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The Five-Year Engagement from Universal opened with $3.5 million Friday and is headed for an estimated $10.4 million opening weekend, missing the $19.5 million ShowBuzzDaily forecast badly. The romantic comedy starring Jason Segel and Emily Blunt should average a tepid $3,500 per theater at 2,936 theaters. Five-Year Engagement is headed for a preliminary $34 million in North America. NBC Universal CEO Steve Burke told a CAA retreat that “the movie business in in steady decline,” according to The Wrap. It’s movies like this (from his and other studios) that keep audiences uninspired and unmotivated to go to a theater, get a DVD, or even spring a few bucks for a video on demand impulse buy. Read Mitch Salem’s review of this formulaic movie here.
Pirates! Band of Misfits from Sony opened with $2.8 million Friday and is headed for a similar $10.9 million opening weekend (thanks to a nice bump from kid-heavy Saturday matinees and early evening showings), right at the $10.5 million ShowBuzzDaily forecast. The well-reviewed animated film should average only $3,100 this weekend at 3,358 theaters. Pirates! is headed for a preliminary $39 million total domestic.
Safe from Lionsgate opened with a similar $2.6 million Friday and is headed for $7.3 million Friday-Sunday, near the $7.9 million ShowBuzzDaily forecast. The action film starring Jason Statham should average $3,200 per theater over the weekend at 2,266 locations. Safe is headed for a preliminary $24 million domestic.
Think Like a Man is holding fairly steady at $105 million in our ShowBuzzDaily Domestic Final estimate. The Hunger Games is now down to third through fifth place in the widely-reported but mostly irrelevant rankings (depending on how the actual numbers come in). Nevertheless, we have upgraded The Hunger Games yet again to just under $400 million domestic. Its sixth weekend gross of $11 million is actually incredibly rare. The last film to gross over $10 million in its sixth weekend of wide release was The King’s Speech back in late 2010/ early 2011 with $11.1 million, and before that How to Train Your Dragon did it ($10.6 million in its sixth weekend the first quarter of 2010), The Blind Side pulled it off ($11.5 million in weekend six in late 2009), and a little film called Avatar (an amazing $34.9 million in weekend six in early 2010). That’s it in the last few years. Remember that the average film grosses only $600,000 in its sixth weekend (if it is still playing at all), and a really good showing in weekend six (top 10%) is $4.1 million.
In case you missed them, click to see this week’s Weekend Predictions
(millions) Showbuzz Early FRI Domestic
Forecast Proj. Actual Final
Think Like a Man (Sony) [$17.5] $18.0 $ 5.5 $105
The Lucky One (WB) [$12.0] $11.7 $ 3.9 $ 66
The Hunger Games (LG) [$10.5] $11.0 $ 3.0 $395+
Pirates! Band of (Sony) [$10.5] $10.9 $ 2.8 $ 39
Five-Year Engagement Uni [$19.5] $10.4 $ 3.5 $ 34
Safe (LG) [$ 7.9] $ 7.3 $ 2.6 $ 24
The Raven (Rel) [$11.0] $ 7.0 $ 2.5 $ 17
Three Stooges (Fox) [$ 5.7] $ 5.3 $ 1.3 $ 49-
Chimpanzee (Dis) [$ 5.5] $ 5.2 $ 1.6 $ 33
Total Box Office Volume
The Top 12 Films this weekend are looking like $97 million total Friday-Sunday, down 33% from the same calendar weekend last year (which was powered by the very strong Fast Five opening) and down 28% from the average for this weekend the past four years. (However, view this four-year average for the weekend with caution as the 17th weekend sometimes falls in April as in the last few years and sometimes is the more potent first weekend in May.)
Top 12 Films: Weekend #17
2012 $ 97 Five-Year Engage $10, Pirates! $10, Safe $7
2011 $145 Fast Five $86, Prom $5
2010 $ 92 Nightmare on Elm Street $33, Furry Vengeance $6
2009 $150 Wolverine $85, Ghosts of Girlfriends Past $15
2008 $151 Iron Man $99, Made of Honor $15
2008-11
Avg $134
Check back tomorrow for updated weekend figures and revised estimates for domestic final grosses.
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