Weekend predictions: Shang-Chi still rules as industry braces for worst weekend since May

September 24th, 2021

Dear Evan Hansen will be taking a long-shot swing at unseating Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings from the top of the chart this weekend. Our model, and the movie’s preview numbers, suggest it’ll fall some way short, giving the Marvel action movie a fourth straight weekend at the top of the chart. That’s the longest continuous run at the top since Tenet dominated the pandemic-ravaged chart in September last year (The Croods: A New Age also spent five weeks at number one, split between December and February, but didn’t have four straight weekends at the top). The limited number of major new releases since Shang-Chi came out is significantly hitting the market as a whole, and this will be the slowest weekend at the box office since Spiral’s $4.6-million second weekend was enough to give it a weekend win back on May 21. More...

Weekend estimates: Spiral repeats as market braces for Memorial Day

May 23rd, 2021

With no new films opening in over 1,500 theaters, this weekend was always going to be a modest one at the box office as the industry prepares for a make-or-break Memorial Day session. Spiral will repeat at the top of the chart with a projected $4.55 million, according to Lionsgate’s Sunday-morning projection. Its 48% decline from opening weekend is a bit better than expected, and several other films are also holding on well, which means the weekend as a whole looks more solid than feared. It’s still fair to say that A Quiet Place: Part II and Cruella will face virtually no competition when they open this coming weekend. More...

Weekend predictions: Dream Horse unlikely to trouble the top six

May 21st, 2021

With Memorial Day weekend looming over the market, along with its two big new films, Cruella and A Quiet Place: Part II, this will be a quiet weekend at the box office. In fact, to borrow a well-worn phrase, perhaps too quiet.

Dream Horse is the only new wide release this weekend, and (as we will see in a moment) it isn’t expected to do a huge amount of business. Spiral, last week’s number one, didn’t do spectacular business on opening weekend and should see a sharp decline. With everything else in the top ten either coming off a weak debut or pretty much played out, we could see one of the worst weekends in the past couple of months.

Here’s what the model has to say… More...

Weekend estimates: Spiral beats prediction, but not by much

May 16th, 2021

Going into the weekend, the industry was hoping Spiral would earn something around $15 million and help build on recent progress in the theatrical market. Our prediction model was considerably less optimistic, expecting the film to take in a little over $6 million. So the glass-half-full view of the weekend is that the film beat our prediction, with Lionsgate projecting it will earn $8.725 million as of Sunday morning. That’s not a huge amount over what the model expected though, and the rest of the market isn’t looking that great either. More...

Weekend predictions: Spiral leads a rush of new releases

May 14th, 2021

There are four new wide releases this weekend, a new high point as theaters reopen and the theatrical market continues its recovery. In spite of some fairly impressive star power on display, there’s not a huge amount of doubt about which film will top the chart this weekend. Spiral, the latest incarnation of the Saw franchise is getting the widest release, in 2,811 theaters, and by far the loudest pre-release buzz. The sheer quantity of new films makes this a challenging weekend to predict, but here’s what our model has to say… More...