Weekend Estimates by Turkeys-R-Klady
So the story of the box office weekend is Creed… but not just because it did really well, but because box office writers are now overcompensating by overhyping the weekend. The movie is deserving, but The Perfect Guy opened to $26 million in September. Just saying.
The story of Creed will be (or won’t be) in the legs (I think it will be). #100 million is a big hit. $125 million domestic is the boundary for it being one of the year’s big overachievers. If it can get to $150 million, then Creed is a phenom, kind of like a more muscular District 9 and may well, if that is the case, get the Best Picture nomination in the way D9 did. Also, the chance of Michael B. Jordan getting a Best Actor nod would grow exponentially in that case.
Went in depth on Mockingjay yesterday. It’s fine.
I was being lenient about The Good Dinosaur yesterday. It’s not a great opening for Disney, but not ugly. For Pixar, it’s ugly. Only the original Toy Story, 20 years ago, opened worse. And even if you give the film its full 5-day opening number, it still only bests Ratatouille‘s opening 3-day. But, like The Rat Who Cooked, legs could make a weak start look a lot better. Only time will tell.
Spectre reminder… the #2 Bond all-time domestically and the #2 worldwide by more than $150m over #3 and still adding $s.
Solid expansions for both Spotlight and Brooklyn. Now the challenge is to navigate the month of December until award season creates or fails to create magic. This is where the December nomination/award period can actually have an effect on the hopefuls. These films are going to need to float through December, spending as little as possible on traditional marketing, probably not expanding further, and hoping that NY, LA, BFCA, and HFCA can lift the water line while Star Wars eats the big picture box office.
Carol and The Danish Girl are the per-screen heroes of the weekend, nearly identical with each on 4, Carol a nip better while also disadvantaged by being in its second weekend. Q&A screenings for regular audiences took place this weekend in LA, NY, and even Paris.
Here is a look at the awards hopefuls currently in theaters, arranged by total gross as of today.
The Martian – Fox – 3.3 (2,310) – 1420 – 218.6
Bridge of Spies – BV – 1.4 (2,190) – 635 – 67.6
Sicario – LGF – .16 ($1416) – 113 – $46.1
Creed – WB – 29.3 (8.610) – 3404 – 41.8
Steve Jobs – U – .05 (750) – 66 – $17.7
Spotlight – Open Road – 4.4 (4,940) – 897 – 12.3
Brooklyn – Fox Searchlight – 3.9 (4,580) – 845 – 7.3
Suffragette – Focus – .25 (1,140) – 217 – 4.1
Room – A24 – .31 (1,750) – 177 – 3.4
Trumbo – Bleecker Street – 1.5 (2,500) – 615 – 2.6
Carol – Weinstein Co. – .20 (49,500) – 4 – 0.58
The Danish Girl – Focus 18 (45,640) – 4 – 0.18
OUR OF THEATERS
Inside Out – $356m
Straight Outta Compton – $161m
Mad Max: Fury Road – $154m
Black Mass – $62.5m
Mr. Holmes – $17.7
Love & Mercy – $12.6
NOT YET OPEN
The Big Short
Concussion
The H8ful Eight
Joy
The Revenant
Youth
how much money do these movies make? i always assumed boxoffice minus production costs and its all profits. now apparently the marketing money is even more than production costs, theatres have to take their piece, which is on average half the profits? how do movies ever make money. read somewhere the marketing for straight outta compton was $60 million. so even that film looks like it barely made a profit.
I’m baffled that GOOD DINOSAUR is experiencing some mild bashing, when PEANUTS looks more and more like not only the least profitable Blue Sky movie by a country mile, but a genuine money loser. I understand the urge to give a beloved and faithful product a pass, but sheesh.
CREED is mostly a story because we’ve gone nearly two months without a bonafide box office hit aside from Bond and Katniss (Bridge of Spies and Goosebumps will make some money but not enough).
@eldrick, very few movies make any money before the home market unless they have significant ancillary revenue like a video game or toys. Maybe 15 Hollywood movies a year. This year, probably less because of the top-heavyness. And yeah, at $750 million, the cost of Bond in budget means it’s still not one of the most profitable movies of the year. Not even close.
So one of the absolutely worst movies of my childhood was The Pirate Movie. Universally reviled, derided and mocked. Must have been an embarrising flop for Fox. But even with 33 years of inflation and opening on 2,000 more screens Victor Frankenstein couldn’t beat it’s opening weekend take. Ouch.