WORLDWIDE STUDIO SCORECARD.  Year to date, Warner Brothers remains on top with $804 million worldwide, while Disney has vaulted to a competitive second place with $677 million (because of the arrival of Captain America: The Winter Soldier).  Sony and Universal remain in the next tier with about $530 million worldwide each.  Fox and Paramount are […]

  OPENINGS:  At $53.5M, SHAZAM (DC/New Line/Warners) had the lowest opening weekend of the current DC run of superhero movies (it was also below all the Marvel openings), but it was produced to be a lower-budget companion piece to the megabusters, and with that in mind, its opening was fine.  Overseas was bigger at $102M, but […]

OPENINGS:  Here are the records FURIOUS 7 (Universal) has racked up:  #4 worldwide opening at $384M (behind the final Harry Potter, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, and The Avengers)–although that may be cheating a bit because it opened in a few territories on Wed-Thurs–#3 international opening at $240M (behind the last Harry Potter and […]

  Strong holds by Dawn of the Planet Of the Apes and some longer-running titles made this weekend look less terrible than it was. OPENINGS:  THE PURGE: ANARCHY (Universal) topped the newcomers with $28.4M, but that was 17% below the $34.1M opening weekend for last year’s Purge.  While Purge 2 will turn a profit, it […]

  OPENINGS:  It was a bleak Memorial Day weekend at the box office, the worst in decades.  FURIOSA: A MAD MAX SAGA (Warners) limped to a victory for Friday-Sunday with $25.5M, but it may well tumble to 2nd place once the Monday holiday numbers are tallied.  Tellingly, Warners refused to so much as issue a […]

WORLDWIDE STUDIO SCORECARD.  The 2014 Scorecard, updated with additional overseas grosses, has been updated below.  The 2015 Scorecard will be introduced toward the end of January. YEAR TO DATE BOX OFFICE. Looking at North American box office, 2015 to date is -4% behind last year but +7% above the average for this point the past […]

  OPENINGS:  BIG HERO 6 (Disney) was a convincing winner in the US, riding a 52% Saturday bump to a $56.2M weekend.  Word of mouth can be expected to be strong, and there’s no reason to think Big Hero 6 won’t hold solidly at least until the Thanksgiving weekend arrival of The Penguins of Madagascar […]

WORLDWIDE STUDIO SCORECARD.  Updated look at 2016 by studio. YEAR TO DATE BOX OFFICE. Looking at North American box office, 2016 to date is still +3% above last year and still +3% above the average for this point the past four years ($9.259 billion).  Over the same period, Hollywood films have grossed over $24.3 billion worldwide when […]