If preliminary numbers at Deadline hold, GRAVITY (Warners) will own the new record for all-time best October opening.  It had a superb $23.5M Saturday, up 35% from its $17.5M opening day, for what should be a $55M+ weekend.  That would handily break the current October record of $52.6M for Paranormal Activity 3.  More importantly, […]

  OPENINGS:  With a $17.5M Friday that should get it close to $50M for the weekend, GRAVITY (Warners) is the first of the year’s Oscar hopefuls to get both rapturous reviews (98% on Rotten Tomatoes) and strong audience support.  That doesn’t guarantee awards in February–the Academy often resists science-fiction and fantasy when it’s time to […]

Based on Friday’s grosses, Weekend #40 of 2013 looks like a decent $109 million for the top 12 films, down 18% from last year’s atypical weekend but up 10% from the average for the same weekend the past few years. Opening at 3,575 theaters Friday, Gravity from Warner Brothers grossed $17.4 million Friday and is on track for […]

The 40th weekend of the year is looking like a good $107 million for the top 12 films, way down from this weekend last year (boosted by Taken 2) but up 9% from the multi-year average for this weekend. Opening at over 3,450 theaters Friday (way above the 2,886 average theater count for opening weekends the […]

  OPENINGS:  Once it became clear that the predicted $40M wasn’t going to happen, CLOUDY WITH A CHANCE OF MEATBALLS 2 (Sony) badly wanted to claim a $35M opening, and so it did.  Actually hitting that number will require the 2d lowest Sunday drop in the Top 10 (behind only the phenomenal Instructions Not Included, one […]

Updated international box office chart:

STUDIO SCORECARD. In the worldwide studio rankings for 2013 to date, the weekly changes look much higher than normal.  Most of those increases are a function of some September films not being fully counted in the yearly totals for the past few weeks.  All of the 2013 films are properly accounted for now. Warner Brothers […]

Based on Friday’s and Saturday’s grosses, Weekend #39 of 2013 looks like an okay $98 million for the top 12 films, up 5% from the average for the same weekend the past few years. Opening at 4,001 theaters Friday, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2 from Sony grossed $9.3 million Friday and $15.2 million Saturday, now on […]