The Amateur has been one of the bigger success stories of 2025 movies so far. An adaptation of the book by Robert Littell, the film was a spy thriller starring Oscar-winning Rami Malek and nominee Laurence Fishburne. The trailer showed that it had the makings of a thrilling action ride.

The film was also heavily marketed for its premium large formats (PLF), particularly with its IMAX screenings. This was such a heavy part of the marketing that it even sparked some spoofy jokes at the time, with moviegoers chiding, “Did you hear about the new movie releasing this week called IMAX?“

The Amateur was budgeted at around $60 million. This meant it would have to make somewhere around $150 million worldwide to start turning a profit. Instead, it likely lost money, as it made only $96 million.

That said, The Amateur is now having a second life on streaming. It started streaming on July 17, and it is already the no. 1 movie on Disney+ worldwide, as per FlixPatrol. It has reached the top spot in countries such as Canada, Australia, and the United Kingdom.

In some respects, The Amateur‘s streaming success can be looked at as a win. Looking more closely at the film and its performance, however, one major lesson can be learned.

IMAX Publicity Is Not Enough To Succeed

And The Amateur Demonstrates This Perfectly

One reason that The Amateur was likely marketed so heavily on IMAX comes from the lesson Hollywood learned from the 2023 Christopher Nolan film Oppenheimer. The movie’s multiple PLF formats saw sold-out shows for weeks. These tickets also cost more money than standard screenings, upping the box office potential.

However, this did not work out this time. The Amateur got mediocre reviews, and audiences did not flock to IMAX screenings despite its event movie type of PLF format promotion. As a result, the film’s success has been relegated to the streaming medium.

Oppenheimer‘s win does not exist completely in a bubble. Sinners was also promoted for its IMAX and other PLF formats earlier this year, and that worked out well for the film. Leaning on PLFs to generate revenue and hype, as a result, can work even outside of Nolan.

These films, however, have to offer more than just premium format availability. It is not enough to just claim event movie status; rather, a film has to earn this merit and hype. The Amateur‘s middling reviews simply could not do that, and thus its delayed streaming boost can be viewed as much as part of a cautionary marketing tale as anything else.