India, Dec. 31 -- A lot had been expected of 2025 in terms of Hollywood box office performance. There were some huge releases, such as the final Mission Impossible film and Avatar: Fire and Ash. In the middle of the year, horror found a lease of life with Sinners and other hits. And Zootopia hit it out of the park, along with A Minecraft Movie. Yet, the success of these films was not enough to assuage fears of takeovers, shutdowns, and more in an anxious year for Hollywood.

The year saw tepid growth for Hollywood films in North America in 2025, with cinemas struggling to recover to pre-pandemic sales levels. Bloomberg reported that U.S. and Canadian theatres took in $8.76 billion through December 28 this year. While this represented a 1....