> This weekend is all about the holdovers.  It looks like Dolphin Tale and Moneyball will lead the way this weekend, followed closely by The Lion King in 3D.  Courageous and 50/50 look like they will be the strongest of the four openers, while the poorly reviewed Dream House and What’s Your Number? trail.  Business […]

  There may be a pair of tight races at the box office this weekend.  Based on preliminary numbers at Deadline, VENOM (Tencent/Columbia/Sony) has the early lead with $9.5M on Friday, down 71% from last week’s opening day.  That’s much worse than the 54% Friday-to-Friday drop for Doctor Strange and the 57% for Justice League, […]

  By superhero movie standards, SHAZAM (DC/New Line/Warners) was moderately priced, with around $225M in production/marketing costs.  Preliminary numbers at Deadline put its opening day at $20M (including $5.9M from Thursday), and although that’s a cut below comic book blockbusters like Captain Marvel ($61.7M), Spider-Man: Homecoming ($50.8M) or Wonder Woman ($38.2M), it’s solidly in line with […]

>Cars 2 exceeds its forecast, but will it hold up?  Bad Teacher also blows past its forecast, driving the weekend up 16% over the same weekend last year. Cars 2 opened with $25.4 million on Friday, and it looks like the Pixar sequel will gross $74 million from Friday-Sunday.  The film is headed for $195 […]

  It’s shaping up to be a close race at the box office this weekend, and with the result likely to come down to performance on Sunday, we may not know the winner for sure until final numbers are issued on Monday.  HIDDEN FIGURES (20th) was the clear winner on Friday, with preliminary numbers at […]

Based on Friday’s grosses, weekend #22 of 2014 looks like $159 million for the top 12 films Friday-Sunday, 16% above the norm for this weekend but -1% from last year.   Opening at 3,948 theaters, Maleficent from Disney grossed $24.2 million Friday and late Thursday, putting the film on track for a $71.0 million opening three-day weekend (well […]

  ANNABELLE: CREATION (New Line/Warners) will easily take the weekend.  According to preliminary numbers at Deadline, opening day was $15.1M, slightly below the $15.5M for 2014’s original Annabelle, but Creation is much more frontloaded, with $4M from Thursday night, almost double the $2.1M for Annabelle.  That suggests a lower weekend multiple than Annabelle‘s 2.4, and […]

Based on Friday’s grosses, weekend #24 of 2015 looks like $269 million for the top 12 films Friday-Sunday, well above the norm for this weekend into record territory.   Opening at 4,273 theaters Friday, Jurassic World from Universal is on track for a $210.0 million opening three-day weekend according to the studio (miles above our pessimistic $117.0 million ShowBuzzDaily forecast […]