What Is the Best Day Ever in Hollywood History?
Andrew Gruttadaro
Before ‘Oppenheimer’ and ‘Barbie’ change the day of July 21 forever, it’s time to figure out which days of the year have been home to the best (and most) movies ever
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The Ringer
The film industry is, at this point, over a century old—don’t forget how the Oscars spent a chunk of airtime this past March celebrating (or rather, cough, advertising) the 100th anniversary of Warner Bros. But despite existing for more than 100 years, much of the industry’s lifespan has been spent figuring itself out: building systems that would quickly come crumbling down, evolving and devolving and then evolving again. (For a crash course on this stuff, just watch the last few minutes of Babylon; it’s super profound, dude, I promise.) With the advantage of hindsight, many of Hollywood’s brief states seem almost unfathomable now: the unilateral entrusting of auteurs; the lean toward adult-oriented content; the backing of original ideas, untethered to any previous intellectual property; the sheer lack of saturation.

It wasn’t until 1975 that Hollywood began to resemble the game we know today. After Steven Spielberg’s Jaws chomped its way in the middle of summer to being the first American movie to gross over $100 million, studios recognized the metaphorical ocean of oil they were sitting on. Release dates became more targeted; summer in particular became blockbuster season, a landing zone for prime releases, as studios realized that people wanted the cool respite of a theater as much as they wanted to go to the beach.

Now, just days away from the dual release of Barbie and Oppenheimer, it’s hard not to see the pink-and-black double feature as the culmination of Hollywood’s honing of its release strategies—a phenomenon made possible by years and years of studying the most ideal times to release a movie.

But what is the most ideal time? What date on the calendar has had the most success over the years? Well, I’m glad I just asked those previously rhetorical questions, because I think I have the answers. In the lead-up to Barbenheimer, The Ringer has documented every movie released in the summer months—as well as some other choice windows—since 1960 and analyzed their critical and commercial success, using a proprietary formula, to then ultimately determine which day of the year holds the Hollywood title belt. Join us as we comb through history, extract lessons from decades of studio decision-making, and figure out whether there have been double features that could make even Barbenheimer blush.

The Methodology

Our ultimate goal in this exercise is to determine the Best Day in Hollywood History in a way that measures the number of movies released on a given date, how those movies performed at the box office, and the critical reception to those movies. Because there have been a lot of movies released since 1960—and because the documentation of these movies has been left to somewhat unreliable authorities such as IMDb, Box Office Mojo, and Wikipedia—we had to institute some rules for this study:

A film’s domestic “wide release” was considered its official release date.

In cases when a film did not have a wide release, its limited release date was cited.

In situations when the above outlets differed on a movie’s release date, we went with the date cited by the most outlets; in the rare case when each outlet cited a different release date, we deferred to Box Office Mojo.

As for our window of analysis, we studied the following between the years of 1960 and 2022:

The months of June, July, and August

The week leading up to and including Christmas Day

April 27 and April 26—also known as the days on which Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame were released

2020 was not included, for reasons that should be clear

Because our ultimate goal was to determine the date on which the most and best movies have been released, there were some assumptions made in order to narrow our scope, and thus, keep us (and The Ringer’s fact checkers) from losing our minds. Historically, the highest-grossing movies have been released during the summer and around the holidays, making those windows obvious targets. But summer dominance has decreased over the last decade or so, as Disney started to drop its Marvel mega-blockbusters outside of the warmer months—and inspired studios like Universal to do the same with its Fast & Furious installments, for example. So to make sure we weren’t short-shrifting the spring or fall dates, we threw the release dates of Infinity War and Endgame into the competition to see how they’d stack up. And the fact is that even though dates like that are now home to some of the biggest box office totals ever, those single performances can’t lift up dates that have been historically reserved for less than stellar stuff. (Not including Endgame, the most successful movies released on April 26 are 1978’s The Last Waltz and the 1996 Jeneane Garofalo rom-com The Truth About Cats & Dogs.) So as you read on, rest assured that you’re looking at the best of the best.

As for how we ranked the dates, it was a two-part process. First, each movie’s critical and commercial success was rated using a formula that took into consideration box office performance—adjusted to account for inflation, and also to account for pandemic-related swoons post-2020—and ratings on Rotten Tomatoes and IMDb. (For reference, the highest-scoring movie recorded was E.T., with a total of 566.65; the lowest score was the 2008 spoof Disaster Movie, with a total of 25.71.) Those specific scores were then averaged out and accumulated to capture a release date’s average success (which reflects quality and commercial success on a per-movie basis for each date) and total success (which incorporates volume and how the number of movies released on a given date impacted box office figures). Two separate rankings were made based on those two scores—a top 10 was then composed of the dates with the best average between those two lists.

That all makes sense, right? You definitely didn’t just skip all of this mumbo-jumbo and scroll directly to the ranking, right? Cool, I appreciate that.

The Best Days in Hollywood History

10. June 24

Average Movie Score: 171.28

Overall Score: 3,596.78

Notable releases: Catch-22 (1970), The Lion King (1994), March of the Penguins (2005), Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (2009), Elvis (2022)

Our 10th-best date isn’t necessarily home to the highest quality of movies—The Lion King is probably June 24’s best movie—but holy hell does it have a lot of movies that put some dang butts in the seats. Some of that can be chalked up to a high volume of buzzy kids movies—Cars 2 also dropped on June 24—but this date also features films that majorly outperformed box office expectations (The Shallows) and then other movies that were definitely bad but undeniably commercial (Land of the Dead, Bad Teacher). And then there’s last year’s June 24, which featured the dual release of Elvis and The Black Phone and probably convinced many in Hollywood that theatrical releases were all the way back post-pandemic. A pretty solid day!

9. June 12

Average Movie Score: 179.59

Overall Score: 3,412.24

Notable releases: Rosemary’s Baby (1968), Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981), Predator (1987), This Is the End (2013), Jurassic World (2015)

Look at that list of five movies—you could host a movie marathon of those five today and make a billion dollars. This day rocks. This is also the date when Can’t Hardly Wait and Dirty Work came out in 1998. That’s probably not Barbenheimer levels to you, but it definitely was to a kid whose parents let him watch too many movies (me).

8. June 30

Average Movie Score: 170.99

Overall Score: 4,445.65

Notable releases: Carnal Knowledge (1971), The Firm (1993), Apollo 13 (1995), Spider-Man 2 (2004), The Twilight Saga: Eclipse (2010)

June 30 does have some bangers, there’s no doubt about that: all of the above, the South Park movie, The Perfect Storm, The Devil Wears Prada, and most important, Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie. But it also just has SO MANY movies. It’s certainly helped by its adjacency to the 4th of July and the fact studios picked it as a release date even in years when it didn’t land on a Friday. If you’re going for pure volume, it’s pretty hard to beat June 30.

7. December 18

Average Movie Score: 176.43

Overall Score: 4,234.37

Notable releases: The Prince of Egypt (1998), You’ve Got Mail (1998), The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002), Avatar (2009), Star Wars: Episode VII—The Force Awakens

Our first appearance from the week leading up to Christmas, December 18 has both solid volume and average quality. What’s most interesting, though, is how the date has only become a juggernaut in the 21st century. The Two Towers, Avatar, and The Force Awakens is freakin’ WILD—the latter are two of the top five highest-grossing movies of all time, and that trio is pretty much why this date is on the list.

6. December 21

Average Movie Score: 170.96

Overall Score: 6,838.40

Notable releases: Lawrence of Arabia (1962), The Graduate (1967), Mission: Impossible—Ghost Protocol (2011), Sing (2016), Aquaman (2018)

Remember how I just said it was gonna be hard to beat June 30’s volume? Well, December 21 blows it out of the water—only December 22 and December 25 have seen more movies released (and those two dates have had much worse movies, which is why you won’t see them on this list). But unlike December 18, the 21st has always been a prime date for big releases. Lawrence of Arabia?! The Graduate?! Thunderball?! December 21 has had shit popping since the ’60s.

5. July 15

Average Movie Score: 200.65

Overall Score: 3,411.13

Notable releases: Die Hard (1988), True Lies (1994), There’s Something About Mary (1998), Wedding Crashers (2005), Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 (2011)

July 15 hasn’t had a ton of releases—note the relatively low overall score—but it has the most consistency of any date on this list. (Only June 11 had a higher Average Movie Score in this exercise, and that number was mostly propped up by massive scores from E.T., Jurassic Park, and Austin Powers.) It’s smack-dab in the middle of the summer, and it’s truly delivered what you’re looking for when you pack into a theater on a hot day.

4. June 22

Average Movie Score: 176.76

Overall Score: 4,418.90

Notable releases: Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966), Alien (1979), Escape From Alcatraz (1979), The Karate Kid (1984), Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988), The Fast and the Furious (2001)

Back when your parents—and your parents’ parents, probably—were young, I bet they used to be like, “Oh fuck, June 22’s coming up. I bet a dope movie’s about to come out.”

3. December 20

Average Movie Score: 176.51

Overall Score: 5,118.80

Notable releases: All That Jazz (1979), JFK (1991), Scream (1996), Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle (2017), Star Wars: Episode IX—The Rise of Skywalker (2019)

We are now entering the pantheon of dates with the most and best movies. With December 20, though, it’s probably worth restating that by “best” we mean a combination of critical and commercial success. Because this date does have a ton of great popcorn fare—in addition to the movies listed above, it can also claim Out of Africa, Father of the Bride, and Gangs of New York. But December 20 is also home to some of the worst holiday releases ever (even if they did numbers at the box office). Do you know what also came out alongside The Rise of Skywalker (a true abomination) on December 20, 2019? That’s right: Cats. I feel like if the world hadn’t turned upside down a few months after this weekend, we’d still be talking about what a travesty it was.

2. December 19

Average Movie Score: 177.20

Overall Score: 4,961.68

Notable releases: Kramer Vs. Kramer (1979), 9 to 5 (1980), Platoon (1986), Titanic (1997), The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001)

Why did so many people go see Kramer Vs. Kramer during the holidays in 1979? Who were these sickos being like, “It’s Christmastime, and you know what that means: DIVORCE MOVIE.” What, did you not get enough familial strife at home?

Anyway: Titanic and The Fellowship of the Ring. That’s pretty much all you need to make a legendary release date.

1. July 3

Average Movie Score: 187.58

Overall Score: 3,939.24

Notable releases: Back to the Future (1985), Die Hard 2 (1990), Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991), Independence Day (1996), Transformers (2007), The Amazing Spider-Man (2012)

This is summer movie heaven. This is blockbuster Eden. This is box office Valhalla. Bury me in popcorn, slather me in butter, and leave me here to bask in the glow of July 3, the biggest and best release date in Hollywood history.

Some (Potentially Obvious) Takeaways

Holidays = Money

There are only three dates in the top 10 that aren’t a week or so within Christmas or the 4th of July. Those two holidays stand as prime earning periods for Hollywood as people, freed from their jobs and schoolwork, flock to theaters to watch, well, pretty much whatever’s playing. You probably aren’t learning this just now, reading this article; you’ve probably been dragged to the movies after an awkward family Christmas dinner enough times to notice this larger trend. But knowing this, it is interesting to see which movies studios save for these holidays, whether because they know the movie will explode in prime circumstances, or because they think a movie (that they probably spent too much money on) needs the boost of a captive holiday audience.

This might all be changing, though: This year’s major 4th of July movie was Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, which only just broke even and has been widely dubbed a flop. With the post-pandemic box office landscape still crystallizing and Hollywood’s IP obsession reaching a bursting point, a holiday boost is no longer guaranteed. Maybe they should figure out how to make more movies like Back to the Future and Independence Day.

The August Dumping Ground

You might notice that there’s a missing month in the above ranking. August was shut out of our top 10, and to go even further, only two August dates landed in the top 25: August 13 (Bonnie and Clyde, Free Guy) and August 6 (The Fugitive, The Sixth Sense). While Hollywood as a whole did ultimately realize and decide that people did want to spend part of their summers indoors, it seems that they eventually determined that August—particularly the back half of it—should be reserved for the beach. This is certainly a chicken-or-the-egg situation: Do movies flop in August because no one wants to go to theaters, or does no one want to go to theaters in August because studios drop all their trash during that month? But the fact that ’60s and ’70s movies like Mary Poppins, Bonnie and Clyde, and American Graffiti were all released in August suggests that studios grew increasingly intentional about keeping their best projects away from the late summer weeks.

That said, just because a movie is coming out in August doesn’t mean it’s going to be bad. It might just mean that a studio doesn’t know what they’re doing. (Superbad, The 40-Year-Old Virgin, Little Miss Sunshine, and Don’t Breathe are vigorously nodding their heads right now.)

An Oversaturation Point

One thing you’d probably notice only if you had access to the spreadsheet we made for this project—no, I won’t link to it, it’s way too nerdy—is the stunning increase in releases over the years. On December 21 of 1965, only one movie was released; exactly 53 years later, four major movies were released. And the trend persists when you look at releases per year: Just over 100 movies were released in 1980, while over 700 movies were released in 2016. Considering there are only 365 days in a year, and only 52 Fridays, that means extremely overcrowded release dates and thick competition, which leads to tons of movies getting overlooked. It also means audience exhaustion, which likely played a role in the ascension of superhero and IP blockbusters since, faced with a laundry list of choices, people mostly went with the familiar by default.

Of course, the pandemic put a halt to this upward trend; only 449 movies were released in theaters in 2022. That’s still far more than 1980, but it’s a much more manageable pool than the one that was bursting at the seams in the 2010s. Now if we could just get studios to make the right movies …

The Last Days of Summer Dominance

A major blockbuster and beating the heat in the cool air-conditioning of a movie theater—for someone born in the 1980s, nothing screams “summer” quite like that. But there’s a reason that feels so nostalgic: Those days are gone. Look at the top 10 highest-grossing movies of all time—all of them are from 1997 or later, and only two of them were released during the summer. Mega-franchises like the MCU and Fast & Furious have had major success with release dates that used to be reserved for One Night at McCool’s and Jason X, and the more those habits become ingrained, the less the summer months matter. Perhaps the preconceived notions that Hollywood once had about June and July are now valid. Perhaps the landscape is still sorting itself out after the reset of the pandemic. Or maybe soon, each of those months will be a dumping ground, just like August.

The Biggest Summer Double Features Ever

OK, now that you know what the best movie release date since 1960 is, let’s drill even deeper, tap into that Barbenheimer energy, and sort out the single best days in Hollywood history. A few notes before this ranking: We once again used our formula to determine the double features that were the most critically and commercially successful, and this time we considered only movies released in the summer months; also, only movies that grossed over $75 million at the box office (adjusted for inflation) were considered to appropriately capture the two-huge-movies-on-one-day vibes.

10. June 2, 2017: Wonder Woman and Captain Underpants: The First Epic Movie

Do you think anyone actually saw these two movies back-to-back? I would like to meet them.

9. August 6, 1999: The Sixth Sense and The Thomas Crown Affair

Just beautiful. It’s got basically everything you could possibly want in a double feature: clashing genres; horror that gives way to a sleek and sexy heist; multiple twists; Pierce Brosnan. I might fire up these two movies right now. The ’90s were so goddamn good.

8. June 22, 1979: Escape From Alcatraz and Alien

Yes. I accept. The ’70s were so goddamn good.

7. June 17, 2016: Finding Dory and Central Intelligence

Honestly, this one’s pretty underwhelming and pretty reflective of the state of movies in the last decade in general. The 2010s were not so goddamn good.

6. June 23, 1989: Batman and Honey, I Shrunk the Kids

[Makes a guttural sound.] Ugh. Hell yes. That’s the stuff.

5. July 18, 2008: The Dark Knight and Mamma Mia!

It’s gone seriously under the radar during all of this Barbie/Oppenheimer hype, but Christopher Nolan has ALREADY GONE THROUGH THIS. Where were all the Dark Knight/Mamma Mia! memes in 2008?! Why have I not seen any Photoshops of Heath Ledger’s Joker dancing with Meryl Streep?!

4. July 28, 1978: National Lampoon’s Animal House and Hooper

Trust me, I thought this one was a mistake too because I had never heard of Hooper, an action-comedy in which Burt Reynolds and Sally Field play stunt coordinators who are also dating (Hollywood was no doubt cashing in on the success of Smokey and the Bandit). But brother, let me tell ya: People seemed to really fuck with Hooper in 1978. I kinda feel like Chad Stahelski needs to remake it.

3. June 12, 1981: Raiders of the Lost Ark and Clash of the Titans

What I wouldn’t give to be in a movie theater on June 12, 1981, right now.

2. June 16, 1978: Grease and Jaws 2

This one actually has pretty strong Barbenheimer vibes. Would you see Grease and then Jaws 2, or would you see Jaws 2 and then Grease?

1. June 8, 1984: Gremlins and Ghostbusters

This is so freaking good. A perfect mid-’80s lineup right here. Just imagine the practical effects discourse on the “For You” tab on Twitter if these two movies dropped on the same day right now.

10 Summer Double Features That Did Not Have Elite Scores but Still Deserve Recognition Anyway Because They’re Either Weird, Hilarious, or Personally Important

June 25, 1982: Blade Runner and The Thing

And in just one day, Film Twitter was born.

July 12, 1991: Point Break and Boyz n the Hood

You might disagree, but in my opinion this is the strongest, most timeless double feature in history. Two perfect movies, released on a glorious day in July ’91.

July 16, 1993: Free Willy and Hocus Pocus

July 16, 1993, was basically Barbenheimer for every ’90s kid. (And for those of you wondering why Hocus Pocus was released in fucking July, it’s because Disney didn’t think kids would go see a movie during the school year. “The argument was … kids are in school,” producer David Kirschner said with some bemusement in 2018. Amazing call by the suits there; God bless reruns and ABC Family for saving this movie.)

August 16, 1996: The Fan and Tin Cup

Sports are dope.

June 20, 1997: My Best Friend’s Wedding and Batman & Robin

Some more elite ’90s energy right here (as well as a glorious amount of gay energy, whether textual or subtextual).

June 27, 1997: Face/Off and Hercules

My dad took me to see Face/Off in theaters. I was 8 years old. I wonder if he told my mom that he was taking me to Hercules.

July 25, 1997: Air Force One and Good Burger

Why were there so many good double features in 1997?! That’s three in just over a month. How do we get this back?!

June 25, 2004: Fahrenheit 9/11 and The Notebook

And the Academy Award for the worst/weirdest vibes goes to …

August 3, 2007: The Bourne Ultimatum and Hot Rod

There’s a lot happening with this one. I don’t have any data or evidence to back this up, but I’m pretty sure this date is responsible for the last 16 years of masculinity. On behalf of all men, I apologize for the way that we built our personalities off of these two very different but very DUDE movies.

July 21, 2017: Dunkirk and Girls Trip

WAIT, CHRISTOPHER NOLAN HAS GONE THROUGH THIS MULTIPLE TIMES BEFORE BARBENHEIMER?! WHO KEEPS COUNTERPROGRAMMING AGAINST HIS MOVIES?!

Now it really makes sense why Nolan’s been so calm and collected during the Oppenheimer press run—he’s already lived through it twice. Hopefully Barbenheimer lives up to Dark Knight/Mamma Mia! and Dunkirk/Girls Trip. Maybe one day we’ll do this again and see whether it was enough to make July 21 one of the greatest Hollywood days ever.

A previous version of this article stated that Titanic was released in 1998. It came out in 1997.