September 30th, 2011
October starts next weekend with the release of two films, including Real Steel, which should have no trouble winning the box office, as its main competition is a political drama opening in 1,000 fewer theaters. Because it is the only saturation level release next week, and because it allows me to use a rare double-pun in the title, it is the target film in this week's box office prediction contest. In order to win, one must simply predict the opening weekend box office number for Real Steel.
Whoever comes the closest to predicting the film's opening 3-day weekend box office (Friday to Sunday), without going over, will win a copy of Living Will on DVD.
Whoever comes the closest to predicting the film's opening 3-day weekend box office (Friday to Sunday), without going under, will win a copy of Season of the Witch on DVD.
Entries must be received by 10 a.m., Pacific Time on Friday to be eligible, so don't delay!
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July 19th, 2011
New releases were dead on arrival on this week's DVD sales chart. None reached the top five, while only three reached the top 30. This left Sucker Punch in top spot, but with only 105,000 units / $1.58 million units for the week giving it totals of 381,000 units / $5.71 million after two.
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July 12th, 2011
While it's not common for a box set to lead the way on the Blu-ray sales chart, it is also no real surprise that Lord of the Rings: Extended Edition Trilogy managed to do just that, as it was clearly the biggest new release of the week. It took top spot with sales of 336,000 units, and thanks to its premium pricing, it generated $25.21 million in opening week consumer spending.
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July 12th, 2011
While plenty of new releases reached the top of this week's sales chart, none were exactly burning up the chart. Leading the way was Sucker Punch, but with only 275,000 units / $4.13 million during its opening week on the chart. Season of the Witch could claim a share of first place with $4.28 million in opening week sales from 265,000 units sold.
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July 5th, 2011
It's a terrible week for new DVD and Blu-ray releases with no first run releases of note. There's not even an abundance of limited releases, TV on DVD releases, or catalogue releases to pick up the slack. The best-selling release according to Amazon.com is 13 Assassins on Blu-ray and it is also arguably the best. It's really the only competitor for Pick of the Week.
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June 27th, 2011
It's a bit of a madhouse in terms of DVD and Blu-ray releases this week: Amazon.com has more than 400 listed. That said, a lot of them are catalogue titles that would barely warrant a mention during a slow week. The most intriguing first run release is Sucker Punch on Blu-ray / DVD / Digital Copy Combo Pack, but while I think it's worth picking up, it's appeal is limited enough that it is not worthy of the Pick of the Week honors. Fortunately, one of the catalogue titles is clearly Pick of the Week material. In fact, Lord of the Rings Trilogy: Extended Edition - Blu-ray is one of the most anticipated releases in the history of Blu-ray.
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June 26th, 2011
Nicolas Cage's career has been erratic for the past several years. He's made some great movies, like Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans and Kick Ass, but he's also made some horrendous choices in projects. Of his weaker selection of films, Season of the Witch earned some of the worst reviews of his career and struggled to make any noise during its theatrical release. Is it really this bad? Or does it have enough redeeming qualities to make it worth checking out on the home market?
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January 20th, 2011
International numbers were a day late due to the holiday, but there were some interesting stories to report. Firstly, Tangled climbed to top spot with $16.01 million on 4187 screens, in 38 markets, for a total of $214.02 million internationally and $395.03 million worldwide. It was able to climb to the top, despite no major market openings. It did add $3.33 million on 432 screens during its second weekend in Australia. That was enough for second place in that market over the weekend, while it lifted its total there to $13.23 million. In Brazil it remained in first place with $2.69 million on 447 screens over the weekend and $12.98 million after two. Up next is the U.K., while it has yet to open in Spain, Scandinavia, and Japan and by the time its done, it could have $500 million worldwide.
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January 18th, 2011
2011 continues its trend of performing pretty well against 2010, if you ignore Avatar. This time last year, Avatar earned just over $40 million at the box office over the three-day weekend. This weekend 2011 was behind 2010 by just under $40 million over the same period. (You get a similar result if you look at the four-day numbers.) One could look at this as a small victory, as Avatar is such a rare commodity that it is unfair to expect the box office to compensate for that. However, there are a number of points that makes that thinking dangerous. First of all, even taking out Avatar, 2011's growth is not enough to keep pace with inflation. Secondly, without Avatar as competition, The Book of Eli probably would have earned at least a few million more, as would the rest of the box office. Thirdly, 2011 lost over the four-day weekend by a margin of $210 million to $159 million, which means there were about 7 million fewer people at theaters this weekend, which means there were 7 million fewer people seeing trailers, posters, etc. for upcoming films, and the box office can hardly afford missing out on that much free advertising. Finally, already 2011 is behind 2010 by nearly $200 million, at $798 million to $601 million, and if the conventional wisdom becomes, "2011 will be a disaster at the box office", it will take something special to overcome that negative buzz. And quite frankly, I don't see anything really special hitting theaters till the fall, and by then it will be too late.
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January 11th, 2011
The winners of our Tis the Season contest were determined and they are...
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January 10th, 2011
It was quite a depressing weekend, as almost no film in the top five topped expectations. Worst still, it wasn't expected to be a good weekend to begin with. This left the overall box office down just over 30% from last weekend to $112 million. More importantly, that was nearly 30% less than the same weekend last year. If you want to really search for good news, you could point to the fact that if you take out Avatar out of the equation, then 2011 would have beaten 2010 over the weekend, but even here the margin of victory would have been lower than the ticket price inflation. It is way too early to judge how well 2011 will do compared to 2010, but so far it is 23% off of last year's pace at $281 million to $365 million. I expect that gap will grow in terms of raw dollars, but by the time Memorial Day rolls around, 2011 could start rattling off some wins.
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January 9th, 2011
The post-Holiday hangover at the box office began in earnest this weekend, with the week's new wide release, Season of the Witch, and wide expansion, Country Strong both unable to gain much traction, allowing holdovers to dominate the chart.
True Grit will end the weekend on top with an estimated $15 million, according to Paramount, and a running total of $110 million.
Little Fockers will finish second with about $13.8 million, per Universal's estimates.
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January 6th, 2011
So, will holdovers bewitch the box office?
The answer to that is almost guaranteed to be yes.
There is almost no chance either the one wide release, Season of the Witch, or the major expansion, Country Strong, will top the chart. In fact, one could argue there's a better chance neither will reach the top five. This is really bad news for the start of 2011. We knew the holdovers wouldn't be as strong as they were last year, no with Avatar earning $50 million over the weekend, but if the new releases can't keep pace with last year's new releases, we could be in trouble.
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January 1st, 2011
Well, 2010 is over and while it started amazingly, it ended on a real down note. I'm not saying December was a disaster. ... Actually I am. There were only ten wide releases, and of those, eight missed expectations, some by very wide margins. Despite having a $200 million lead going into the month, 2010 still managed to lose out to 2009. The bad news continues in 2011, as Avatar made $300 million during January alone. With no strong holdovers to help power the box office, and only one or two potential solid hits among the new releases, 2011 will likely get off to a very weak start.
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December 30th, 2010
Just one wide release next week, Season of the Witch, and as such it's the obvious choice for target film in this week's box office prediction contest. In order to win, one must simply predict the opening weekend box office number for Season of the Witch.
Whoever comes the closest to predicting the film's opening 3-day weekend box office (Friday to Sunday), without going over, will win a copy of Jersey Shore: Season Two on DVD.
Meanwhile, whoever comes the closest to predicting the film's opening 3-day weekend box office (Friday to Sunday), without going under, will win the Heart Burned collection from GIANTmicrobes.
Entries must be received by 10 a.m., Pacific Time on Friday to be eligible, so don't delay!
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