January 7th, 2006
For the third week in a row,
The 40-Year Old Virgin was the leader on both the rental and the sales charts. It ended the year on top with $8.51 million over the week, which was down just 1% from last week and enough to push its total to $27.48 after three weeks.
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December 27th, 2005
It's a relatively strong week for DVD releases with several contenders for DVD Pick of the Week.
This shouldn't be too surprising since Boxing Week sales have become much more important in recent years.
However, it is still not as strong as it has been in the past several weeks and there are also a lot of releases that look like they are simply being dumped on the market.
In the end, Toy Story 2 - 2-Disc Special Edition was the clear choice for DVD Pick of the Week, but there are some others worth picking up.
One last note, some DVDs were released yesterday to take full advantage of the Boxing Week sales and this list includes them as well.
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December 4th, 2005
Here's this week's round-up of international box office numbers.
In Her Shoes fell out of the top five this week with $3.95 million on 2,050 screens in 23 markets for a $30.60 million international box office.
The film held up amazingly well in Spain, dropping just 8% to $810,000 on 290 screens, but it wasn't as fortunate in France where it lost more than half its opening, earning $400,000 on 293 screens, falling out of the top ten in the process.
It suffered a similar fate during its third weekend in the U.K. where it was down 55% to $736,000 on 268 screens, but the film already has $7.06 million there, which is better than its domestic run if you take into account the relative sizes of the two markets.
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November 27th, 2005
The Legend of Zorro fell from second to sixth this week and because of that its quest from $100 million internationally took a serious hit. Over the weekend the film pulled in $4.20 million on 4062 screens in 62 markets for a running tally of $80.73 million. In France the film fell 57% to $1.01 million over the weekend and $14.80 million during its four-week run while it had a similar drop-off in Spain where it was down 56% to $475,000 over the weekend and $9.10 million in total. The box office was less kind in Russia, (down 68% to $136,000); Germany, (down 70% to $232,000) and the U.K., (down 83% to $120,000).
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November 20th, 2005
The Corpse Bride missed the top five by the narrowest of narrow margins losing out to
Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit $5.50 million to $5.45 million. The film earned its $5.45 million on 2586 screens in 28 markets pushing its total to $53.4 million total at the international box office. In South Korea the film fell 43% to $753,000 on 114 screens, which is better than average for the market. And the film is also doing well in Italy adding $764,000 on 268 screens to its $2.67 million running tally there, $700,000 in France for a $8 million box office, and $462,000 in Japan for a $7.0 million box office.
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November 13th, 2005
Chicken Little started its international run with day-and-date debuts in 9 markets earning $5.54 million on 900 screens, just missing the top five in the process. Its best market was kid-friendly Mexico with $3.1 million on 600 screens, which is about on par with its opening domestically. On the other hand, the film broke records in Malaysia with $477,000 on 40 screens. Other results include a first place debuts in Russia with $1.1 million on 197 screens and in Taiwan with $463,000 on 18 screens, (including previews).
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November 6th, 2005
With
The Legend of Zorro earning a nearly worldwide release this past weekend, and the imminent release of another
juggernaut, there was little room for other releases this weekend on the international scene.
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October 30th, 2005
Oliver Twist opened in two major markets over the weekend, placing second in both France with $2.4 million on 547 screens and Italy with $1.3 million on 301 screens.
Other markets include $360,000 in the U.K. for a $3.6 million total there and $140,000 in Poland for $1.1 million. Add it up and you have $4.2 million for the weekend and $9.6 million in total.
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October 23rd, 2005
The Brothers Grimm dropped just 35% during its second weekend in France adding $2.1 million to its $5.7 million total there. In Germany, the film performed a nearly the same level falling 36% to $950,000 over the weekend and $2.9 million during its run. Overall the film made $4 million for a $27.8 million runny tally and that places it fourth on this week's charts. While the film struggled domestically, it is doing quite a bit better on the international scene, and could show a profit sometime during its home market run.
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October 16th, 2005
Company 9 remained in first place in Russia, its home market, down just 13% to $4.3 million for a running total of $14.3 million, which is well ahead of Revenge of the Sith's final box office in the market (which was just shy of $10 million).
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October 10th, 2005
It was a bad weekend at the box office. Granted, the box office hit $104 million over the weekend, up 17.6% from last weekend, but it was down 2.9% from last year, making this a weak start to October. The fall box office is still ahead of last years pace by 4.9% at $581.8 million, but year-to-date, 2005 is off by 6.5% at $6.608 billion.
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October 9th, 2005
Company 9 opened in its native market of Russia with a stunning $5.0 million over the weekend and $6.25 million including the midweek numbers, which is better than Revenge of the Sith's opening in that market.
This also means there were two films that did so well in their local markets that they managed to place in the top five overall.
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October 7th, 2005
Five new films are opening in varying degrees of wideness from 3,645 theatres for Wallace and Gromit to 969 for The Gospel. All while all five could have an impact at the box office, the real question is whether the overall market can rebound from last weekend's setback.
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October 3rd, 2005
The mini-winning streak the box office was on came to a crashing end this weekend as the total box office was only $88 million, down 11.4% from last weekend and a stunning 21.7% from last year. Of course, this time last year was the first weekend in October, so the year-to-year drop-off is to be expected. Year-to-date, 2005 is behind 2004 by 6.6% at $6.479 billion to $6.934 billion. But at least the Fall is still ahead by 7.7% at $453 million, and at this point you have to take whatever good news you can find.
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September 30th, 2005
Today is the last day of a very successful September. Unfortunately, this does mean the year-to-year gains we've been seeing will come to an end.
This time last year was the first weekend in October and all three wide releases combined won't top the debut of Shark Tale.
But hopefully that will be a momentary setback for an otherwise healthy Fall box office.
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September 29th, 2005
During the past week promotional websites for several movies were launched and some older ones added additional content. Here the list of this week's releases, a couple of new sites and few updates, including this week's winner,
The Greatest Game Ever Played -
Official Site.
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September 1st, 2005
September is the prime dumping ground for movie studios, where the films that just didn't work get ditched to die an undignified death. So why are there no less than five movies opening wide that look like they should be reasonably good? Either the studios are trying to counteract the poor reputation September has, or I have really bad taste in movies.
This month is very difficult to predict for a number of reasons, not the least of which is the fluidity of the release schedule with several films on the bubble for wide releases.
In fact, there are almost as many films that may or may not open wide in September than there are films with a solid release schedule.
Predicting what a film will earn without knowing if it will open wide is tricky because you have to figure out how much it would earn if it opens wide, how much it will earn if it goes the limited route, and what are the odds it will open wide versus a limited release.
This resulting weighted average is lower than a similar prediction for a movie that is known to be opening wide, which makes the month look even worse that it otherwise would.
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August 18th, 2005
During the past week promotional websites for several movies were launched and some older ones added additional content. Here the list of this week's releases, a couple of new sites and few updates, including this week's winner,
Into the Blue -
Official Site.
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July 28th, 2005
During the past week promotional websites for several movies were launched and some older ones added additional content. Here the list of this week's releases, a couple of new sites and few updates, including this week's winner,
Sky High -
Official Site.
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July 14th, 2005
During the past week promotional websites for several movies were launched and some older ones added additional content. Here the list of this week's releases, a couple of new sites and few updates, including this week's winner,
Skeleton Key -
Official Site.
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June 30th, 2005
During the past week promotional websites for several movies were launched and some older ones added additional content. Here the list of this week's releases, a couple of new sites and few updates, including this week's winner,
Pretty Persuasion -
Official Site.
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March 31st, 2005
During the past week promotional websites for several movies were launched and some older ones added additional content. Here the list of this week's releases, a couple of new sites and few updates, including this week's winner, The Longest Yard - Official Site.
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January 30th, 2004
This week's new batch of movie release dates sees the studios start to position themselves for blockbuster performances in Summer 2005, and do some shuffling around of less ambitious releases in 2004.
Among movies with new or moved dates: a remake of The Longest Yard,
a revival of The Pink Panther, an adaptation of TV's Bewitched, Tarantino's Kill Bill: Volume 2 and many more.
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