OPENINGS:  KNOCK AT THE CABIN (Universal) won the eternal footnote that it was the film to finally dethrone Avatar 2 at the top of the box office, but its $14.2 start was at the low end of expectations, below the $16.8M for 2021’s Old and thus M. Night Shyamalan’s lowest opening since his pre-Sixth Sense […]

> This weekend should be another good one versus last year, up around 9%.  The strongest entry looks to be Hugh Jackman and the robot boxers in Real Steel — it’s playing in a lot of theaters and we expect a very solid per screen average, giving it a forecast $26 million opening.  (Aside from The Lion […]

  OPENINGS:  THE EXORCIST: BELIEVER (Blumhouse/Morgan Creek/Universal) was at the low end of expectations with $27.2M, and it was also below projections internationally with $17.9M in 52 markets.  It’s hard to tell just what this means in terms of the bottom line, because while a $125M worldwide total wouldn’t look terrible against $30M in production […]

Weekend #19 of 2012 looks like it will be about $163 million for the top 12 films, up 26% from last year’s comparable weekend and up the same amount from the four-year average for this weekend.  Only one movie dares to open against the second weekend of The Avengers phenomenon.  Dark Shadows should actually have […]

  OPENINGS:  The box office for TWISTERS (Warners/Universal) was paradoxical.  In the US, the movie strongly outperformed expectations with $80.5M.  However, it showed much less appeal overseas, with $27.1M in 76 territories this weekend ($42.7M to date including some revenue from markets that opened last week).  Twisters is also about to lose virtually all its […]

> The seventh weekend of 2012 is another good one, running ahead of last year and the multi-year average for this weekend.  The Vow should hold on to the top spot, with Safe House a close #2, and Ghost Rider Spirit of Vengeance opening in third place for the weekend.  This Means War is basically […]

Weekend #8 of 2015 is looking like $119 million for the top 12 films this weekend (Friday-Sunday), another weekend well above the normal volume for this weekend (see track below). Opening at around 2,600 theaters Friday (slightly below the 2,886 average theater count for opening weekends the last two years), Hot Tub Time Machine 2 from […]

> Two comedies open above $20 million this weekend (one at forecast and one slightly below), while Transformers 3 stays at #1 and its ShowBuzzDaily Domestic Final has been upgraded.  However, the weekend as a whole is down significantly from this weekend last year.  Horrible Bosses opened almost exactly at forecast ($9.9 million Friday for […]