OPENINGS:  Early January is a potent slot for horror movies, and M3GAN (Blumhouse/Universal) kicked off the year with a strong $30.2M, essentially the same as last year’s $30M for the rebooted Scream, despite all the franchise value of the latter (Scream also had the advantage of opening over the month’s holiday weekend).  M3gan has […]

  OPENINGS:  PAW PATROL:  THE MIGHTY MOVIE (Nickelodeon/Paramount) launched with $23M, above expectations and an impressive rise over the $13.1M start for the 2021 installment of the franchise.  It also has $23.1M overseas from 45 markets (the 2021 film earned 72% of its global total internationally).  This series is produced at relatively low cost by […]

  OPENINGS:  DESPICABLE ME 4 (Illumination/Universal) arrived at the high end of expectations with a $75M 3-day weekend and $122.6M since its July 3 opening.  That was a tad below 2013’s Despicable Me 2, which also opened on a Wednesday July 3 with $83.5M/$143.1M.  Despicable 4 should pass $300M in the US, which would put […]

> There’s not much to add about the weekend grosses that hasn’t been said (see Mitch Metcalf’s round-up report here), so let’s take a look at who, apart from the studios themselves, did and didn’t have a fun weekend: WINNERS Women of THE HELP:  Emma Stone isn’t likely to get Oscar consideration for her performance, […]

> The Games are barely slowing down. THE HUNGER GAMES:  We’ll find out soon enough whether any of the genuinely exciting rumors about possible sequel directors (Alfonso Cuaron, David Cronenberg) are true, because Lionsgate needs Catching Fire in the can by early 2013, when Jennifer Lawrence has to report for X-Men duty.  For now, THE […]

Ten days into the three-week holiday movie season, 2012 is now 9% behind the average 10-day total over the last several years ($264 million this year for the first ten days versus $290 million on average 2004-2011).  However, 2012 remains 16% behind the last time Christmas fell on a Tuesday (2007 — $316 million the […]

STUDIO SCORECARD. Warner Brothers has jumped into second place in worldwide box office for the year to date, thanks to the opening of Man of Steel and to some extent continued overseas business for Great Gatsby and Hangover 3.  With the projected domestic total for Man of Steel, Warners is now the #1 studio domestically […]

STUDIO SCORECARD. In the worldwide studio rankings for 2013 to date, only moderate changes for each studio.  The biggest gainer this week was Paramount, which released a film from its tiny slate: Jackass Presents: Bad Grandpa. However, it shows just how slow the box office environment is right now when a $93 million weekly gain is tops among […]