The Weekend Report: July 24, 2011

We Need Another Hero

The debut of Captain America: The First Avenger surprised skeptics with a sturdy $65.1 million that ranked it first in hearts and box office. Conversely the week’s other major opening, the rom-com Friends with Benefits, slightly under-performed with an $18.5 million bow that ranked third overall.

Niche newcomers included an OK start of $147,000 at 50 theaters for Bollywood’s Singham. Korea’s popular Sunny had an impressive $20,300 at two venues while a couple of other exclusives received strong starts. French import Sarah’s Key garnered $112,000 from five exposures and Sundance lauded Another Earth grossed $76,400 from four initial playdates.

Weekend box office totaled more than $190 million that translated into a 28% slide from seven days earlier. It was, however, 17% improved from 2010 when Inception’s $42.7 million trumped the $36 million debut of Salt.

Industry trackers concluded that summer crowds were growing weary of caped and hooded crusaders and pegged the launch of Captain America coming in at between $50 million and $55 million. Its $4 million cache from Thursday previews appeared to signal that the prognosticators were on target and that the Captain – movies very first super hero thanks to a 1943 serial – would trail the second weekend of the Harry Potter finale.

But a larger than expected Harry decline coupled with a hearty Friday debut put the venerable avenger at the head of the class. Exit polls tipped the scales with 64% of ticket buyers male. The crowd was also 58% in excess of 25 years of age and its 66% stereoscopic engagements accounted for 38% of the box office. It now appears that the audience most receptive to 3-D movies is aged between 18 and 30 years old and that’s exactly the part of ticket buyers that have declined the most in 2011.

The zeal to see Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows, Part 2 was apparently greater than had been perceived. The hallowed series has generally experience 50% second weekend drop offs domestically and if international declines are comparably severe the box office bar will have to be lowered on the franchise conclusion.

Tracking on Friends with Benefits was supposed to translate into a $20 million to $22 million opening and that seemed doable especially as the film had no direct genre competition. Exit polls showed a not unexpected female tilt of 62% and 56% of buyers aged 25 years and older underlying once again the erosion of younger crowds at the multiplex.

Next weekend’s launch of Cowboys & Aliens has the industry in an anxious mood. A straw poll at CinemaCon in March revealed the industry was most dubious about the film’s commercial prospects but optimism has build since then with daily tracking reports being closely scrutinized for clues to its opening stamina.

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