Storms be damned:  according to preliminary numbers at Deadline, despite (or because of) the snows on the East Coast, Saturday was a very healthy day at the multiplexes.  Far from taking a Day 2 hit, IDENTITY THIEF (Universal) had a 33% Saturday bump comparable to the 2d day track of Bridesmaids, and now looks […]

  How big is big enough?  It’s a question that comes up on giant franchise installments, and the latest is THE FATE OF THE FURIOUS (Universal), the 8th in its series.  According to preliminary numbers at Deadline, its opening day earned $45.5M (including $10.4M from Thursday night), a huge number, but down 33% from Furious […]

  OPENINGS:  There was nothing supernatural about the blah $17M opening for CARRIE (Screen Gems/Sony/MGM), on the low end of Halloween horror openings, and with Bad Grandpa targeting a similar audience next weekend, there’s little chance for recovery.  Even though the reviews were never going to be good, Sony’s strategy of keeping the movie under […]

  OPENINGS:  MIDWAY (AGC/Bona/Lionsgate) was mildly ahead of expectations with $17.5M in the US, and it should perform well on Veterans Day Monday.  However, with around $150M in production and worldwide marketing costs, a $60M US total would leave it with a steep uphill climb to reach profitability.  Early overseas results weren’t particularly promising at […]

  OPENINGS:  The really bad news for GODS OF EGYPT (Summit/Lionsgate) wasn’t the $14M US opening, although that was certainly pathetic enough.  No, the really bad news was that in 68 overseas territories covering most of the world (although not yet China, which opens in 2 weeks, nor France, Germany or the UK), it managed […]

  OPENINGS:  With the pandemic raging throughout the country and about 20% fewer theatres open than last week, box office numbers plunged across the board.  There were no truly wide openings, but the Jackie Chan vehicle VANGUARD (Gravitas) opened at 1375 theatres with a low $400K start, a per-theatre weekend average of just $290. Similarly, […]

> No doubt the enormous success of THE LION KING hasn’t been lost on anyone at Disney, and we can expect to see 3D reissues of more classic animation over the next few years, leading into yet more homevideo editions. If not for Lion King being in the market, DOLPHIN TALE would almost certainly have […]

>The Smurfs continue to print money overseas — now only $26 million from passing Cars 2 in worldwide box office revenue.  Dolphin Tale (#54) and Moneyball (#56) are currently not on the chart and have no overseas money to date.  Dolphin Tale will certainly be more exportable than Moneyball — the baseball theme will just […]