Friday Estimates by Klady
$12 million was a significant mark for the Justin Bieber doc (maybe it should have appropriated the name of the Chris Rock doc, Good Hair), as that was the amount the Jonas Bros did in their entire first weekend and it’s about 50% more than the Hannah/Miley Concert doc did on its opening day. It’s hard to figure out just how frontloaded this film is. If you go by the Michael Jackson: This Is It numbers – which were cooled by a Wed launch – it will be a $36m weekend. If you go by Miley Montana, it could be in the low low 40s. If you go by the Jonas Bras, low 30s.
Sony is clearly looking at 50 First Dates when they tell their media mouthpiece, Nikki “4 Days & My Doorstep & You Won’t Get A Picture Of Me” Finke, “Justin Bieber Wins Friday With $12.5M; But Adam Sandler Should Finish Weekend #1.” (I’m pretty sure that the movie being marketed as “Adam Sandler ogles the swimsuit model” isn’t Date Movie #1 Of 2011.) Unbiased Magic 8 Ball says, “Unlikely.” And please note… I have been more bullish on Sandler’s box office power than most anyone out there. But Sony is putting up a $10m figure for Friday… Klady has it at $9.3m. And even Grown Ups, which is now Sandler’s all-time high grosser, didn’t do 3x opening day. Nor did Anger Management, his biggest out-of-summer opening.
There is no reason to believe that 3-Bieber will drop much on Saturday, given the history of the only 3 musical concert films that have ever opened to more than $4 million in a weekend. None of them dropped as much as 10% on Saturday. Look for Sandler to end up around $27m and for Bieber in at least the low 30s.
Disney did better opening an animated film from Starz Animation than Fox (Space Chimps) or Focus (9), even if Gnomeo & Juliet isn’t burning down the box office. The weekend number should end up in 2nd Tier Disney Land, near Meet The Robinsons.
And The Eagle is perplexing. Looks like an epic, released like a pick-up. Welcome to The Movie Business 2011. It’s no disrespect to Focus. They are doing a piece of business. The US is the only territory where Focus is involved, though UPI bought some of South America, the UK, Spain, and Mexico. The stakes are so low here that anything more than they have done is risking more than the apparent reward. And if it heated up, somehow, Focus could capitalize on it.
In Oscar news, The King’s Speech will pass $90m today and should be past The Social Network by next week at this time. True Grit passes $160m this weekend. Black Swan lost about half its screens and The Fighter about a third of its screens to the new films which ate almost 13,000 screens between them. Both now have almost identical screen counts around 1050. Fighter will end the weekend just over $85 million and Swannie will be just under $99 million, celebrating $100 million sometime this next week.
Another crappy looking Sandler movie, another good box office performance. Why do people watch this crap?
“Just Go With It” had all the makings (a fine cast; a workable premise) of a first-rate romcom. All it needed was a (MUCH) better script. And maybe a director capable of some visual panache. The Hawaiian locations look as unprepossessingly dowdy as the island resort in “Couples Retreat.”
Although it’s the first time Sandler actually looks his age (mid-40s) on film, his character still behaves like an emotionally arrested teenager.
The best thing I can say for “Just” is that at least it’s an improvement over “Grown Ups.”
actually, that premise didn’t really “work” when it was used back in the 60’s…at least we agree that dennis dugan sucks…he should have stayed an actor…
“And even Grown Ups, which is now Sandler’s all-time high grosser.”
Care to back this up with anything, Poland? We are talking domestic b.o here and last I checked Big Daddy still made more.
Scooter- I have some residual childhood affection for “Cactus Flower,” so a “re-imagining” of the basis triangular premise 40+ years later didn’t seem like an intrinsically bad idea.
I’ve actually liked some of the Dugan-directed Sandler comedies (especially “Big Daddy” and “Happy Gilmore”), but his shortcomings are becoming increasingly evident with every misfire (the abysmal “Grown-Ups” and now “Just Go”). Interesting how a freelancing Sandler will entrust his “brand” with an auteur director like PT Anderson and Judd Apatow (both times with genius results), but when it comes to in-house “HM” productions he always sticks to hackish “yes” men like Dugan.
Sandler did 4X opening day with 50 First dates. He had the advantage of a Valentine’s Day Saturday but I;m sure the date crowd will be out in force Sat and Sunday this weekend. If it opens below 30 million blame the over marketing of the bikini model which turns off half the date crowd
Proman… YOU’RE talking domestic only here.
I love that you know full well what I mean, yet you get all uppity anyway. Troll.
I really liked YOU DON’T MESS WITH THE ZOHAN. I haven’t seen GROWN UPS or hardly any of Dugan’s other films, but he brought a certain slapdash vigor to ZOHAN that worked well for me. Maybe having Apatow on board that one as a writer/producer helped.
Thanks for the reminder, Yancy.
I loved “Zohan,” too, although its anarchic, even subversive nature seems to brand it as more of an Apatow than Dugan entry in the Happy Madison factory’s ouevre.
“I love that you know full well what I mean, yet you get all uppity anyway. Troll.”
Poland, you know full well I am not a troll. I get uppity because you’re not making any sense. This is a column for domestic Friday estimates and weekend projections. Why the fuck would you start talking about Grown Ups being his all time top grosser worldwide under this context? What point were you making there in that sentence? Grown Ups isn’t even Sandler’s top international grosser. And attendancewise, millons more saw Big Daddy.
But keep ignoring attendendace figures. That serves your columns well.
Wait, complain that he brings up international grosses in a box office thread, then shift goalposts to attendance… in a box office thread….
Hmmm, I think our host may have a bit of a point in his troll comment.
They paid Sandler $25M and Aniston $10M and Bieber’s entire film only cost $13M so Sony can’t at all be happy that it opened 2nd even if it has a chance of taking the weekend. They clearly overpaid Sandler and Aniston here.
Agree with Sams, Paramount matched its production budget in 24 hours while Sony may not match theirs in 24 weeks domestically. Sandler made as much as “No Strings Attached” cost to make….
Paramount is really off to a fantastic start this year with Bieber fever, True Grit, No Strings & The Fighter…and might have the biggest pre-April opening with “Rango” next month. If you count the Dreamworks co-productions, they seem a sure bet to break the single-studio yearly record this year.
Took the kids to Gnomeo & Juliet. Not one to rush out and see. It had a couple references for adults (look, a Borat gnome!) but it was wall-to-wall 1970’s Elton John songs, and it had one of my least favorite cliches, when the characters come out and dance to a song at the end and do a sort of curtain call.
But on the plus side, I’ve now seen a movie that had Hulk Hogan, Ozzy Osbourne, Jason Statham, Stephen Merchant, Michael Caine, Maggie Smith, Patrick Stewart and Dolly Parton.
i’m hoping that ‘rango’ knocks it outta the park…it really is one of the best (ie: most entertaining) animated films i’ve seen in a while…
and, in an interesting bit of cross-promotion: at today’s ‘rango’ press conference, depp made an off-hand remark about being a bieber fan because of his daughter… within fifteen minutes, bieber was in the room introducing himself to depp and thanking him for the kind words (oh, and saying hello to the press)…if i were a cynical guy, i might think it was a set up (but, no, that’s just not me)…..
Yeah that seems like a work. A complete and utter work.
Even though most of Dugan’s films are unwatchable. I do have a gigantic softspot for Brain Donors.
@Krillian apparently the Sandler movie is a wall to wall Police shrine…so consider yourself lucky.
I have a soft spot for Dugan solely because of THE HOWLING.
Hcat: OMG. Someone else remember Brain Donors? A few years back, when I told John Turturro how much I enjoyed his Groucho Marx bit in that one, he looked at me as though he thought I was mocking him. When he realized I was being honest, he seemed genuinely pleased.
hmmm…it appears i’ve lost my last entry…just as well, but i would mention that dugan is not only clueless about the work he’s doing now but clueless about the work he did earlier… he’s pretty detestable….
how can you say that about the man who directed that effortless classic, ‘problem child’?!
Leahnz: Have to admit — Problem Child is a guilty pleasure.
oh, sorry joe. lol. i have a big soft spot for john ritter but i draw the line at ‘problem child’
edited to say: thinking about john ritter, i did my annual christmas pilgrimage to ‘bad santa’ the other night (better late than never), and ritter is just so BONZA in that role, no one could have done bob better justice than ritter, a hard-out classic in his timing and delivery. when i first saw ‘bad s’ i thought it might herald in an era of classic ritter character roles in the twilight portion of his career, how wrong i was. what a bummer.
Ritter was wonderful in Swing Blade
Love it when Ritter tells Karl he’s “psychic” in SLING BLADE.
john r and billy bob, from the down-home brilliance of ‘sling blade’ to the cringe-inducing debauchery of ‘bad santa’, you gotta love it
(or not, i guess you don’t have to love it. i definitely love it)
Brain Donors rules it.
It’s the first ever Vasectomy Bowl!
ETA: I also frequently use “You’re excited?!?? FEEL THESE NIPPLES!” in casual conversation. I actually thought I got that from BASEketball until I just looked up the Brain Donors quote page on IMDB.