OPENINGS:  Hollywood’s barely-breathing Labor Day weekend didn’t get any healthier on Saturday.  The CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND (Columbia/Sony) re-release had a 35% Saturday bump, and like everything else in the market, it will hold nearly steady on this holiday Sunday, then have a Sunday-type decline on Monday.  (The exception is that children’s […]

  Considering the spotty box office record of the DC movie franchise, it was something of a risk to place AQUAMAN (DC/Warners) at the center of the holiday market, but the bet is paying off, at least to an extent.  According to preliminary numbers at Deadline, opening day for Aquaman was technically $27.7M, although that […]

  The box office race is likely to be tight this weekend, with contenders at either end of the quality spectrum.  THE EMOJI MOVIE (Columbia/Sony) drew first blood with a $10.2M opening day (including $900K from Thursday night), according to preliminary numbers at Deadline.  That’s $2.2M better than the first day of Captain Underpants last […]

  ROGUE ONE (Lucasfilm/Disney) is performing as expected, massive but short of last year’s core Star Wars installment The Force Awakens.  According to preliminary numbers at Deadline, Friday’s take was $72M (including $29M from Thursday night), 40% below Force Awakens yet still one of the Top 10 opening days of all time.  In a sign […]

Weekend #48 of 2014 is looking like $165 million for the top 12 films this weekend, down 8% from the norm for Thanksgiving weekend but down a bigger 15% from the same weekend last year (when Frozen opened its long run). Opening at over 3,600 theaters Wednesday (above the 2,886 average theater count for opening […]

  OPENINGS:  ALITA: BATTLE ANGEL (20th) squeezed everything it could out of its opening 2-holiday week, with paid preview screenings on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday nights (totaling $2.4M) preceding its official Thursday opening.  All-in, that put it at $36.5M through Sunday, which will probably become $41M with Monday.  It has two more or less open […]

The 10th weekend of 2013 looks to be the first up weekend after six down weekends in a row.  The top 12 films Friday-Sunday should total $128 million, up 6 to 11% from the same weekend the last few years.  Keep in mind this is the weekend that has given us John Carter, Battle: Los […]

>The 13th weekend of the year should be very strong: about $169 million for the top 12 films up 49% from last year’s comparable weekend and up 32% from the four-year average for this weekend.  Wrath of the Titans should open just below $40 million, far behind the pace of Clash of the Titans from […]