Home Market Releases for May 22nd, 2018

May 23rd, 2018

Black Panther came out on DVD, Blu-ray Combo Pack, or 4K Ultra HD Combo Pack last weekend and it is still scaring away a lot of the competition. That’s not to say there are no new releases that are worth picking up. In fact, A Fantastic Woman, I Kill Giants, and Early Man are all contenders for Pick of the Week. In the end, that title went to Early Man on Blu-ray. More...

Home Market Releases for May 15th, 2018

May 14th, 2018

Black Panther comes out on DVD, Blu-ray Combo Pack, or 4K Ultra HD Combo Pack this week and it has scared away all of the competition. It’s so bad, that even though Black Panther was Pick of the Week last week and I hate giving a film Pick of the Week twice, it is still clearly the best film on this week’s list. The only real competition is Early Man, which is only coming out on Video on Demand this week, but I got to the review early. More...

Featured Blu-ray and DVD Review: Early Man

May 14th, 2018

Early Man bombed in theaters, even compared to the average stop-motion animated film. The critics liked it, but audiences stayed away. Why is that? Is it too British, like many Aardman Animations movies? More...

Weekend Wrap-Up: Another Week, Another Set of Records for Black Panther

February 26th, 2018

Almost everyone expected Black Panther to earn first place over the weekend. I doubt there were many people who expected this. The film fell just 45% earning $111.66 million for a ten-day total of $403.61 million, helping the film make appearances on a number of record charts, including; second biggest second weekend of release, second fastest to $400 million, etc. The new releases matched expectations, more or less, with Game Night earning second place and coming within a rounding error of our prediction. Overall, the box office earned $192 million. This is 33% lower than last weekend; however, this is a good hold for a post-holiday weekend. Compared to last year, the box office was up by 55% and this is a much more important number. Year-to-date, 2018 has a 14% / $230 million lead over 2017, at $1.88 billion to $1.65 billion. This is great news at this point of the year, but we really need to stretch that lead to over $300 million in the next two plus weeks, before we are dealing with Beauty and the Beast, if we can’t, then this lead could evaporate before the end of March. More...

Weekend Wrap-Up: Black Panther Re-Writes the Record Book

February 20th, 2018

Black Panther destroyed expectations over the Presidents Day long weekend earning $202.00 million / $242.16 million over the 3-day / 4-day weekend. The list of records this film broke seems endless, but we will get to that in a bit. Unfortunately, the two other new releases, Early Man and Samson, both bombed. On a more positive note, the total box office rose 103% from last weekend reaching $285 million. This is the third-biggest weekend of all-time, and the biggest non-December weekend. This is also 92% higher than the same weekend last year. Even if we use Presidents Day of last year, 2018 was still 51% higher. More importantly, 2018 completely erased the small deficit it had and is now ahead of 2017 by $120 million or 8% at $1.62 billion to $1.50 billion. More impressively, 2018 is even ahead of 2017 in terms of ticket sales at 178 million to 172 million. More...

Weekend Estimates: Black Panther Powers to $218 Million Long Weekend

February 18th, 2018

Black Panther is riding a waving of positive feedback all the way to record territory this weekend, with Disney projecting a $192 million three-day, and $218 million four-day weekend, as of Sunday morning. That gives the film three outright records right off the bat: biggest weekend in February, biggest three-day Presidents Day weekend, and biggest four-day Presidents Day weekend. In each case, the film is topping the jaw-dropping-at-the-time opening of Deadpool in 2016. More...

Friday Estimates: Black Panther Crushes Expectations, Headed over $200 million for Weekend

February 17th, 2018

As expected, Black Panther crushed the competition on Friday. However, it beat all but the most enthusiastic predictions to earn $75.81 million for the day. Add in 97% positive reviews on Rotten Tomatoes and an A+ from CinemaScore, and the film should have good legs over the weekend. On the negative side, it is a monster hit thanks in part to the deafening hype, so that’s going to result in shorter legs. More...

Thursday Night Previews: Deadpool is no Match for Black Panther and Wakandan Might

February 16th, 2018

I tried to remain cautious in the face of the overwhelming hype surrounding the release of Black Panther. This could be a mistake. It started its domestic box office run with $25.2 million in previews on Thursday, which crushed the $12.7 million Deadpool earned during the beginning of its record-breaking debut weekend. Not only is this the best previews for a Presidents Day debut, it is the best pre-summer preview, topping The Hunger Games’s $19.7 million. It is also the second best for the MCU, just ahead of Civil War’s $25 million mark, and just behind Age of Ultron’s result of $27.6 million. The film’s 97% positive reviews suggest it will have long legs; however, as we’ve seen time and time again, even Award-worthy reviews are almost never a match for an extreme Fanboy Effect. That said, this result is way above the $20 million I was expecting and a $200 million four-day debut is now more likely than not. More...

Weekend Predictions: Black Panther is About to Bring In a Lot of Green

February 15th, 2018

It’s Presidents Day long weekend and there are two-and-a-half films trying to take advantage of the holiday with wide releases. However, the only film opening this weekend that people are actually talking about is Black Panther. This film is earning more buzz than any film opening until Infinity War and is widely expected to break records. Early Man’s reviews have been overwhelmingly positive, but it is just hoping to reach the top five. Finally, there’s Samson, which is only opening semi-wide. This weekend last year was the weekend after Presidents Day long weekend, so it is not a fair comparison and 2018 will crush 2017. Compared to Presidents Day of last year, 2018 will still crush the competition. More...

2018 Preview: February

February 1st, 2018

2018 got off to a good start and January more or less held its ground when compared to 2017. There were some misses, but surprise holdovers made up the difference. Looking forward, February will be dominated by Black Panther. In fact, it will very likely make more during its opening weekend than the second place film, Fifty Shades Freed, will likely make in total. Black Panther likely won’t break records, but it could come close, while Fifty Shade Freed and Peter Rabbit both have a 50/50 shot at $100 million. Last February, The Lego Batman Movie both earned $175 million, while Fifty Shades Darker earned over $100 million. Black Panther will easily beat any film from last February; in fact, it could earn more than the top two films earned combined. As long as the rest of the box office isn’t a complete disaster, February should help 2018 earn a significant edge over 2017 in the year-over-year comparisons. More...

Early Man Trailer

December 6th, 2017

Aardman animated adventure with the voices of Eddie Redmayne and Maisie Williams, directed by Nick Park, opens February 16 ... Full Movie Details. More...