ELVIS is on the rise.

After months of having only a teaser poster of a belt buckle, Warner Bros. has finally given us two new ELVIS posters featuring, well, Elvis. One has a young Elvis clad in black leather, the other a less-young Elvis in white leather. 

We often bifurcate Elvis Presley’s career into his young, fit peak and his old, bloated decline. But Presley was only 42 when he passed away, so “old” seems like an inappropriate descriptor. 

At the moment, ELVIS is 37 days away from release, which is just outside the 30-day final marketing push. Still, we are beginning to see some movement in the numbers. 

When the trailer was released in mid-February, awareness climbed to 30% before settling back in the mid-20s. Over the past few weeks, it has been on the rise. It now sits at 29%, just below that 30% high from a few months ago. 

Interest has also been climbing. It now sits at 5.2, a new high for the film. 

These are good signs for a film that has yet to enter its final drive. But how does that compare to other films at the same distance from release?

ELVIS belongs to the “Original – High” group meaning it is not based on existing IP, and it has a production budget above $50M. This is an eclectic group that includes films like THE LOST CITY, THE NORTHMAN, HOUSE OF GUCCI, and THE LAST DUEL.

The numbers look pretty good when we compare ELVIS to the group average at the same distance from release. ELVIS is ahead of the comps in all metrics aside from interest. And as we saw above, interest in the film is on the rise. 

Let’s drill down even further. How does ELVIS compare to HOSUE OF GUCCI, another high-profile studio film made by an acclaimed filmmaker? At the same distance from release, awareness for ELVIS is one point higher than GUCCI. 

When we look at interest, ELVIS is ahead of GUCCI, but notice how interest in GUCCI took off once it got inside the 30-day marketing window. We will keep an eye out to see if ELVIS does the same. 

GUCCI had an opening weekend of $14.4M, and it grossed $22M across the five-day Thanksgiving weekend. 

It’s always encouraging to see the tracking numbers rise before the home stretch. And after a somewhat muted start, ELVIS is showing signs of life. This will be an interesting one to watch over the remaining five weeks.