January 18th, 2011
A total of four new releases reached the top 30 on the sales chart this week. One of those films, Machete, topped the charts with 691,000 units sold and $11.05 million in opening week sales.
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January 3rd, 2011
The first week of the year and this year starts the same way last year ends, without a whole lot of must have choices. Machete is topping the chart, and it's a good movie, but there are not enough extras on the DVD / Blu-ray to rate as Pick of the Week material. On the other hand, Howl's DVD and Blu-ray are loaded with extras, but the movie didn't live up to expectations with critics. After going over the list for a third time, I have to conclude that there are no Pick of the Week releases this time around. That should change next week.
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January 1st, 2011
Lionsgate has an incredible talent for finding and marketing inexpensive movies, creating mostly mid-level hits. There's a reason why they are one of the best mini-majors out there. One could argue they the best overall, as Fox Searchlight has major label support, while Summit without Twilight looks a lot like New Line without Lord of the Rings. One of their latest finds was The Last Exorcism, which cost less than $2 million to make, but earned more than $40 million theatrically. That's not a whole lot of money compared to most wide releases, so will those that discover it on the home market be in for a treat?
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December 1st, 2010
The official arrival of winter is still a few weeks away, but Winter's Bone ushered in the start of Awards Season picking up seven Independent Spirit Award nominations. This was the most of any film, with The Kids Are All Right placing second with five.
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September 9th, 2010
The weekend after Labor Day long weekend is often the worst weekend at the box office for the entire year. This time around there is only one wide release, Resident Evil: Afterlife, which will have no trouble topping the chart. In fact, it will be the only film to reach $10 million over the weekend. Will it do well enough to help 2010 keep pace with last year when there were four wide releases?
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September 7th, 2010
There was some good news and some bad news this weekend. On the one hand, none of the new releases were able to live up to expectations, which resulted in a 6% drop-off from last weekend to $106 million. On the other hand, that was over 7% more than the same weekend last year. Throw in Monday's numbers and Labor Day 2010 earned $133 million, 6% ahead of 2009. Year-to-date, 2010 extended its lead over 2009 to 4.2% at $7.71 billion to $7.37 billion.
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September 2nd, 2010
Labor Day long weekend is the official end of summer vacation, although the summer blockbuster season has been over for a couple weeks now.
It is arguably the worst long weekend of the year to release a film, but there are three wide releases this week hoping to buck that trend.
While none really have a chance at being anything more than a mid-level hit, all three have a shot at top spot, and all three might top last year's number one new release, All About Steve.
Meanwhile, overall 2010 should match 2009 with plenty of room to spare.
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August 31st, 2010
The winners of our Not the Last Chance to Win contest were determined and they are...
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August 30th, 2010
There was an upset at the box office with Takers pulling out a last minute win. However, it wasn't enough for the overall box office, as that sunk 12% from last weekend to $113 million. More importantly, it was down nearly 10% from last year. 2010 still has a $300 million lead over 2009 at $7.53 billion to $7.23 billion and I'm not concerned about the big picture, yet.
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August 26th, 2010
The last weekend of summer is actually the Labor Day long weekend, which is next weekend. So that makes this weekend the penultimate weekend of summer, which is one of the worst weekends of the year to open a film. Last year was a bit of an exception with The Final Destination opening with $27.41 million. There's almost no chance The Last Exorcism will perform that well; in fact, if it matches Halloween 2's opening, I think the studio will be happy.
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August 20th, 2010
It's the last contest of the summer and it looks like The Last Exorcism will be the only true wide release of the weekend, making it the clear choice for 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 Last Exorcism.
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 Strawberry Shortcake: Berrywood Here We Come on DVD and Starberry Shortcake: The Glimmerberry Ball Movie 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 Strawberry Shortcake: Berrywood Here We Come on DVD and Starberry Shortcake: The Glimmerberry Ball Movie 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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August 1st, 2010
July started out rather well, and while there was a little weakness in the end, four films surpassed $100 million, and another could join them soon.
That said, there don't appear to be any $100 million movies opening in August; in fact, there is a chance none will come close.
Worse still, August of last year saw three $100 million movies open in the first three weeks.
There's almost no chance that will happen this year, so 2010 will likely lose ground to 2009 in the yearly box office race.
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