Superstar magicians Burt Wonderstone and Anton Marvelton have ruled the Las Vegas Strip for years, raking in millions with illusions as big as Burt's growing ego. But lately the duo's greatest deception is their public friendship, while secretly they've grown to loathe each other.
Facing cutthroat competition from guerilla street magician Steve Gray, whose cult following surges with each outrageous stunt, even their show is starting to look stale. But there's still a chance Burt and Anton can save the act—both onstage and off - if only Burt can get back in touch with what made him love magic in the first place.
There were only three new releases to chart on the June 30th, 2013 edition of the Blu-ray sales chart, but all three of them reached the top ten. That said, Jack the Giant Killer remained in first place with 90,000 units / $2.24 million over the week for a total of 313,000 units / $7.40 million after two.
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There was a quartet of new releases spread throughout the June 30th, 2013 edition of the DVD sales chart. None were major hits, but at least The Call earned first place with 225,000 units / $3.88 million during its first week of release. It was only a midlevel hit at the box office, so this opening is on par with expectations, given the current state of the overall DVD market.
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Jack the Giant Slayer was thought to be a potential monster hit at the box office. You don't spend nearly $200 million on a movie unless you think it will be a monster hit. However, it bombed in theaters and it is doing no better on the home market. Sadly, it led this week's list of new releases, which explains why the overall Blu-ray sales were so much weaker than last week. Overall 858,000 units were sold generating $20.83 million in total sales. This was 44% lower in terms of units and 38% lower in terms of revenue. Fortunately, this was still better than last year by 16% in terms of units and 19% in terms of revenue. DVD sales held on better on a week-over-week comparison, which resulted in the overall Blu-ray share falling to 33% in terms of units and 42% in terms of revenue.
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It's summer time. Long time readers know what that means for the home market. It's bad news. There are a couple of first-run releases to come out: The Call and The Incredible Burt Wonderstone. The former was a solid midlevel hit earning more than $50 million on a $13 million budget. The latter bombed. Neither one is a contender for Pick of the Week. There are a couple limited releases that might rise to that level, but I think the best release is Todd & the Book of Pure Evil: The Complete Second Season on DVD. Unfortunately, the screener arrived late so I haven't had a chance to review it, and I hate handing out that honor when till after I give the screener a full review. Fortunately, there is a screener that arrived late that is worth that honor: My Neighbor Totoro on Blu-ray.
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While Easter Monday is a holiday up here in Canada, it's not in the United States and the weekend numbers have arrived. The numbers are good, or close enough to being good that I'm choosing to focus on the positive. G.I. Joe: Retaliation won the race for the top with an opening weekend that was a little better than expected. Meanwhile, Temptation also opened on the high end of expectations. On the other hand, The Host failed to live up to lowered expectations. Overall, the box office rose 6.1% from last week. Granted, it did fall compared to the same weekend last year, but it fell by less than 1% (0.99%) and compared to the year-to-date decline, that's positively glowing. I'm calling it a victory. That's right, 2013 has been so bad so far that I'm willing to call a 1% decline a victory. 2013 is still well behind 2012's pace at $2.27 billion to $2.59 billion, which is a deficit of 12% or nearly $330 million.
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As expected, The Croods earned first place, but it didn't dominate as much as many thought it would, because Olympus Has Fallen did better than expected. The overall box office rose 29% from last weekend reaching $139 million. Unfortunately, again as expected, The Hunger Games earned more this weekend last year than the entire box office earned this year. The year-over-year decline was a massive 35%. That's stunning. That usually only happens when there is a misalignment in holidays. Year-to-date, 2013 is now behind 2012 by a 13% margin at $2.06 billion to $2.36 billion. Given the films coming out later this year and the films that came out last year, I just don't see a pathway to victory for 2013.
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As expected, Oz the Great and Powerful easily won the box office race this weekend matching predictions nearly perfectly. The Call was a surprise hit, but unfortunately, the other wide release for the week, The Incredible Burt Wonderstone, failed to find an audience. The overall box office fell 23% from last weekend to $107 million. Its decline from last year was much smaller at just 2.9%, but with 2013 so far behind 2012, any loss is still troubling. We really need to close the gap, which is now at 12% at $2.14 billion to $1.88 billion. Next weekend, it is just going to get worse.
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There are definite signs of life at the box office this weekend, thanks to continued good numbers for Oz the Great and Powerful, an above-expected debut for The Call and a gigantic performance in limited release for Spring Breakers. Those three bright spots do something to compensate for a horrible $10 million opening for The Incredible Burt Wonderstone, which might have fared better with a Summer release, but still casts some doubt on the star power of Steve Carell and Jim Carrey.
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There are two wide releases coming out next week: The Incredible Burt Wonderstone and The Call. Nearly everyone thinks The Incredible Burt Wonderstone will easily be the bigger of the two films. Of course, most think it will have to settle for second place. Regardless, it is 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 The Incredible Burt Wonderstone.
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 Lay the Favorite 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 also win a copy of Lay the Favorite on DVD.
Entries must be received by 10 a.m., Pacific Time on Friday to be eligible, so don't delay!
To enter, send your prediction for the opening weekend gross, along with your name, address and phone number to contests@the-numbers.com. The winner will be determined on March 18th, 2013 once we have the official opening weekend results.
In the meantime, here's a deleted scene from the movie:
February is over, and for the most part, we should be very happy it is done and buried. The biggest hit of the month turned out to be Identity Thief, which will cross $100 million shortly. There were also a couple of impressive midlevel hits, like Warm Bodies and Escape from Planet Earth, but for the most part, it was miss after miss. This is bad news for March, which is not only dealing with a slumping 2013 box office, but will be compared with a strong March of 2012. Last March started with The Lorax, which earned more than $200 million. There's a good chance no March release this year will reach this milestone. Last March was also the month The Hunger Games opened, which earned more than $400 million. There's a chance the top three films opening this month won't earn that much combined. 2013 is going to take a beating in the year-over-year comparison and it is already $100 million behind last year's pace.
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Because some of our sources provide box office data in their local currency, while we use USD in the graph above and table below, exchange rate fluctuations can have effect on the data causing stronger increases or even decreases of the cumulative box office.
Full financial estimates for this film, including domestic and international box office, video sales, video rentals, TV and ancillary revenue
are available through our research services. For more information, please contact us at research@the-numbers.com.
