March 5th, 2023
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Creed III is off to a flying start in theaters this weekend, with United Artists projecting it will earn $58.658 million by the end of today. That’s easily the best 3-day opening for the Creed franchise (and also for a Rocky movie), and even tops the $56 million accumulated over five days by Creed II during the Thanksgiving Holiday in 2018.
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March 3rd, 2023
Creed III looks likely to have the best opening weekend for a film in the Creed franchise, which (not adjusted for inflation) would also give it the best opening for a Rocky movie too, at least based on its excellent $5.45 million in previews, and our model’s expectations. Operation Fortune: Ruse de guerre looks like an also-ran, unfortunately. Meanwhile, Ant-Man and Cocaine Bear keep things interesting as our model picks apart this weekend’s box office prospects.
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March 2nd, 2023
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The third installment of the Creed franchise, and ninth overall film in the Rocky film series, Creed III enters the fray this week as the widest release, and the only film showing in over 4,000 locations. 4,007 of them, to be precise. The sports drama, starring Michael B. Jordan as Adonis Creed, is also Jordan’s directorial debut. The opening count is a Rocky franchise record.
Also opening in wide release is the action-comedy Operation Fortune: Ruse de guerre. Starting out in 2,168 locations, the movie features an all-star ensemble cast including Jason Statham, Hugh Grant, Aubrey Plaza, Cary Elwes, Josh Hartnett and Bugzy Malone. Directed by Guy Ritchie, the movie follows super spy Orson Fortune (played by Statham) and his team of top operatives as they recruit Hollywood’s biggest movie star to help them on an undercover mission to stop a billionaire arms broker (played by Grant) from selling a deadly new weapons technology that threatens to disrupt the world order.
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February 23rd, 2023
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It’s likely no big surprise to see last week’s juggernaut release retain its spot as the widest release this week. Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania debuted in 4,345 locations and went on to collect an impressive $106 million in its opening weekend and currently enjoys a six-day domestic total of $131.33 million. The latest Marvel feature retains its opening theater count, once again making it the only film currently playing in over 4,000 movie houses.
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December 4th, 2018
The post-holiday weekend matched expectations, more or less. Ralph Breaks the Internet led the way with $25.57 million over the weekend. The Possession of Hannah Grace opened better than expected and earned more than it cost to make, so if it can find an audience on the home market, it could break even. Overall, the box office fell almost exactly $100 million from last weekend, but it is a post holiday weekend, so this 47% drop-off is not unexpected. More importantly, this is 9.5% above the same weekend last year, which continues 2018’s winning streak. 2018’s lead over 2017 is basically within a rounding error of where it was last week at $10.8 million / $1.05 billion at $10.70 billion to $9.65 billion.
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November 1st, 2018
October continued 2018’s phenomenal box office run, for the most part. There were a couple of films that missed expectations by $10 million or more, but on the other hand, Vemon and Halloween were smash hits and are now the first and second biggest October debuts of all time. Furthermore, 2018’s lead over 2017 is, as I’m writing this, just shy of $1 billion and if 2018 can maintain this lead, it will be one of the biggest year-over-year increases of all time. It won’t. The fun times end now. Why is that? Last November was amazing. There were only eight wide releases, but six of them earned more than $100 million. Three of those hit $200 million, including Thor: Ragnarok, which earned over $300 million. This year, there are a lot more movies opening in November, but it is a case of quantity over quality. No movie is expected to come close to $300 million and it would take a bit of luck just to have five $100 million hits. The film I’m looking forward to the most is Ralph Breaks the Internet, while it, Dr. Seuss’ The Grinch, and Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald are all aiming for $200 million this month. Fortunately, even if 2018 is behind 2017’s pace by around $300 million, 2018 has built up such a large lead that it should still go into December with an insurmountable lead at the box office.
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December 6th, 2015
Krampus is providing the industry with some surprise post-Thanksgiving, pre-Holiday cheer this weekend, with an opening well ahead of expectations amongst a crowd of slightly disappointing results. Mockingjay, Part 2 will top the chart with $18.6 million, which is off a surprisingly steep 64%. With the film expected to hit $20 million or so this weekend, that’s a disappointment, and makes a final total of $300 million look just out of reach. The Good Dinosaur was expected to have the legs of a Pixar movie, and is instead looking more like a run-of-the-mill high-budget animated film, so instead of topping $20 million, it is down 60% to $15.5 million for the weekend. That left an opening for Krampus, which will take second spot overall with a $16-million debut.
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November 30th, 2015
While not all of the individual movies did as well as expected over the weekend, the overall box office was strong. The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part 2 did a tiny bit better, while Creed was the biggest surprise of the weekend. On the other hand, The Good Dinosaur had a merely good opening. The overall box office rose 5.4% compared to last week and 13% compared to last year, pulling in $182 million over the three-day frame. Year-to-date, 2015 now has $9.55 billion and has extended its lead over 2014 to 4.1% or $380 million.
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November 29th, 2015
The combined forces of a 50% weekend-to-weekend decline at the box office and two strong rivals wasn’t enough to knock The Hunger Games: Mockingjay—Part 2 off its perch at the top of the box office chart this Thanksgiving. With a three-day total of $51.6 million (and $75.8 million over five), the franchise-capper will finish the holiday just shy of $200 million at the domestic box office. With a reported $242.4 million overseas, the film is hurrying towards $500 million worldwide, and sits at $440.7 million as of Sunday evening.
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November 25th, 2015
It appears The Good Dinosaur will win the box office race this weekend with The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part 2 being pushed into second place. Creed should have the best opening weekend of the franchise. Meanwhile, Victor Frankenstein is just hoping for a spot in the top five. I don't think it will get there. Both new releases from last year failed to meet expectations, so that gives 2015 a real shot at coming out on top of the year-over-year comparison.
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November 1st, 2015
October has come to an end and everyone should be happy about that. Except for The Martian, there were no serious hits that opened last month. There were more outright bombs than even midlevel hits. Fortunately, October of last year wasn't spectacular either, so 2015 maintains a healthy lead over 2014. Even more fortunately, November looks fantastic. There are four films that have the potential to earn $200 million or more. The biggest of these is the final Hunger Games movie, which should reach $400 million. Spectre has a real shot at $300 million and could be the biggest hit in the franchise. Meanwhile, nearly every November there's an animated kids movie that becomes a monster hit. This year, The Peanuts Movie and The Good Dinosaur are both aiming for that box office milestone. The last time we didn't have a family film that earned at least $100 million in November was 2011 and that's because there were four family films that opened in the final two weeks of the month and that much competition meant they cannibalized each other. Both of these has a shot at $200 million and if neither of them reached $200 million, I would be shocked. Meanwhile, last November was a good month at the top with three monster hits: The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part 1, Big Hero 6, and Interstellar. However, after those three films, there were not much positive to talk about. It really looks like 2015 will match 2014 at the top, plus it could have better depth. I might be a little too optimistic, but I think November is going to be a great month at the box office.
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February 19th, 2014
The winner of our Between a Rocky and a Hard Place contest were determined and it is...
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February 11th, 2014
It's a strange week on the home market. If you look at the top ten selling new releases on Amazon.com, there are a couple of first run releases, a catalog title, TV on DVD release, and some limited releases. That's basically every category there is. The biggest release is Ender's Game, a film that failed to find an audience in theaters. It barely earned overall positive reviews and it isn't a contender for Pick of the Week. Some of the other best-selling releases are contenders, like The Jungle Book: Blu-ray Diamond Edition or Sherlock: Season Three on DVD or Blu-ray. There are also a few of the smaller releases that were in consideration, including Doctor Who: Story 33: The Moonbase and G.B.F. on DVD. But in the end, I went with Wadjda on Blu-ray Combo Pack for Pick of the Week. One last note, Dry Spell is coming out on Video on Demand. It's a good chance to support ultra-low-budget filmmaking and the reviews I've read have been positive.
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February 6th, 2014
Next weekend is Valentine's Day / Presidents Day long weekend and there are four wide releases hoping to take advantage. Of those four, only two have a shot at first place, RoboCop and About Last Night. RoboCop is opening on Wednesday, so that leaves About Last Night as the clear choice for the target film for this week's box office prediction contest. In order to win, one must simply predict the opening weekend box office number for About Last Night.
Whoever comes the closest to predicting the film's opening 3-day weekend box office (Friday to Sunday), regardless if they go over or not, will win a copy of Rocky: Heavyweight Collection on The Ultimate Guide to the Presidents 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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December 1st, 2013
We had some good news and some bad news in November. The bad news is the overall weakness at the box office continued and 2013 lost its lead over 2012. Strong runs by The Hunger Games: Catching Fire and Frozen did help it bounce back in the end, but 2013 is still going to have a tough time topping 2012. Looking forward to December, we find about a dozen wide releases, sort of. There are several films that are opening in limited release that are expected to expand wide by the end of the month, but I'm not sure that will be the case for all of them. The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug should be the easy winner this month and if it is a little lucky, it might even top its predecessor at the box office. There is a huge amount of hype surrounding Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues and it could double the first film's box office numbers. On the other hand, those two films might be the only two December wide releases to reach $100 million. There are a few that have the potential to get to the century mark, if they are big players during Awards Season. Obviously some of the films coming out this month will win awards, but there's already a lot of competition in theaters before the month begins. There were three $100 million movies last December, led by The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, so while it could be close, it looks like December will lose in the year-over-year comparison. This is really bad news, as 2013 can't afford to go out on a losing streak if it wants to top 2012.
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