A mere four or five years ago it was all but unheard of for a Hollywood studio not to screen a major blockbuster in advance for critics. Back when I first started reviewing movies, in the early aughts, I could count on one hand the number of major theatrical releases which weren’t screened for the press each year. Since then, studios have discovered that potential moviegoers are easier to manipulate into seeing bad movies, if there’s no one around to warn them, and refusing to screen movies for critics has become commonplace whenever Hollywood has a real stinker on its hands. Word of mouth will kill these movies eventually, but only after they’ve made big opening weekend box office generated by tricky advertising campaigns…
https://www.cinemablend.com/new/Killers-Not-Being-Screened-For-Critics-18774.html