their concert films that really helped push the box office to where it is at the close of 2023. >> can you give me one movie you're really looking forward to for 2024? >> all right. it's mean girls 2 and that's because i don't want to show my age right now, but the original mean girls came out when i was in high school. i love it so much and now all new audiences will get to know this comedy classic. >> just saw a trailer for that yesterday when i was watching ferrari, which was pretty good, too. all right, thank you so much for that. and a big thanks to all of you for joining us during this holiday week. we'll see you back here at noon tomorrow. richard lui picks up our coverage now. >> and good to be with you. could the southern border be reaching a breaking point with a record number of migrants arriving every day, u.s. and mexican officials are trying to hash out a plan to tighten security and get a handle on the situation, but how?

plus, israel is barring refugee camps as part of new efforts to find hostages. the head of the idf insists the war will go on for months but some critics think that will not be enough time to wipe out hamas. and jack smith calling on the d.c. court to do something that sounds almost unthinkable. stop donald trump from injecting politics into his election interference trial. we're going to start with secretary of state blinken. all right. we're going to start with blinken and dhs secretary set to meet with mexico's president as we speak. the two countries grappling with what the u.s. is calling quote unprecedented levels of migration as well as security challenges on both sides of the southern border. now, these discussions taking on even more urgency as a massive new caravan of roughly 8,000 mie

migrants or more are making their way to the united states. the u.s. is already struggling to deal with a record number of migrants. nearly 50,000 arriving last week alone, overwhelming shelters and processing centers. monica, give us a sense of the challenges here on the border for the officials that they're facing and what the leaders in mexico city might be able to get done. >> this is something that's been building for weeks here richard and something the biden administration has been following closely trying to do what it can to address this issue. it was president biden himself a couple of weeks ago who really conceded that the current immigration system as it stands is broken. it needs to be fixed. there need to be policy changes. that's something the white house tried to get momentum on with congress and some negotiations and discussions here toward the end of the year. they were hoping to have a framework tied to other critical

priorities as it relates to national security and that's been something that's faced a lot of obstacles and has been punted to january and the coming weeks. so until they can deal with that from a policy perspective, you have these top biden officials, secretary blinken, secretary mayorcas and a key homeland security adviser at the white house going down to have this face-to-face meeting in the week between christmas and new year's to really show the urgency of the administration trying to address this issue and what they say essentially needs to take place here is a very robust conversation about leaning on mexico to ask for some help to step up enforcement at the border. and to try to really talk about potential solutions, but anything that might happen here in the short-term is really just a stopgap measure. it's not something they say that will address the larger issue, which is addressing the root causes of migration and this challenge that we really have seen take place from a

hemisphere cal perspective. when you look at all of the migration from south america up through central america before they get to the u.s. mexico border. so it's something the u.s. administration concedes they need to address and fix but they're a little hamstrung by the politics of it all. >> thank you so much. for the latest, i want to bring in peter baker, chief white house correspondent for the "new york times" and msnbc political analyst. there's a long time, a multilateral solution which could take months or even years. there's short-term now. that is what can they get done to reduce the number of migrants coming towards the u.s. border. what do you think they're discussing? >> exactly that. what you hear of course is an echo of the last administration. president trump you know spent a lot of time leaning on mexico to keep asylum seekers in mexico rather than have them cross the border.

they can still apply but not leave mexico into the united states during that process. and what you're seeing basically is a crisis not just for the border but for the biden administration who's trying to keep this from becoming a major political issue. the polls indicate how much americans are concerned. it's not just republicans but even democratic mayors like adams in new york. democrats in illinois and elsewhere who are seeing the consequences of this and pressuring the administration to take more, take firmer action. >> one of two issues really to discuss here that could be front and center as they sit down for the president as well as those who are there. title 42 or title 42 like measures. there's also the issue of detention. those issues, there is a little bit of overlap in the middle, isn't there, between democrats and republicans? they were really pushing towards

the end of the year or what came to a head before the holidays. are those still what they are talking about and what is the meat on those bones? >> yeah, that's the, look, they think they are close to a deal. they obviously didn't get it wrapped up before christmas. that was a big disappoint especially because it was tied into the ukraine security aid which is an acute issue right now for the administration. but the negotiations on both sides express optimism that they can find a middle ground. that the biden administration is willing to consider variations of things tried. policies that biden denounced when he was a candidate in order to try to stem this crisis. they're not going to go as far as trump did and trump and his allies will criticize whatever deal that does come out, but you're also seeing pressure from the other side. there are liberals especially in the house who are very unhappy about heading back towards things like title 42 even if

it's not as far as trump had gone. >> a grand deal here or incremental move? >> this is really more incremental. the grand deals we've talked about in the past always involve an agreement to deal with the people who are already here. that there would be some sort of a tough on the border element mixed with some amnesty or forgiveness or path to citizenship. that's not even being discussed. that's not even on the table. that tells you how much the politics of this have changed in the last couple of years. >> just as we look at the pictures from tuesday to sunday, it's the mass of people. something we've never seen before as well as the experiences across the countries and cities. peter, stand by. there's more i'd like to to you about with you. to central gaza where isrl is expanding the ground offensive to include crowded refugee camp forcing thousands to flee. the jerusalem post reporting today that the idf believes some of the remaining 129 hostages

are being held there embedded with as many as 4,000 hamas fighters. jay gray is in tel aviv. jay, not only are these areas already crowded with refugees, there's a communications blackout in gaza as you've been reporting. so how do people even know where to go and how are things happening as we look at the steps being taken by the united nations as they have stressed nowhere is safe here? >> translator: that's exactly what the u.n. has said, richard, that no place is safe in gaza right now. and you're right. it's chaos right now. people scrambling and leaving from we should include a place where they were told to go for safety. and now struggling to try and find somewhere else to go in the midst of what is a stepped up campaign on the ground in central gaza. refugee camps now considered according to the idf, i'm quoting, a new battle zone at this point. the fighting intense and very

crowded urban areas and like you talked about, it's another communications problem. the blackout there over the last several days. no internet. no cell phone communications. they've been dealing with that on and off throughout the 83 days now of this war. what we're told is that they are trying to restore service in some areas. obviously with the destruction, that's very difficult. so i think you bring up a great question that doesn't have a real solid answer at this point, richard. there is no instruction on where to go. there is no clear path for these families who are struggling to stay out of the cross fire to take. so that's a big concern, especially with all of the humanitarian agencies watching very closely here. you said that the u.n. said there's no safe place to go. they've also said that they are gravely concerned about those that are in that area. >> jay gray, thank you so much. nbc news correspondent there in

israel. bringing back peter backer of "the new york times." as we look at the reporting coming from jay throughout the last several days here, one of the parts of his reporting is not only the war cabinet meeting on monday. there was also the meeting with dermer. where are we in terms of what the president as well as secretary of state blinken and national security jake sullivan, what have they been able to get done? what's the word or the readout? >> well, they're pressing obviously the israelis to find some way to end the high intensity part of this campaign. they understand that the war may continue for weeks if not months but they think this you know rather intensive version of it needs to scale back to a more targeted approach. or targeted toward hamas leaders, more targeted toward the tunnels and so on and so forth. for no other reason that they are losing the battle of international opinion. they're not hearing much of a response from israelis that meet their interests.

you hear prime minister netanyahu and the idf chief of staff both say that war is not ending anytime soon. in fact, they're intensifying. not the other way around. basically, they're telling the biden administration thank you for your support. we appreciate it but we still have a job to do. we've got a few more weeks before we can talk about pivoting to a new stage. >> for those who weren't watching over the weekend, the 16th call happened in president as well as netanyahu and we also learned that the offer from egypt to again come back to the table was quickly ashoed. what is next in terms of these talks? is it again president biden coming back as it was done before and being right front and center with egypt, qatar, as well as israel? >> yeah, that's right. i think it's going to require more diplomacy. it does not seem close to a deal at this point. if they get to a deal, we may not know about it until it happens because they are trying to keep this relatively secret.

in the first round, that resulted in the first hundred hostages being released. president biden and secret cell negotiators worked with the qataris and egyptians to get a deal between hamas and israel. to the extent that happens may be a while. i don't think we're going to see anything in the next few days. >> got it. so at the moment, unaware of any meetings happening or going to happen. peter, thank you for that summary of all those topics. today, we're getting a fresh look at the tunnels underneath the gaza strip that have been targeted by israel. josh lederman traveled to northern gaza where he toured the largest tunnel israel claims to have discovered so far and it's big. nbc was invited by the israel government to tour the tunnel, however, its military did not review our material prior to it airing. the idf says it's two and a half miles long, goes all the way to gaza city and hamas even used it

to drive vehicles through it. here's some of josh's look inside. >> one of the first things you notice when you set foot in gaza is the perpetual hum of drones flying overhead. they're a daily reminder that everyone here is being watched. this is the entrance to the tunnel and you can see how it goes from the surface of the earth diagonally into the ground. we're barely quarter mile from israel. how did israel not know this tunnel was here? >> we knew about the entrance to the tunnel but we didn't know that the tunnel extended this close into israeli territory. this is one of those horrific things. this was used. people were killed. hostages were taken in here. these are the big questions we're going to ask when this war is over. >> can israel feasibly destroy all of these tunnels? >> we hope so. we have to. we have no choice. if they're left in tack, hamas

could resurface and plan more attacks against israel. so unfortunately, going into a tunnel is dangerous, they're booby trapped and your enemy is waiting for you. they're challenging. that's why the idf is here. we have to risk our lives to destroy these so they're not used for the next attack. >> showing these tunnels to the media, is this an effort to justify incredible numbers of palestinian deaths? >> i think it's to justify the fact that we have no choice but to be in gaza fighting hamas and those civilians were condemned the moment hamas built these tunnels underneath them. >> our thanks to josh for that reporting. coming up, the michigan supreme court has decided on whether donald trump can appear on the state's 2024 primary ballot. we've got that for you. plus, the latest legal move by special prosecutor jack smith in the federal election interference case. later also, we're counting down to the iowa caucuses. will it be the last stand for a number of gop candidates? we're back in 60 seconds. numbers we're back in 60 seconds

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another legal development that could shape the 2024 race for the white house. today, michigan's highest court rejected a bid to remove former donald trump from the ballot. just one week after colorado's supreme court made the opposite decision barring trump from its ballot citing the insurrection clause and 14th amendment as to why. for more on this, i'm joined by catherine christensen. also an msnbc legal analyst. catherine, why did this happen in why did michigan make this decision? >> well, some people argue they punted but it was one sentence. it just said we are not persuaded that the questions presented should be reviewed by this court. so the dissent, there was one that said this case could come back by the plaintiffs for the

election, for the november election. for the primary ballot, michigan has said we're not getting involved here. so they are just stepping aside. now, it should be noted that colorado has a law that's very different than michigan. in michigan, michigan does not have a law that requires a candidate to prove that they're qualified to run. whereas colorado does. so that could be a possible reason. but it was just one sentence. so the majority of the court did not give a reason. they just said we're not reviewing this at this time. very important that the supreme court issue a decision. so, inevitably they're going to take the colorado case and they're going to make a decision and that will basically give all of the states where they're still pending, issue is still pending, guidance. >> now we have the political balance potentially here. those who appointed these judges as we know in colorado, two to one democratic appointed versus republican appointed.

how is it legally possible we have two different states reaching two different conclusions on the same matter? >> it happens all the time. states elect different people, states have different judges, states have different law. colorado law, you have to prove your qualified. michigan law, you don't have to prove that. that's what we have the united states supreme court for quite frankly. to make sure there's one rule throughout the land on this issue. and there will be. i can't imagine that they will not take the colorado case and when they do, they're going to issue the decision, which all of the other states will have to follow. >> does it complicate the supreme court when they have two different states, they could have five states, 16 states, 17 all said, really, and all the different opinions coming down from these different courts and justices. what does that do for the supreme court when they have all these different rulings? >> that's what they're there

for, quite frankly. to, when you have also in federal court when you have they call it a split in the circuits, the supreme court is there to say we're going to decide now. the same on this issue. so you have michigan, colorado saying something different. we're also waiting for maine. the supreme court is going to come out with a decision. i don't know when that decision will happen but they will come out with a decision. >> what does jack smith do with this? does he take it upon his own and add it to his own case? >> no. he is, which is quite interesting, the federal election case, remember he has a classified documents case in miami. that case has been stayed as we await what the district of columbia court of appeals is doing. but he just filed a motion today, which is called a motion in limit, both sides can file. that's basically a pretrial motion. you're requesting the court to prevent the other side from bringing in evidence.

it's interesting that he would file a motion on a case that stayed. so jack smith, the special council, is staying out of this 14th amendment disqualification issue. he's focusing in on the election interference case and the classified documents case. that's where his jurisdiction and his focus is going to be. >> and finally quickly here, there was today the issue of political opinion including politics and the barring of donald trump from doing that. can you summarize that quickly for us? >> yes. jack smith, his prosecutors, are asking the judge not to allow trump to argue that he was selectively politics. not to injection politics in it. juries are supposed to listen to the facts in court and follow the law as the judge instructs. not be swayed by politics. they are also asking that donald trump not be allowed to argue it was law enforcement's fault for january 6th because they weren't prepared. so that is a pretrial motion. it will be interesting how the

judge will feel about him filing a motion when everything has been stayed but that's another, that's for another day. >> that's for another day and if you're a betting person, you know what side you're going to bet on. that political arguments will or will not be injected by former president trump in this process. thank you. next, countdown to the iowa caucuses where the gop primary stands ahead of the contest next month and which candidates it could break. t next month and which candidates it could break. steve? with a laundry detergent. (♪♪) gain flings. seriously good scent. a force to be reckon with. no, not you saquon. hm? you! your business bank account with quickbooks money, now earns 5% apy. 5% apy? that's new! yup, that's how you business differently.

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- it's possible to hate pushups again. - to feel understood. - to begin healing both inside and out. - to feel like myself again. - and now i know anything is possible. (gentle music) the countdown to the first primary contest is underway. now less than three weeks to get their messages across and win support before iowa. it will be a challenge to catch up to former president trump. we were just looking at polls. according to the latest nbc news poll for instance had a 32-point lead over his nearest opponent, desantis. that's the largest ever recorded lead in history this close to a

caucus in iowa. want to bring in vaughn hillyard and isaac. good to see both of you. vaughn, starting with you. you were most recently with desantis. what is the energy like when you see poll numbers like that. are they beaten? feeling like this is the end? >> the trouble for desantis, i was with him in new hampshire. there was about 30 people in the room compared to about 4,000 the next day for donald trump. new hampshire comes january 23rd, but you're looking at the poll numbers from iowa and he's more than 30 points now. this has been his reality now for the better part of nine, ten months here and so for desantis, this is go time these next 19 days here. they and the superpac affiliated with them, they built this organization with him. ultimately, whether that's as manufacturers, a caucus win. as for nikki haley, i talk to

those who could change their registration on caucus night who could support her. >> named not donald trump. the twist, the turn, the pivot. in iowa for desantis, knock on a lot of doors. typically for iowa, that is the play. is it working for desantis given how many percentage points he is behind? also in new hampshire? >> campaigns will disagree about how much they can get out of the ground game. the infrastructure knocking on doors. if there's one kind of contest, it would be a caucus. they're not just asking people to vote. they have to come at a specific

time, going to be cold. it might be snowing. they have to show up, go to a meeting. there's a lot more than voting. that has been one of the advantages that desantis had. haley in turn really lacked that. i mean going back to the summer with the lincoln dinner, she really wasn't putting up, investing in iowa much at all. and just recently, she's picked up the endorsement of americans for prosperity and they are sort of supplying that infrastructure that she lacked and sending people out to knock those doors and giving her the ground game on match with what the desantis superpac and the trump campaign built for themselves. >> what's the story line on nikki haley? if it's robbing peter to pay paul. if desantis losing points they just go over to her? or is it a mix of hey, she's looking very interesting for republican voters. >> that's the hard part. in our nbc polling, it's not

like the desantis voters say they could go to haley. when talking about the ground organization for nikki haley, they have spent the last year going and finding iowa voters who were not so positive about donald trump. they were not definite hard no donald trumps, but they were identifying which voters those were and now they say they are putting their support and now trying to activate those voters to come out for nikki haley who didn't have the same type of ground organization compared to donald trump. i was just down in florida talking to campaign advisers and the campaign for donald trump has said that across the precincts, they have captains where each of them, more than 1800, are in charge of turning out ten new caucusgoers. these are folks who didn't even take part in 2018. these are all new folks. if they can turn out those sorts of numbers, it's hard to see how anyone can come close to donald

trump. >> good ground game, certainly strategy. as we go through january, that's really the crucible, isn't it? for those not named donald trump candidates. ramaswamy's campaign saying we've got to stop the tv advertising. when things get tight, say good-bye to the marketing. >> the campaign is saying they're seeing a low roi on broadcasts. it's very expensive and they want to spend the money elsewhere. that's their explanation. you're right. the campaigns that are not getting momentum that are not getting support in the polls are going to have a hard time raising money particularly after the results in iowa and that problem is the most acute for

desantis. who between the campaign and the superpac and the outside group, it's something like $200 million that's been invested in this race. that's a lot of money to spend for second place or maybe even worse. >> vaughn, which of all these not donald trump have the best ground game right now? and has the best energy right now? >> i think those are two different things. it's interesting because the folks that have been running desantis' ground game, they have built up and hired tons of staffers. this is the same group of folks that have been running the operation for ted cruz for eight years. you could feel that energy, that momentum. ted cruz beat donald trump in the state of iowa largely because of that ground game, but humans are humans. ted cruz isn't ron desantis and we have not seen that same sort of evidence that ron desantis is going to be able to actually turn out what the ground game

intended to activate here. the hardest part is looking beyond iowa. if donald trump wins new hampshire, that's nikki haley's home state. if donald trump wins there, it becomes very difficult. ted cruz was able to win a great number of states against donald trump and right now, donald trump is winning by a lot in every state in the union. >> so nikki haley, south carolina is where she steps in, stays out? >> that's really going to be the place. there was talk about her being his vp and she was not outright dismissing it saying she wasn't running for vp but just here in the last 12 hours came out defiantly on his social media account calling her a bird brain, saying she is not the person, the not smart. so there's little to suggest for nikki haley that there's a path forward beyond winning this nomination against donald trump. >> and you know because you cover him, he does turn on a dime. next, the holiday weather that could snarl your travel to get

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it may not have been a white christmas for most of us in the united states but the new year's eve travel rush is kicking off with hazardous travel conditions cue to a nasty and messy winter

storm that barrelled through the plains and heavy rain coming through the northeast. michelle, how does it look for us trying to get out there? >> hi there, richard. great to s. much better in the plains. still a little slippery. all blizzard warnings have been dropped. we're leftover with winter weather advisories and that includes about 100,000 people in portions of the plains. that's the snow. we're looking at a lot of rain in the east and pacific northwest. we have a storm system that moved onshore today. we're going to get a little break tomorrow then another one moves onshore on friday. lower elevation rain and higher elevation snow. but it's the east that's a mess. we're looking at heavy rain falling. foggy conditions, kind of gloomy weather slowing usdown on the roads. also heavy rain throughout portions of the great lakes and

to the interior parts of the northeast. also the carolinas, we're looking at heavy rain. that's going to be the story as we go throughout the day and unfortunately, we're going to keep this rainfall in here today, tomorrow, friday, not really clearing out until friday. and we're expecting 1 to even 3 inches of rain in some spots. the grounds are very saturated. we're going to watch the river levels as well especially in the northeast. boston, hartford, new york city, philadelphia seein quite a bit of rain. you could see 1, 2.5 inches of rain. that's going to affect the airports. new york city and d.c. possible delays in charlotte. we're already hearing about de la delays in seattle because of the mountain snow, too. it's difficult to travel in that area especially on the roadways. difficult tomorrow in boston, also new york city. likely to see delays in philadelphia, d.c., ccago because we're seeing the storm

system kind of just stay in place. it's taking a long time to get out of here. this is what it looks like on our future cast. it's moving up the east coast. bringing heavy rain today. richard? >> michelle with the latest. thank you so much. ahead, we are looking at 115 million americans that are expected to travel this holiday season and today alone, there have been hundreds of flight delays and a few cancellations. joining me now from reagan national airport in the d.c. area is julia jester. certainly looks a little wet behind you. what does it look like there? >> it actually looks a lot better inside the airport than out here, richard. the d.c. area airports have experienced roughly 50 delays so not a perfect travel day but passengers i spoke with were pleasantly surprised when they arrived here. but the key is that most of them arrived more than two hours

early for their flights in anticipation of potential disruptions but they were in a pretty good mood when we talked. take a listen. >> we were worried about the rain. the crowds. we were worried about the gw parkway, which is under construction and horrible. but it all turned out just fine. >> yes, yes. we didn't want to travel over the christmas holidays per se because it's just too much traffic. too many people. >> not today. >> not today. today's, to my surprise, very, very good. >> other airports not so good. san frcio is seeing a bulk of the more than 3500 delays across the nation. it's got a ground delay due to low ceiling. another hard hit area, florida. orlando, the tsa tells me is one

of the busiest hubs today and that is seeing many delays as well as several airports throughout florida experiencing ground delays and departure delays. so as best travelers can get early, get there early, check your airlines to make sure that you know your travel situation before you get to the airport to avoid those travel induced headaches, richard. >> julia, thank you for that. now as we close out this year, 2024 is already shaping up to be a major year for space exploration including the first humans in a flyover of the moon since the days of the apollo space program. nbc's tom costello has more. >> that's right. elon musk of course owns spacex and spacex right now provides the only way american astronauts can right now get to space on an american rocket. and america's future hopes and dreams for space depend on spacex.

that rocket roar and cheering coming from south texas in november. >> separation. >> was for a much improved second test of elon musk's starship after the first one exploded shortly after liftoff. this time, all 33 engines fired in perfect unison. while the booster was lost in a spectacular explosion three minutes after launch -- >> and as you can see, the super heavy booster has just experienced a rapid, unscheduled disassembly. >> the uncrewed second stage climbed 92 miles high. well into space before self-destructing. >> we got so much data and that will help us to improve for our next flight. >> nasa and america have strapped their dreams to that spacex rocket. that next flight will be early next year. then late in the year, nasa's artemis astronauts will loop around the moon. in 2022, an artemis test flight

orbited the moon with no crew. that is the spaceship that will take the artemis crew to an orbit around the moon for the first time in more than 50 years. this is a nine-day mission. a quarter of a million miles just to get there and this ship is nothing like apollo that carried neil and buzz. it is much more advanced, much more automated. already, they're training at nasa's johnson space center. mission commander, reed weissman, pilot victor glover, mission specialist, christina cook, and canadian fighter pilot, jeremy hansen. >> i'm most looking forward to paving the way to the future. back to the moon, on to mars. the fact we get to contribute to that, the honor of my life. >> and we are proud to be a part of the artemis generation. we are going back to the moon. >> later this decade, nasa hopes artemis and elon musk's starship

will rendezvous in lieu nar orbit. nasa chief bill nelson says america's return to the moon will not be an apollo repeat. >> we're going back to the moon. it's actually a different moon. we're going to the south pole. >> the south pole, which may hold frozen ice water, critical for a future moon base and a potential source of rocket fuel for missions on to mars. it's why india landed a probe there in 2023 and it's the same region that china is targeting for a human landing. the new space race seems likely to pick up speed in 2024. >> tom, i think the space race is really between us and china and we need to protect the interests of the international community. >> also in 2024, boeing is hoping to finally launch its star liner spaceship with astronauts to the space station.

many years delayed and well behind arch rival spacex. and billionaire entrepreneur jared isaacman will command polaris dawn. another private mission set to reach the highest earth orbit ever flown. i caught up with them training in colorado. why do this? why do we need to go into space. >> i mean, there are questions that we've been asking ourselves since the dawn of civilization that we don't know the answers to and the universe is so big. >> that mission will also feature the first ever space walk involving a private astronaut and they will continue raising money for st. jude children's hospital. the first mission back in 2021 raised a quarter of a billion dollars for st. jude. back to you. >> tom, thank you for that reporting. next for you, is it curtains for the traditional holiday season movie rush? that's straight ahead. you're watching msnbc. aight ahe. you're watching msnbc.

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♪ your attention is what ♪ >> all right. that was when we were at the movies. a look at a few of the top movies in 2023 including "the color purple" which came out on christmas day. and despite big titles dropping this year, 2023's box office sales actually are still forecast to fall short riding on highs and lows. "the color purple" stunned, though, with an $18 million opening, while the sequel to "aqua man" premiered as one of d.c. comics' lowest earning franchise films. our entertain correspondent joining us to break it all down. chloe, i can kind of guess where you're standing. how is it looking -- how was 2023 better at the box office? tell us the good stuff. >> reporter: first of all, "the color purple" far ed soog expectations with the biggest christmas day opening since 2009. overall, more people went to the movies this year in 2023 than they did last year. so let me break it down f you. this year's coming right in under $9 billion at the north

american box office. that's more than last year, 2022, at $7.20 billion. then when you get down to the pandemic, remember, everyon said tom cruise and "mission impossible" saved movie theaters in 2022, then 2021, at the height of the pandemic, you had a little over $2 billion. pre-pandemic levels, people were going to the movies. it was upwards of $11 billion at the box office. the thing is there are less movies coming out. this year we saw about 88 movies come out in theaters. last year over 100. there are less theaters these days, and it's just so expensive in general to go to the movies. i've been saying that as a family of four, granted i'm in manhattan right now, but to go to the movies on the upper west side, at the theater behind me, if i were to take my two kids and husband, it would cost over $100, going to the theater is still a luxury for most americans. >> chloe, you bring up a good point. has the movie experience now

become something that we need to make sure it's a little bit epic, that it's the big blockbuster and then we go? i mean, the theater behind you has an imax theater in it. lots of folks there for, again, "oppenheimer." lining up to see the movie. is that the difference right now, that we'll go to theaters if it's big? otherwise, hey, streaming is okay? >> here's the thing, if you're looking to go see a big movie like "barbie" and "oppenheimer" or "bashen heimer," there are theaters at the theater but there's a shorter window from a time when the movie opens in theaters to when it might hit streaming. there's less incentive to spend money to see a movie in the theaters when for maybe a little over $20 or slightly less you can watch from the comfort of your home, just maybe a week or two weeks after it hits theaters. but also streaming fatigue in general, there's so much to watch, there's so many options. and like i said, less movies are coming out in movie theaters,

and overall it's just expensive to see movies in the theaters overall. >> how does 2024 look? if we look at the oscar noms and nods right now, we've got big numbers out there in 2023. seems like 2024 is on an upswing. >> reporter: i mean, look, right at the top of 2024 you're going to see timothee chalamet who stars in "dune 2," a movie we were hoping to see come out in 2023. due to the hollywood strikes it was pushed to the following year. "mission impossible" was pushed to 2025 because of the strikes. "mean girl 2: the sequel," another "mad max" movie coming out. there are bright spots. who knows if 2024 will beat 2023 because so much of the film slate was moved due to the strikes. >> i noted you left out "beverly hills cop 4" which is coming out in the spring which is what the team is telling me now. we can do that on the next report. chloe, thank you so much. coming up in our next hour,

2023 was a year of speakership battles. the ouster of a scandalous lawmaker and indictments for the 2024 gop frontrunner. what 2024 could bring us in the world of gop politics. plus, gun ownership is increasing fast among black women in the united states. we'll take a closer look at the trend. the next hour of "msnbc reports" starts after a short break. stick around. stick around and gentler on your skin. try downy free & gentle. whenever you're hungry, there's a deal on the subway app. buy one footlong, get one 50% off in the subway app today. now that's a deal worth celebrating. man, what are you doing?! get it before it's gone on the subway app. ♪♪ love you. have a good day, behave yourself. like she goes to work at three in the afternoon and sometimes gets off at midnight. she works a lot, a whole lot. we don't get to eat in the early morning.

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