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 […]

> Now that THE HELP has opened about as well as Dreamworks/Disney could have hoped, the next goal is a 2d weekend decline of around 40%.  That would match the hold of Julie & Julia, and would make a $100M gross for Help very realistic.  The film’s only direct competition next weekend is the seemingly […]

>Another win for Katniss Everdeen. THE HUNGER GAMES: In just its 3rd weekend of release, and with plenty left in the tank, THE HUNGER GAMES (Lionsgate/Summit) hit $302.8M, and has already outgrossed every picture in the Twilight series. (Only 5 movies have gotten to $300M faster.) By this time next week, it will also have […]

  A fairly sturdy set of Saturday numbers firmed up the weekend a bit, but the start of the holiday movie season is still just mediocre. OPENINGS:  JACK REACHER (Paramount) had a 13% Saturday bump and is predicting an 18% drop on Sunday, for a $15.6M weekend.  That tracks for a holiday period of about $50M, […]

  OPENINGS:  In some ways, the most important number of the weekend was the $71.6M that MAN OF STEEL (Warners) earned outside the US and Canada.  Although it’s lower than the $113.1M domestic weekend ($125.1 with Thursday Wal-Mart screenings included), it included less than half the world, only 24 territories, giving the new Superman a […]

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 […]

WORLDWIDE STUDIO SCORECARD.  Despite having the only movie to cross the $300 million worldwide line (The Lego Movie), Warner Brothers lags behind Sony which has no mega-hit but three of its four films in 2014 are at $100 million or more worldwide.  But it’s early in the race with Disney yet to release a film in […]