> Captain America and the final Harry Potter film’s second weekend will battle for #1, with each around $60 million.  Friends with Benefits should open at a decent level for an R-rated comedy.  The weekend should be up well over 20% from this weekend last year when Salt and Ramona & Beezus opened (remember those?).   Opening at […]

2013 remains solidly on the same pace as the other second-tier years recently.   Through 11 weeks, 2013 totals $1.692 billion for wide-release films in North America (those playing at more than 400 screens).  2008 was $1.664 billion at this point, while 2011 was $1.634 billion. The top-shelf years were already at or near $2 […]

> For all the wildly unexpected success of THE LION KING, Disney has limited boxoffice upside, because the new Blu-Ray hits the streets on October 4, and that’s not likely to be a date that can be changed. The Friday number for DRIVE is right on the edge between meeting expectations and disappointing them; its […]

  The hunger for religious-themed movies hasn’t been dissipated at all by the recent Son of God, God’s Not Dead and Noah, as HEAVEN IS FOR REAL (TriStar/Sony) had a very healthy $3.7M start on Wednesday at 2417 theatres despite indifferent reviews (50% positive on Rotten Tomatoes), edging out CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE WINTER SOLDIER (Disney) […]

> Super 8 misses the Top 20 Worldwide Gross list, while Hangover Part II, Kung Fu Panda 2 and X-Men: First Class continue to move up the rankings. Super 8 joins the Worldwide Gross list just outside the Top 20 (tied for 21st place with $111 million worldwide — an estimated $104 million domestic total […]

  OPENINGS:  The magic weekend number for THE BOURNE LEGACY (Universal) is probably $40M, now that Friday has come in a bit lower than preliminary estimates suggested at $14M.  Unless business collapses on Saturday, expect the Sunday estimate to begin with a “4,” although in fact the final weekend figure (released on Monday) could be […]

Iron Man 3 will push the 18th weekend of the year to well over $210 million for the top 12 films, fully 19% better than the average for the comparable weekends recently but still 15% below the same weekend last year, when The Avengers exploded. Opening at over 4,000 theaters Friday (a very high theater […]

> Two of the season’s major films are launching unconventionally this evening, and it’s worth taking note.  Both Sony’s THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO and Paramount’s MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE – GHOST PROTOCOL will begin “sneak” screenings at around 6-7PM, before officially opening tomorrow.  For boxoffice gross purposes, it’s not clear whether the studios will report […]