Friday Estimates by Klady, Mo Ana Less
Among Walt Disney Animation films, Moana is only behind Zootopia. But few big animation movies open on Thanksgiving weekend, so it’s too early to get a realistic handle on where this big wave is going. The great news for Disney is that Moana doesn’t face Sing! until December 21, and while Trolls is holding well, it’s not eating the market.
Fantastic Beasts remains a curiosity. It’s doing fine. But what is fine when you are looking for the next great franchise? It would be crazy to expect numbers matching the mature Potter and so far, it is pacing #2 and #3 pretty well. The real question for Beasts is whether it can come close to those 2&3 numbers internationally, where both early Potter films grossed over $545 million. If the film does in the 500s worldwide, it won’t be a failure, but WB will be trying to figure out how to build the franchise.
Doctor Strange is a solid B for Marvel… but that A level is awfully high for any new character to hit. Already closing in on $600m worldwide, it’s a hit in the general marketplace. But how much higher can it go?
Allied is not a hit. Domestically, at least. But the international market is Brad Pitt heaven. So don’t be surprised if this one ends up in the $250 million range worldwide.
Arrival, on the other hand, is holding strong and building with word of mouth. Paramount will get a boost of publicity with Denis Villeneuve coming to town next week and with awards and nominations almost here.
Bad Santa 2 did bad business, too.
Not a good start for Rules Don’t Apply, which probably should have tried to find an audience to build on instead of fighting the wide fight from opening day.
Solid starts for exclusives Miss Sloane and Lion.
STRANGE is indeed a curiosity…the #5 superhero grosser of the year, with a gross on par with OZ THE GREAT AND POWERFUL for Disney…but it’s also the #2 single-origin MCU title behind IRON MAN. Maybe it can hit $25 million in Japan (MCU records falling across Asia here) and leg it to $700 million worldwide. That would put it on par with SS if SS cost $50 million more (STRANGE has that Chinese inflation).
Btw that BEASTS cume is about $20 million low. It’s still too early to tell how this thing will play out, as the audience skews older, which may play in its favor. Or not. The best comparison is probably DEATHLY HALLOWS 1, and it’ll end the weekend about $63 million back, but that isn’t that bad considering it was $44 million back after the first two days.
Regardless DP, beasts is already over $350 worldwide with only 1 day of China, and $100 million+ yet to go here, so mid-600s looks like a minimum.
In Amy Adams’ filmography, ARRIVAL is playing like…JULIE & JULIA! So maybe $100 million is possible. Take that THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL and BATTLE LOS ANGELES (and hopefully IDR)!
Add “Bad Santa 2” to the long, ugly list of unwanted sequels to flukey comedy sleepers (“Ted 2,” “Horrible Bosses 2,” “Neighbors 2,” etc., etc.).
I’m still in a state of shock over the “Rules” numbers.
To open that catastrophically a movie would normally have had to receive the most bruising reviews imaginable and opened completely, utterly cold (i.e., zero marketing/publicity). Even taking into consideration that it was a tough sell to anyone under 40 (50?), there really is no rational explanation for why it arrived so utterly D.O.A.
I feel absolutely horrible for Warren Beatty who bent over backwards promoting the hell out of this, a long-burning passion project. He’ll always be one of the all-time greats. It’s humiliating and so very sad that he would (almost certainly: who’s going to green light another Beatty movie
at this point?) close out his brilliant career on such an ignominious note.
Agreed, I’m sad for Beatty failing so egregiously here. He had his Indian Summer in the 90’s (Dick Tracy, Bulworth, Bugsy) but it’s unfortunate that while his contemporaries like Eastwood and Redford have had / are having successful third acts in their careers, Beatty seems to have missed that boat. I’m still sorry that he wasn’t in Kill Bill.
Have those of you who feel bad for Beatty watched “Rules Don’t Apply”? It’s close to excruciating. The reviews have been, if anything, way too kind to the film. It’s a colossal misfire, and its failure is richly deserved. How anyone spends four decades coming up with such a pointless story is beyond me.
On second thought, that missive is pretty harsh, but I want to be clear that my ire is toward the film, not toward anyone here. I feel like it wasted my time.
Yes, pretty harsh, Christian.
Maybe I’m a Beatty apologist (I prefer “enthusiast”), but I thought it was a lovely, out-of-time sort of film.
And it proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that Alden Ehrenreich is the real deal. (I’d love to see him score an Oscar or Globe supporting nod for his work in “Hail, Caesar!” Definitely one of the high points of my movie year.)
For a waste of time, I nominate “Allied.” Expertly crafted, but utterly lacking in tension, erotic heat, romantic passion or excitement of any kind really. It’s the type of perfectly decent script that any contract director could have knocked out of the park in the ’40s w/ the right star pairing. But Robert Zemeckis, for me at least, seems incapable of getting anything right these days. I haven’t liked a Zemeckis film since “Cast Away.”
(Yes, Wally: I, too, have always wondered what Beatty might have done w/ Tarantino. Guess we’ll never know.)
Ah, a shot at Zemeckis! Return fire ! ☺ (I’m a fan of his, but not always.) I had hopes for ALLIED but have been put off by the reviews. But then I remember being put off by the reviews of some of his other films, only to discover I liked those films a great deal – especially on the big screen – and am usually glad I saw them at the theater.
OK, confession time: I’ve never seen “Reds.” (runs and hides)
Beatty probably could get a Dick Tracy reboot greenlit, as long as he doesn’t insist on actually playing Tracy (Dick Tracy Sr. handing over the reins to a younger actor perhaps).
@Christian
I’m a Zemeckis fan and I think Allied is the worst movie he has ever directed.
The movie is a mess. It reminds of the Hitchcock movie Topaz, where Hitchcock had all this long talking scenes thinking he was creating suspense and nothing was happening. His instincts were off. Zemeckis is there in this movie.
Hitchcock followed Topaz with Frenzy. Hopefully, he does better on the next one.
The problem with selling a Warren Beatty film is that there are so few of them. His last movie was 15 years ago. I want him to succeed but when you make so few films the odds are against you. It’s not an issue of age..he’s always been slow to get projects off the ground
ALLIED is not as bad as DEATH BECOMES HER, which is way worse than anyone remembers. Also, I continue to be confused as to why A CHRISTMAS CAROL isn’t considered the ugliest and one of the most terrifying kids movies (not in a good way) ever made.
“The problem with selling a Warren Beatty film is that there are so few of them. His last movie was 15 years ago. I want him to succeed but when you make so few films the odds are against you. It’s not an issue of age..he’s always been slow to get projects off the ground”
You said it – Beatty has pretty much been the anti-Eastwood during the third act of his career, he has been extremely non-prolific – how many movies has he been in since 1980?? What maybe SEVEN movies total….and three of those movies were mega-bombs (Ishtar, Town and Country, Love Affair). Nobody was keeping him from working except himself…..Rule Don’t Apply was never going to register, should not be shocking to any one.
And yeah, him not taking on Kill Bill is going to be up there with the greatest missed opportunities for an aging movie star….right up there with Harrison Ford turning down Traffic.
His last hit was what – 30 years ago? I’d love to rest on my laurels at my job. He’s done. Time to be the subject of another biography and move on.
REDS is excruciating. It’s will made excruciating, but still excruciating none the less.
Ethan, his Christmas Carol, is just weird in fucking general. Jim Carrey, playing every fucking character, is just so bizarre, that it’s the worst use of mocap ever.
“ALLIED is not as bad as DEATH BECOMES HER, which is way worse than anyone remembers.”
Oh no, I knew how bad it was when I saw it on the big screen. There isn’t any room for WAY worse.
A Christmas Carol was, I thought, terrific up until the misconceived shrinking / horse and buggy chase in the Christmas Future sequence. And Polar Express was, in retrospect, more of a game changer than people give it credit for. It’s synthesis of mocap, IMAX and 3D is now standard practice for the modern blockbuster. The first soldier through the gate is always the one who gets it.
“Reds” is a masterpiece, Christian. Don’t let anyone tell you differently.
Its sheer level of creative ambition/audacity makes most 21st century Hollywood movies look like mud pies in comparison. And Nicholson’s Eugene O’Neill is one of his all-time greatest performances.
“I continue to be confused as to why A CHRISTMAS CAROL isn’t considered the ugliest and one of the most terrifying kids movies (not in a good way) ever made.”
Funny, but I’ve always felt the same way about “Polar Express,” Ethan.
A CHRISTMAS CAROL will always stand out, more than anything for me, for the sequence below (starting at about 1:15), which is totally depraved for a kids movie (I’m not a prude, I swear), and I guarantee will be the only thing in my lifetime that literally sent a kid screaming and running toward the exit (others cried).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AtWrAjtptUU
REDS is anything but excruciating. More like sublime, epic, and moving.
‘Fantastic Beasts’ is perfoming well for a Potter movie without Potter. And it’s an origin story. But people seems not to be excited by the film or invested in the story. It’s not the cultural phenom the press told us it was going to be. Probably that’s what Warner fears the most. I bet the screenplay for the sequel will be ‘story by J.K. Rowling’ but it’ll be written by someone else.
If I had to make a list of greatest Paramount films just off the top of my head I would probably put Reds at #4 after Godfather, Liberty Valance and Raiders and ahead of Godfather 2, Once upon A time in the West, Shane, Duck Soup Roman Holiday etc etc.
Its the best David Lean film David Lean never made (and better than half the ones he did).
Beatty’s place in film history is secure: “Splendor in the Grass,” “All Fall Down,” “Lilith,” “Mickey One,” “Bonnie and Clyde,” “McCabe and Mrs. Miller,” “The Parallax View,” “Shampoo,” “Heaven Can Wait,” “Reds,” “Dick Tracy,” “Bugsy,” “Bulworth,” “Rules”….
Sure, I would have loved it if he’d been more prolific as both actor and director/producer/screenwriter, but his body of work speaks for itself.
And yes, I’m one of those people who thought “Ishtar” and “The Fortune” were both ridiculously undervalued in 1975 and 1987 respectively. Gotta say both have held up pretty damn well. Not sure how many 21st century Hollywood comedies will look as good in future decades.
Plus, you’ve gotta love any man whose most enduring romantic relationships were with Julie Christie, Diane Keaton and Annette Bening.