Girlhood is the biggest winner at the box office this year

• Movies that celebrate women crushed it at the box office in 2023.
• Thanks to "Barbie" and Taylor Swift, women of all ages showed up in theaters.

On opening night of Taylor Swift's "The Eras Tour" movie on October 13, the hum of fans singing along to the pop star's music echoed through AMC's Burbank 16 in Los Angeles. In the lobby, moviegoers in sparkling dresses, cowboy boots, and exclusive Swift concert merch waited to purchase exclusive popcorn buckets and matching cups, bonding with other women over outfits and the dates they saw the singer perform. Others posed together in front of cardboard setups of Swift and film posters.

Groups of joyous women dressed up for a movie as if it were a night would be a unique occurrence, except that something similar had happened here three months earlier, when the theater had been engulfed in a sea of pink as sold-out crowds flocked to showings of "Barbie."

Yet to call "Barbie" and Swift's "The Eras Tour" film spectacles would be to slightly miss the point. They were also massive moneymakers.

Greta Gerwig's smart and unexpectedly existential take on Mattel's iconic toy (along with some savvy marketing) broke box-office records, becoming the first movie from a solo female director to surpass $1 billion worldwide. "Barbie" will likely close out the year as 2023's highest-grossing movie — a first for a movie directed by a woman.

Taylor Swift's "The Eras Tour" concert movie, announced mere weeks ahead of its October release, delivered the largest opening weekend ever for a concert film and is now among the 20 highest-grossing movies of the year.

It's safe to say 2023 has been the year of the girl at the box office.

But more than that, "Barbie" Summer and Taylor Swift Fall became cultural touchstones that could help usher in a new era of films that celebrate what it means to be a girl.

'Barbie' and 'The Eras Tour' became must-attend events for their simple pleasures

Venturing to see "Barbie" or Swift was about more than visiting a theater to see a popular movie. It was about feeling camaraderie before, during, and after a screening.

"These things become eventized. So it is not just a piece of entertainment, a piece of content, but it becomes a cultural moment," said Sheila Marmon, the founder and CEO of Mirror Digital, which helps brands reach multicultural audiences.

There was something joyful and wholesome about dressing up to go to the movies to take part in what felt like a giant party, where fans could marvel at each other's outfits. The fact that the film's light-hearted comedy gave way to a cathartic and instantly iconic third-act speech from America Ferrera about what it means to be a woman became an even stronger bonding experience for female fans, as many were surprised to leave the theater crying, overwhelmed by its existential messaging.

Swift, meanwhile, allowed women to tap into their inner child and feel like a young girl at a concert singing along, taking selfies, waving cell phones with the lights on, and, in some theaters, getting up and dancing in front of the screen while wearing homemade friendship bracelets. Theater etiquette be damned — this was a moment to be as happy and free as Swift sings about in "22."

Other 2023 movies celebrated girlhood, too

It wasn't just "Barbie" and Swift's concert film. The joys and hardships of growing up as a girl were encapsulated in a handful of movies out this year.

Briana Hill, a partner and cochair at Pryor Cashman whose practice focuses on film and TV development and rights acquisition, told Business Insider she took nine 11-year-olds to see Judy Blume's critically acclaimed adaptation of "Are You There God, It's Me Margaret" this spring. The coming-of-age movie follows a young girl who's eager to get her first period.

"There were a lot of friend groups, mother-daughters that also treated it like an outing," Hill said, acknowledging that while the film may not have had the box-office numbers of "Barbie" (it grossed $21.5 million on a reported $30 million budget), it still provided an important shared theatrical experience for girls and women alike who could relate to such a monumental moment in their lives.

Marmon, whose company partnered with a client earlier this year to promote Disney's live-action retelling of "The Little Mermaid," added that the film inspired girls to get their hair done and dress up like a princess that isn't normally showcased on the big screen.

"That moment was so important to tell stories that empower girls," Marmon said of the film, which stars Chloe Bailey as a Black Disney princess Ariel, who has sisters of all backgrounds. "Just seeing the seven sisters represent all the diversity across the world was really refreshing and really important for girls to see themselves."

Female-written and produced films like the lesbian sex comedy "Bottoms" and senior-citizens-gone-wild romp "80 For Brady" also broke new ground in exploring complex female relationships in high school and enduring friendships later in life.

"When you're able to show everyone that they're included and that they have a seat at the table, then you win," Marmon said of the importance of on-screen representation.

"If you look at some of the movies that have had a lot of success across genres, it's because they are looking to be more inclusive in terms of who can be a superhero, who can be a leader, who can be the key protagonist."

We need more movies geared toward women

Despite the year's major successes, Jeff Bock, a box-office analyst at Exhibitor Relations, told BI that studios still aren't making enough movies for girls and women.

"It is still catered to 13-year-old boys, as it has been since the 1980s," Bock said of Hollywood's theatrical output. "They keep making the same movie over and over and over. And now we see that on a $200-million scale, where they just keep making Indiana Jones films and Transformers films."

Hill believes there are two reactions when studios see a massive hit like "Barbie."

"One is kind of the 'Let's rush and try to replicate it,'' Hill said, adding that smart executives know that "Barbie" performed beyond expectations. "I think overall it does give a certain kind of permission or incentive to maybe be a little more daring."

"What I keep hearing from executives across every vertical in entertainment is it's a time of a lot of change. And I think people are more open right now, in general, to exploring different ways of doing things. In some cases that might look more like independent film strategy," Hill added, referencing Swift and Beyoncé sidestepping studios to release their concert films.

Nicole Russin-McFarland, a composer, actor, and founder of Lucky Pineapple Films, a largely women-led production company, told BI that some female creatives hesitate to take the risk of telling a female-centric story, in case the movie doesn't pan out. She says Swift and Beyoncé are helping women be seen as power players in creative fields.

"A standard female filmmaker or film producer wants to make the same old movies again out of fear of being an individual. You have the choice of trying, failing and not working, or going for that expectation that isn't going to make you a living legend, but it gets you work. You need the rent paid," Russin-McFarland said.

She thinks "Barbie" is just the first sign of a larger ripple effect to come.

"'Barbie' isn't going to open every door for me on its own. What it is doing is opening the door for another woman succeeding so she can hold the door open for me," Russin-McFarland said.

"Movies made because of 'Barbie' are going to make a domino effect of more women's movies being made across every genre."

She added, "Every woman paving the way helps the future for all of us."