June 20, 2010

The highly anticipated Toy Story 3 arrived right on target with an estimated $110.2 million debut, which marked the biggest (unadjusted) opening for a Pixar movie. The week’s other incoming title Johah Hex wound up with an accursed $4.9 million that ranked it seventh in the weekend lineup.

The session also featured strong activity in the niches including Bollywood entry Raavan, which scored a hefty $710,000 (including Tamil-dubbed versions). Among exclusives Cyrus was a much-appreciated problem child with a brisk $44,450 average from four exposures while Italian import I Am Love had an impressive $16,090 average in its eight venues. Additionally Saturday sneaks on the Tom Cruise-Cameron Diaz action-comedy Knight and Day attracted 85% overall capacity and strongly positive exit polling.

It all added up to close to a $200 million weekend that translated into a significant box office boast following a month of eroding expectations.

In industry circles, Toy Story 3 had been pegged to open with better than a $100 million weekend and its $42 million Friday gross had trackers predicting an initial tally between $120 million and $125 million. But to great surprise box office dropped 10% Saturday leaving pundits scratching their collective heads. Historically family animated films virtually never take a second day dip (Wall-E a rare exception with a 5% Friday to Saturday slippage).

Disney distribution chief Chuck Vian explained some of the difference to the fact that Friday figures reflected Thursday and Friday midnight shows of roughly $4 million. Factoring that out of the equation would mean the film was flat on Saturday when one would expect family audiences to pick up the slack. Vian likened the skew to see the film on opening day to the more adult oriented The Simpson Movie. The argument is somewhat buttressed by the fact that 83% of U.S. schools were on recess on Friday but it still sounds like a lot of on the spot spit-balling that won’t become more clearly appreciated until second weekend grosses are collected.

Weekend revenues climbed 31% from both last weekend and the comparable frame in 2009. Last year the debut of The Proposal led the field with a $33.6 million bow while The Hangover and Up took place and show positions with respective box office of $26.7 million and $23.5 million.

After months of lackluster returns Bollywood has been bouncing back with strong openings for Housefull, Raajneeti and now Raavan. The Hindi sector obviously took note of the increasing significance of the Tamil audience in North America with 24 dubbed prints as part of its domestic debut that out-performed original language versions on a pound for pound basis.

The summer session, while hardly the richest vein for alternative fare, has been in 2010 appreciably open to provide commercial traction for a handful of movies that have filled in the cracks for mainstream fatigue. The on-going strength of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo should shortly pass $10 million domestically – a rare feat for a non-English language film. It’s also afforded the likes of Solitary Man and Please Give to expand to an unexpected degree and bodes well for Winter’s Bone, Cyrus and The Kids Are All Right to get more than a foot in the door in the coming weeks.
-by Leonard Klady

Weekend Estimates: June 18-20, 2010

Domestic Market Share: January 1 – June 17, 2010

Top Domestic Box Office Grossers: January 1 – June 17, 2010

* does not include 2009 box office

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