OPENINGS: KUNG FU PANDA 4 (DreamWorks Animation/Universal), the first new all-ages animated release since the holiday season, arrived at the high end of projections with $58.3M, impressively above the $41.3M start for 2016’s Panda 3. (And at a reported production budget 40% lower than its predecessor.) It faces no direct competition for months, and […]
>Based on Friday and Saturday box office (and estimated Sunday numbers), Twilight Saga Breaking Dawn Part 1 will drop 70% this weekend but remain at #1, and its final domestic estimate has been upgraded to over $300 million because the second weekend drop could have been even worse. The Muppets opened decently in second place […]
Based on Saturday’s grosses, Weekend #52 is now on pace for $168 million, very similar to the outlook yesterday. However, Django Unchained and Les Miserables continue to move in opposite directions. Yesterday, it looked like both films would be around $29 million for the weekend (with Les Mis only $400,000 behind Django). But based […]
On Sunday mornings, the devout go to church, and movie studios lie. (There’s not much overlap between the two groups.) The studios lie (or fudge, if you’re sensitive about the L Word), fundamentally, because they can get away with it: when “estimated” box office returns are announced on Sunday mornings, they’re simply repeated–one might […]
Based on Friday’s and Saturday’s grosses, weekend #7 of 2014 now looks like $160 million for the top 12 films Friday-Sunday, much lower than yesterday’s estimate ($171 million) but still 22% ahead of this weekend’s average the past several years. Saturday was not kind to three of the four new movies (except RoboCop). We know […]
Based on Friday’s and Saturday’s grosses, weekend #38 of 2014 now looks like $93 million for the top 12 films Friday-Sunday, 8% above the norm for this weekend ($86 million) and up a bit from yesterday’s estimate ($91 million). Opening at 3,604 theaters, The Maze Runner from 20th Century Fox grossed $11.3 million Friday and […]
Based on Friday’s grosses, weekend #17 of 2015 looks like $88 million for the top 12 films Friday-Sunday, better than it looked yesterday ($81 million) but still below the norm for this weekend. A solid Saturday lifted the weekend estimates for most films at least somewhat, but the weekend rankings did not change materially. Opening at […]
OPENINGS: RISEN (Affirm/Columbia/Sony) topped the weekend’s arrivals with an $11.8M start that was above the $11.4M for War Room and the $9.2M for God’s Not Dead, although it was well below Heaven Is For Real‘s $22.5M. The Christian genre has tremendous multiples–both God’s and War Room ended up at 6x their opening weekends–and Risen […]