OPENINGS:  Despite a holiday opening and a much higher (and more costly) level of hype, GLASS (Blinding Edge/Blumhouse/Buena Vista Intl/Universal) barely squeezed past Split over the 3-day weekend, $40.6M vs. $40M.  Even that number assumes a solid Sunday, although an 8% Saturday drop (Split gained 13% on its 1st Saturday), indicates that word of […]

  OPENINGS:  LITTLE (Legendary/Universal) led the weekend’s weak crop of newcomers with $15.5M, buoyed by a 15% Saturday bump.  That’s about 15% below the recent opening of What Men Want, which was aimed at a somewhat older audience, and suggests an OK $45M US total.  It had a limited overseas opening in 11 markets, where […]

WORLDWIDE STUDIO SCORECARD.  Here is an updated look at the 2019 film slates by studio. BOX OFFICE. Looking at North American box office, 2019 is now -6% below last year’s comparable span (two points better than last week) and now basically even with this point the past four years ($5.987 billion).  Over the same period, […]

  WORLDWIDE STUDIO SCORECARD.  Here is an updated look at the 2019 film slates by studio. BOX OFFICE. Looking at North American box office, 2019 is now -6% below last year’s comparable span (1 point worse than last week’s comparison) and now basically even with this point the past four years ($8.852 billion).  Over the […]

WORLDWIDE STUDIO SCORECARD.  Here is an updated look at the 2020 film slates by studios (films entering wide release in the 2020 calendar year). BOX OFFICE. Looking at North American box office, 2020 is now -9% below last year’s comparable span (another 7 points worse than last week) and -21% below this point averaged over […]

  OPENINGS:  With the LA movie theatre market now open (at 25% capacity) and a general rise in vaccinations, the box office seems to be taking its first very tentative steps back to pre-pandemic life.  The one wide opening of the weekend THE COURIER (Roadside) wasn’t at all impressive at a $2M start, but the […]

  OPENINGS:  THE BATMAN (DC/Warners) was the first event movie to open in 3 months, and the market responded with a $128.5M weekend, the 2nd-highest of the pandemic era (although not close to Spider-Man: No Way Home‘s $260.1M start).  About $4M of that number is attributable to AMC’s new “variable pricing” policy, hiking the ticket […]

  OPENINGS:  As expected, BLACK PANTHER: WAKANDA FOREVER (Marvel/Disney) swamped the box office worldwide.  Its $180M US weekend was below Doctor Strange 2 ($187.4M) and the original Black Panther ($202M, on a Presidents Day weekend), but still the biggest opening Hollywood has seen in 6 months, reinforcing the MCU as the center of movie culture […]