘Minecraft Movie’ phenomenon good for film culture?

Young people around the country went to see the Minecraft Movie, bought hundreds of millions of dollars in tickets, made a ruckus, and posted about it. What should we think about that?

Chicken Jockey! (Warner Bros Discovery)

There are two things that Serious Film People believe, almost as articles of faith:

1. Young people in particular aren’t typically all that interested in seeing films in the big screen, they’d much rather stick to YouTube or TikTok, and this state of affairs represents a genuine crisis for the movie business.

2. In-theater behavior these days is unspeakably awful, with filmgoers thinking nothing of talking out loud, throwing things, and even sometimes filming the screen and posting that video to social media.

This weekend, something seems to have thrown those two assumptions into conflict: A new movie was released, drew a young and enthusiastic audience, and made a massive box office in its opening weekend, far beyond expectations.

That movie was A Minecraft Movie, which made over $300 million worldwide and $175 million domestically in its first three days.

On the other hand, the film was accompanied by another phenomenon: People in the theater celebrating, saying the lines along with the characters, in some cases throwing popcorn and other items, and filming the whole thing and posting the clips to TikTok and other social platforms.

The “Chicken Jockey” scene, in particular, seems to have struck a chord and led to wild cheers— that’s what happened when my son went to see the movie on Saturday — but some social media posts have featured rankings of their favorite moments from the movie.

I haven’t seen A Minecraft Movie yet, so I’m not commenting on the quality of the film itself. But I’m kind of at a loss as to whether or not this is a good or bad thing.