VENOM (Tencent/Columbia/Sony) is the first big-budget action movie to open since The Meg in mid-August, and that (plus a huge marketing campaign) seems to have gotten it past murderous reviews for an enormous start, the biggest ever in October.  Preliminary numbers at Deadline have opening day at $32.3M (including $10M from a Thursday that […]

  The movie that set the all-time highest opening weekend record last week?  It’s gonna win this weekend, too. THE AVENGERS:  Disney‘s estimate of a $100M weekend may be aggressive (although with Mother’s Day in the mix, maybe not), but it hardly matters, since Avengers will barrel past the $75M current 2d weekend record with […]

  A great start for the weekend, if you overlook the fact that 2 of the 3 new arrivals flopped. OPENINGS:  THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN (Sony) has successfully rebooted the franchise, no question about it.  (Unless it tanks overseas, which is hugely unlikely.)  But Spidey hasn’t come back quite at full strength:  even with a 6-day […]

  For the studios, a Good Friday that generally lived up to its name. OPENINGS:  GI JOE: RETALIATION (Paramount/MGM) had a very solid second day, rising 48% for a $15.5M Friday.  That’s still only 2/3 of the $22.2M that its predecessor GIJoe: The Rise of Cobra did on its opening day (despite 3D ticket premiums […]

  OPENINGS:  THE BEST MAN HOLIDAY (Universal) took advantage of being the only new movie in the market and nosed ahead of Thor on Friday, $10.7M to $10.5M.  That lead won’t hold for the rest of the weekend, but it’s still a great result for Best Man, which should end up with a weekend total […]

  Even though it’s just mid-July, Guardians of the Galaxy is the only likely blockbuster opening left this summer.  Barring some surprises, the seasonal picture is ugly. OPENINGS:  THE PURGE: ANARCHY (Universal) took Friday with $13M, but that was $3.8M below the opening day of the first Purge.  The sequel is likely to be at least […]

  Pixar is still Pixar, but the Disney Animation division of the studio (also headed by John Lasseter) is proving that it’s a formidable creator of animated features as well, following Frozen with the smashingly imaginative ZOOTOPIA (Disney).  Based on preliminary numbers at Deadline, Zootopia had a $18M Friday (including $1.7M from Thursday night), and […]

  There don’t appear to be many surprises in the Friday box office numbers, based on preliminary estimates at Deadline.  As usual, ticket sales declined on Thanksgiving itself (particularly for family movies), then surged on Friday, and the results were largely in line with Wednesday’s form. MOANA (Disney Animation) wasn’t able to keep up its […]