Home Market Releases for January 16th, 2018

January 15th, 2018

It’s not a particularly good week on the home market with no one film that is a must have dominating the rest of the pack. However, this is actually a good thing, as there are several smaller releases that get a chance to shine and there are several Pick of the Week contenders as a result. This includes the biggest release of the week, Blade Runner 2049, as well as a limited release, Loving Vincent, and a forgotten film, Matinee. In the end, I went with I, Daniel Blake: The Criterion Collection as the best of the week. More...

Home Market Releases for January 2nd, 2018

January 2nd, 2018

This is the first Tuesday of the year, so it should be no surprise that there are not a lot of top-tier releases on this week’s list. In fact, there were so few releases worth mentioning that I had to pad the list with some films that were not selling well enough to be worth mentioning during most weeks. As for the Pick of the Week contenders, there were only two: Lucky and Battle of the Sexes. It was a close race, but in the end, I gave that title to Lucky on DVD. More...

Weekend Predictions: Will Thor Rule, or is it the End of World for the Box Office?

November 2nd, 2017

November begins with Thor: Ragnarok and A Bad Moms Christmas. Thor: Ragnarok is widely expected to be the sixth film of 2017 to open with $100 million. On the other hand, A Bad Moms Christmas opened yesterday and when I started writing this in the early hours of Thursday morning, there were still no reviews on Rotten Tomatoes. Oh boy. That’s not a good sign. Worse still, no other new release it going to come close to $10 million over the weekend. This weekend last year, there were three wide releases that earned more than $10 million, led by Doctor Strange with $85 million. Thor: Ragnarok will top that, but this year's depth is terrible compared to last year and we will very likely see yet another loss in the year-over-year comparison. More...

Weekend Wrap-Up: Box Office is Cut to Pieces, Earning Just $75 million

October 31st, 2017

It was a terrible weekend at the box office with only two films cracking $10 million, Jigsaw and Tyler Perry’s Boo 2: A Madea Halloween. Geostorm earned third place with just $5.90 million. Overall, the box office fell 21% from last weekend to just $75 million. More importantly, this is 15% lower than the same weekend last year. Year-to-date, 2017 continues to struggle with a running tally of $8.57 billion. This is $470 million or $5.2% below last year’s pace, meaning we fell behind last year’s pace by a further 0.2 percentage points. The box office really needed to be eating into the deficit during the month of October, but that hasn’t been the case. More...

Thursday Night Previews: Jigsaw Grabs a $1.6 million Piece of the Box Office

October 27th, 2017

Jigsaw earned $1.6 million during its midnight previews last night. Happy Death Day earned an even $1 million during its previews on its way to a $26 million opening. However, there are many factors that will result in shorter legs. For instance, Happy Death Day earned better reviews, while Jigsaw is the latest installment in a long-running franchise. Finally, Happy Death Day’s target audience skewed female, while Jigsaw skews male and men are more likely to rush out to see a movie than women are. That said, this is a great start and the film should easily top our prediction with at least $20 million during its opening weekend. More...

Weekend Predictions: Can Jigsaw Still Fit at the Box Office?

October 26th, 2017

There are three wide releases coming out this week, although only Jigsaw is expected to make any real impact at the box office. The other two, Suburbicon and Thank You for Your Service, are opening in barely more than 2,000 theaters and neither of them are expected to do well at the box office. Meanwhile, Tyler Perry’s Boo 2: A Madea Halloween, has an actual shot at repeating in first place, mostly because of the weak competition. This is terrible news for the overall box office, as it means we are going to have a hard time matching last year’s box office, even though last year there was only one wide release, Inferno. More...

Weekend Wrap-Up: By earning $21.23 million, Boo 2 is the only Non-Disaster Film of the Weekend

October 24th, 2017

The weekend box office was weaker than expected with only one of the new releases topping predictions. Tyler Perry’s Boo 2: A Madea Halloween wasn’t that one film, but it still led the way with $21.23 million. The only other film to top $10 million was Geostorm with $13.71 million, but it lived up to its disaster genre due to its $100 million production budget. Overall, the box office fell 6.5% from last week to $95 million. That decline is positively glowing compared to the year-over-year comparison. Compared to this weekend last year, 2017 was down 25%. Year-to-date, 2017 is now behind last year’s pace by 5.0% or $440 million at $8.46 billion to $8.90 billion. Unless November and December are stellar, there’s no way 2017 is going to catch up to 2017. More...

Friday Estimates: Boo 2 Scares Up $7.47 Million, Other New Releases are just Scared

October 21st, 2017

As expected, Tyler Perry’s Boo 2: A Madea Halloween led the way on Friday with $7.37 million. Granted, its reviews are terrible, as its Tomatometer Score has fallen into the single-digit range. On the other hand, it earned a A minus from CinemaScore, which is the same score its predecessor earned. If this film has the same legs as the original did, then it will earn $22.4 million during the opening weekend. However, it is a sequel, so it will likely miss that mark with about $22 million. That’s approximately 10% below our prediction, so I’m happy with that result. It is also likely more than the film cost to make, so Lionsgate should also be happy. More...

Weekend Predictions: Will Moviegoers Want to View Boo 2?

October 20th, 2017

There are five films opening wide or semi-wide this week, but only one of them, Tyler Perry’s Boo 2: A Madea Halloween, has a real shot at top spot. The best-reviewed new release of the week is Only the Brave, while the Geostorm is the widest release. Then there are the two semi-wide releases, The Snowman and Same Kind of Different as Me. Because there are so many new releases coming out this week, one or two of them are practically guaranteed to slip between the cracks. This weekend last year, the box office was led by the original Boo! with $28.50 million, while the new releases made just over $70 million combined. That seems out of reach for this year’s crop, so 2017 will likely lose in the year-over-year comparison. More...

Contest: Feeling Happy: Winning Announcement

October 19th, 2017

The winners of our Feeling Happy contest were determined and the entrants with the closest predictions for Happy Death Day’s opening weekend were... More...

Weekend Wrap-Up: Death Day Made the Box Office Happy with $26.04 million

October 17th, 2017

Happy Death Day led the weekend, as expected, but did so with a surprisingly strong $26.04 million. The only other truly wide release of the week was The Foreigner, which also beat expectations, albeit by a smaller margin. The overall box office still fell from last weekend, down 4.2% to $100 million. This is 1.4% higher than the same weekend last year. On the one hand, this is not enough to compensate for inflation. On the other hand, at this point, any win is worth celebrating. Year-to-date, 2017 is still behind 2016 by a large margin, but at least it was able to close the gap by a little bit at $410 million / 4.7% at $8.34 billion to $8.75 billion. More...

Weekend Estimates: Young Women Power Death Day to Victory

October 15th, 2017

This weekend will be another winner for horror movies, with Happy Death Day powering into first place with a projected $26.5 million, according to Universal’s Sunday morning numbers. That puts it miles ahead of Blade Runner 2049, which failed to broaden its audience this weekend, and is down 54% to $15.1 million, for $60.6 million in total. More...

Friday Estimates: Friday was a Happy, Happy Day as Death Pulled in $11.6 million

October 14th, 2017

Happy Death Day topped expectations by earning $14.3 million on Friday. Even with short legs, it will still make $25 million over the weekend, possibly a little more. This is likely more than it cost to make and advertise, at least initially. I suspect Universal will up their ad buy after this result and will also increase the initial print run for the DVDs / Blu-rays as well. The film’s reviews are 68% positive, while it earned a solid B from CinemaScore. Earning a B would be bad for most movies, but horror films routinely fall in the C range, as horror fans tend to be very negative. For example, gorehounds will hate anything without enough blood, but torture porn will turn off even more fans. Pleasing even half of the opening day audience is impressive. More...

Thursday Night Previews: Should Happy Death Day be Happy with $1 million

October 13th, 2017

Happy Death Day started its box office run with $1 million during its previews. This is a mere fraction of what It earned earlier this fall, but it is better than the $772,000 Ouija: Origin of Evil earned this time last year. If Happy Death Day earns the same legs, then it will pull in about $18 million this weekend. Its reviews are not as good, but it is also not a sequel, so those two factors should balance out. This is exactly what we predicted, so I’m happy with this result. Since the film only cost $5 million to make and likely less than $20 million to advertise, the studio should also be happy. More...

Weekend Predictions: Will Happy Day be the Death of the Box Office?

October 12th, 2017

I thought this would be a really busy weekend with Blade Runner 2049 repeating in first place and four wide releases competing for spots in the top five. However, last weekend, Blade Runner 2049 missed expectations, so it won’t dominate the chart this weekend. Meanwhile, two of the four wide releases are not going to open truly wide. This leaves Happy Death Day with a relatively easy path to first place. The Foreigner has almost made enough in China to pay for its production budget, so as long as it can cover its advertising budget here, it will break even before it reaches the home market. Meanwhile, Professor Marston & The Wonder Women is opening semi-wide and Marshall is opening nationwide. They may or may not open in the top ten. This weekend last year, The Accountant opened in first place with close to $25 million, while all three wide releases combined made $38 million. It is going to be tough for 2017 to match that. More...

Contest: Sharp as a Blade: Winning Announcement

October 11th, 2017

The winners of our Sharp as a Blade contest were determined and the entrants with the closest predictions for Blade Runner 2049’s opening weekend were... More...

Contest: Feeling Happy

October 6th, 2017

It’s a busy weekend with four new releases coming out; however, only one of them, Happy Death Day, has a real shot at topping Blade Runner 2049 for first place. Because of that, it is the only real choice for the target film in this week’s box office prediction contest. In order to win, one must simply predict the opening three-day weekend box office number for Happy Death Day.

We are continuing the Halloween Trick or Treat contests this week. Each winner will get a Frankenprize that is either Halloween Treat, a Horror film plus another prize, or a Halloween Trick, a movie so bad it is scary it was made plus another prize.

Whoever comes the closest to predicting the film’s opening 3-day weekend box office (Friday to Sunday), without going over, will win a Frankenprize, as described above. Whoever comes the closest to predicting the film’s opening 3-day weekend box office (Friday to Sunday), without going under, will also win a Frankenprize, as described above. Finally, we will be choosing an entrant from the group of people who haven’t won, or haven’t won recently, and they will win the final win a Frankenprize, as described above.

Entries must be received by 10 a.m., Pacific Time on Friday to be eligible, so don’t delay! More...

2017 Preview: October

October 1st, 2017

September destroyed the previous September monthly record for total box office take, with $800 million or so (we won’t know the exact figure until after the weekend), which tops 2016’s record of $616 million. Granted, this is almost entirely due to It’s record breaking run, and the rest of the month was merely average. Kingsman: The Golden Circle was the only other film to come close to $100 million. October doesn’t look any better, as far as depth is concerned. Blade Runner 2049 is widely expected to be the biggest hit of the month, but it is the only film expected to reach $100 million domestically. Boo 2 should be the second biggest hit of the month, while there are only a couple of other films that have a shot at $50 million. Part of the problem is the level of competition, as there are 16 films opening during the four October weekends. (Needless to say, some of the predictions below will be a little short, as there’s not much to say about a film that will barely open in the top ten and disappear two weeks later.) That’s way too many and most will be buried by the competition. Last October was a flop, as no film earned more than $100 million at the box office. There were a few films that came close, including the original Boo! movie. As long as Blade Runner 2049 matches expectations, 2017 should win the year-over-year comparison by a small margin. If we get one surprise hit, then 2017 has a real shot at closing the gap with 2016 by a significant margin. I choose to be cautiously optimistic. More...

Happy Death Day Trailer

July 19th, 2017

Horror movie starring Jessica Rothe, written and directed by Christopher Landon opens October 13 ... Full Movie Details. More...