Hollywood just marked its fourth consecutive $1 billion month of domestic box office sales, and movie theater operators are celebrating.

The July 31 opening of Sony Pictures' Spider-Man: Brand New Day launched AMC Entertainment to its highest revenue weekend for tickets and food-and-beverage sales in its 106-year history, counting more than 10.2 million moviegoers in its theaters in the U.S. and worldwide.

According to CEO Adam Aron, Spider-Man was the ninth movie title since March to have a "gangbusters opening-weekend gross."

Cinemark Holdings has said Spider-Man: Brand New Day had become the highest grossing domestic film in the theater chain's history, delivering record-breaking results across the company's premium formats, as well as driving food, beverage, and merchandise sales. Cinemark was a Barron's stock pick in June.

Both stocks are up big this year, with AMC shares rising 70% and Cinemark up 62%.

At the same time, director Christopher Nolan's three-hour The Odyssey , the first theatrical release filmed entirely on specially developed IMAX 70mm film cameras, has grossed a record $406.4 million from global IMAX screenings, or 28% of the specialty theater chain's total ticket sales. That includes $180.7 million domestically and $225.8 million internationally, making it the biggest IMAX release of all time in 65 countries.

IMAX Corp. shares are up nearly 47% this year. CEO Rich Gelfond called the film a "monumental achievement" that shattered its longstanding box office record, with screenings scheduled through at least Sept. 17 at IMAX theaters worldwide. The 41 IMAX 70mm theaters worldwide have grossed $56 million, or an average of nearly $1.4 million per screen, according to Rentrak.

Marcus Theaters, the nation's fourth largest theater chain, also saw its highest-ever weekend box office when Spider-Man opened, as well as its highest concession and merchandise revenue. Its parent, Marcus Corp., is up 95.5% this year.

All told, Hollywood studios are headed for their biggest year domestically since 2019. For the summer, sales could potentially rival 2013's record, according to data gathered by Rentrak.

Domestic box office revenue stands at nearly $7.1 billion through Monday, or 20.3% of $1.20 billion ahead of the same point last year, according to Rentrak. That's only 7.5%, or $572.6 million, below the same period in 2019, not adjusted for inflation.

This year's summer domestic box office sales since May 1 are nearly $4.46 billion. That's 25.7% more than the same number of days last summer and 6.4% ahead of the same number of days in 2019.

"If the summer movie season ended today," summer 2026 would rank as the fourth best summer for domestic box office, Rentrak's head of marketplace trends Paul Dergarabedian said. And there are nearly two weeks left before the summer movie season ends on Labor Day.

August just became Hollywood's fourth straight month that box office revenue surpassed $1 billion. Eric Handler, senior media and entertainment analyst for Roth, wrote Monday that August's $1.1 billion so far is 95% above August 2025, with a week left in the month.

This summer's total through Monday is only $297.2 million below the record summer of 2013, which grossed nearly $4.76 billion.

Hollywood studios have actually unleashed fewer qualifying wide releases this summer, with 34 movies opening in or expanding to 2,000 or more theaters, compared with 32 last summer. It's also below the 44 movies released at this point in the summer of 2019, and 38 movies during the comparable period in summer 2013, according to Rentrak.

But despite fewer wide-release movies, this summer's films are generating approximately $131.1 million in total marketplace revenue per movie, Dergarabedian said. That is 38% more box office per movie than in the summer of 2019, and 9% more than in the record summer of 2013.

"For me, the numbers continue to tell a compelling story," he said. "The strength of the year-over-year gains, the performance relative to 2019, and the fact that summer 2026 already ranks among the biggest summer movie seasons in history provide further evidence of the theatrical business's continued resilience and momentum."

One other factor is that because of when Labor Day falls, this summer movie season has 130 days versus the typical 123 days - seven more calendar days in which to generate revenue, he added.

Meanwhile, some films continue to shatter expectations.

Spider-Man brought in another $39 million in domestic ticket sales through Sunday, and it has grossed $2.22 billion worldwide, making it the sixth highest-selling film ever, according to Rentrak. That total includes $221.4 million in ticket sales just in China.

Benchmark Equity Research on Monday raised its third-quarter domestic box office forecast to $2.69 billion. Analyst Michael Hickey expects Spider-Man to reach $900 million in domestic box office sales, from $854.9 million now, saying it could pass Walt Disney's Star Wars: The Force Awakens as the highest-grossing domestic film ever, not adjusted for inflation.

But theater chains have a number of challenges, too.

Stephen Galloway, dean of the Dodge College of Film and Media Arts at Chapman University and former executive editor of The Hollywood Reporter, told Barron's that overall box office ticket sales aren't the same as attendance and don't reflect how much ticket prices have risen, especially for IMAX and other premium formats.

"When you factor in inflation, it's still impressive but the numbers are nowhere near as good as they look," especially in comparison to the droves of moviegoers who went to see 1997's Titanic or 2009's Avatar, he said. The Odyssey, which cost $250 million to produce plus another $125 million reportedly for marketing, can still pack in audiences. But some lower-budget films are struggling.

"Goliath, high-risk films are doing well, and low-budget date films are doing well, but middle-ground films aren't all doing as well," Galloway said. "We're still not back to the glory days."

Placer.ai estimates that movie theater attendance from Jan. 1 through July 31 is up 8.1% over the same period in 2025, but down 27% from the same span in 2019.

Still, IMAX is having a higher-than-projected quarter that could reach $600 million of revenue, versus the consensus estimate of about $400 million and "far outpacing the company's all-time record of $365 million" in the second quarter of 2019, Handler wrote. The Odyssey's $406.5 million is already more than $130 million higher than Imax's second-highest movie of all time, Avatar.

Labor Day weekend, the official end of the summer movie season, will pair current run movies like Spider-Man, The Odyssey, Insidious, and Tony, with newer offerings such as Warner Bros. Pictures' Coyote vs. Acme and Disney's The Dog Stars, both opening this Friday.

Hollywood still has a number of potential hits slated for later this year. AMC reported that when advance tickets for Dune Part 3 went on sale earlier this month, "the crushing volumes briefly slowed or glitched our online ticketing systems," as AMC saw "extraordinarily high demand, particularly for premium format presentations and for some of our most desired locations," CEO Aron said on social media.

"Ticketing traffic across AMC's website and mobile app reached levels approximately three times higher than what we experienced during the Spider-Man: Brand New Day ticket launch, which itself followed strong advance sales for The Odyssey ticket launch before that."

Warner Bros.' Dune Part 3 opens in theaters on Dec. 18.