Weekend Estimates by Magic Snatched Klady
This Mother’s Day weekend may (or may not) reflect the least accurate projections of Sunday numbers in memory. Both Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol 2 and Snatched are projecting Sunday as significantly bigger than their Friday gross, which would be unusual. Expect the 1-2-3 order to stay in line tomorrow, but with different grosses.
I almost did a spit take when I saw today’s weekend projections. Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol 2 made a giant leap on Saturday and a big projection for Sunday, but it is within reason, given Marvel’s history. King Arthur: Legend of the Sword took its sad $5m start and projected a sad, but unsurprising $14.8m weekend. And Snatched leapt from a $5m Friday to a $17.4m weekend. Huh?
Last Mother’s Day, in the only such example in the last five years of Mother’s Days, the 2 top movies (Captain America: Civil War and The Jungle Book) had exceptional Saturdays and Sundays. But the newcomer in the #3 slot, Money Monster… the only non-mega-movie? Just under 3x Friday. The movie Mother’s Day? Normal weekend trend line, Sunday less than Friday. So why is Snatched projecting 3.5x Friday? Likely to assure that it will be the #2 film and the #1 new film (and #1 comedy… ha ha ha) over the very close Friday competition of Krap Arthur.
Thing is, the Guy Ritchie bloodbath is laying down to die, so Snatched will be #2 even if the real number is $16m or under. And I wouldn’t be surprised if the Guardians number drops a million or two when “actuals” land tomorrow (not that a million or two means anything in that film’s box office history).
Only three films managed $10k per-screen this weekend (and mind you, that is only 1100 or so ticket buyers – at most – per screen over a three-day weekend): Guardians, the four-screen premiere of Paris Can Wait and the exclusive of Stefan Zweig: Farewell to Europe.
Also of note, there are three $1m-plus non-English market films on the charts this weekend: How To Be A Latin Lover, Baahubali 2: The Conclusion, and Bon Cop Bad Cop 2.
BATB is on the verge of becoming the first movie to crack the Worldwide Top 10 in 16 months. That’s the longest stretch without a movie cracking the Top 10 since the drought between TDK and AVATAR almost 8 years ago. This after a dozen movies turned the trick in the three and a half years between AVENGERS and FORCE AWAKENS.
LAST JEDI and INFINITY WAR will likely make it, but then you raise the bar to probably $1.4 billion, which is tough. The Yuan is now down 11% from two summers ago, the pound -30%+, and yen and euro very weak as well.
It was evident last summer there’s a general overseas slowdown, and now with GUARDIANS underperforming, ALIEN severely underperforming (-60% vs PROMETHEUS comps) and ARTHUR bombing as hard as it did, it may be slow going, with Vin Diesal/videogames in China and Disney princesses in Japan serving as outliers. PIRATES and TRANSFORMERS are big tests, but can anything new break out?
Out of curiosity what was Guardians projected to gross if it’s underperforming? And is that underperformance domestic or global?
I don’t think there’s any question it’s underperforming somewhat overseas, mostly due to China. It’s going to probably barely clear $100 million there, and trail THE WINTER SOLDIER, DR. STRANGE and probably ANT MAN and LOGAN. Not to mention XXX and Resident Evil 6. Given the surprising success of the first movie, that’s a shocker.
But China has been shaky in the last year when Vin Diesel and video games don’t visit. Only three summer flicks cleared $100 million there last year, down from six in 2015. Of course, the market is allowing more movies in, but supposedly more people have access to movies as well…soooooo
At least it doesn’t matter to the bottom line as much!
That is surprising considering how much people seem to like/love the first one, as well as the fact that the sequel has received generally positive reviews. I see it’s at $630 million now. What do you think the final number will be?
Hard to tell. The way it crashed in China means $850-$900 million is most likely though. In the states I’d expect it to play out more like IRON MAN 2 than ULTRON or CIVIL WAR (given they opened bigger and crashed harder) or WINTER SOLDIER (which was unusually leggy and had a unique release date), which would put it at $370 million. That would be ahead of DEADPOOL and right behind SPIDER-MAN 2.
Overall it should end close to FATE OF THE FURIOUS in terms of box office profitability though.
Correction on Alien: It’s down more like 30% as Fox put out weird early figures. So not as bad as it initially looked but there’s a reason they’re using MAD MAX (224 million overseas) rather than PROMETHEUS (276) as the comp.
Yup GOTG is definitely under-performing for a Marvel title in China which will keep it from getting headlines for being another billion dollar title but no, it won’t really affect its profits that much. Interesting that Iron Man 2 was leggier than ‘Civil War but its reputation has completely dive-bombed over the past few years – I think part of it was that due to the goodwill of the first Iron Man, a lot of folks (including many on this blog) were expecting a Dark Knight-sized jump with the sequel but that simply wasn’t the type of film that Jon Favreua directed (or was allowed to direct).
And wow, Fate of the Furious has done about 40% of its overseas grosses in China….I didn’t realize it was THAT high. And XXX: Xander Cage Goes to Jail did 55% of its overseas gross in China too – seriously should Vin Diesel just MOVE to China at this point??
And I’m just curious: are SOME studios able to negotiate better terms with China than 25%?
Ray Pride is a good person to ask on that.
Here’s how bad the exchange rate issue has become: GUARDIANS 2 has apparently outgrossed the original’s total by 8% overseas (it’s surpassed the original’s total in 34 markets in local currency) despite trailing by 13% in raw dollars. So a 20% swing…yikes.
Exchange rates are monkeying with a lot of grosses/return. Whenever there’s an insightful dispatch about trends in percentages/partnership of China returns, I link them on the front page.
It should be noted these Marvel movies have a long tail. Sure the box office may be off a bit but how many baby groot dolls are they going to sell?
What’s with the talk about GotGV2 underperforming in China? It’s at $80.5m after two weekends. It will outgross the original there. This franchise isn’t the Avengers or Captain America, so I’m not sure how exactly it’s underperforming.
Coproductions like The Great Wall get more than 25% from China (I believe that one returned a more typical 45% or so).
It’s under-performing for an MCU title in China – even Ant-Man and Doctor Strange which were non-Avengers movies cleared $100 million in China easily and GOTG2 might not get there.
Also Ethan and I had this protracted disagreement a few weeks ago but one fact was not disputed: the typical MCU film now gets 20% to 25% of its overseas gross from China. Whereas GOTG2 isn’t likely to get more than 12% or 13% from China….which I saw once again is NOT a bad thing. If GOTG2 clears $900 million worldwide with that much less help from China, then it ends up being as profitable as ‘Civil War….maybe just maybe, Disney/Marvel gets a BIT more leverage over Downey and his wife as a result.
With all the surprise hits they had this spring I thought Universal would be the first to cross a billion domestic this year but Fate ran out of gas faster than I expected, now they have to wait for Cruise to pull them over the finish line and Disney is going to blow past it a few weeks before. I have to say I am saddened by anything that reinforces a strategy of a studio putting out less than ten movies a year.
and even more saddening
RIP Powers Boothe
“Choke Sob” WOLVERINES!!!
Universal is not crying right now Hcat, I wouldn’t worry.
They have Despicable Me 3 coming next month which will likely be more profitable than anything else Disney releases for the remainder of the year.
Sure, Geoff. When. The Last Jedi, makes two billion dollars. I’m sure, that it will not even be close, to as profitable, as the shittiest looking sequel this year. DM3, has that, Ice Age sheen to it. Great abroad, but a turd sandwich domestically.
Hcat, Disney didn’t pay all of that money for ip, to go back in time, and have a Touchstone release slate. They are playing a high stakes game, because they can. Everyone else? Shouldn’t try, and that includes Warners. Who should have split that King Arthur money, into three or four smaller movies. Why they think, that they are I’m the same ballpark as Disney, is contually baffling. Owning DC, doesn’t mean you know what to do with it.
I have a hard time believing DESPICABLE ME 3 will be more profitable than LAST JEDI, but no trouble believing it could be the third most profitable movie of the year behind JEDI and perhaps BATB (it would need to be on par with the second movie for the latter). Given how seriously terrible MINIONS was, I wouldn’t be surprised with a slight drop-off either.
Are we heading toward an age of 50% Disney/Universal market share? Sadly, it’s looking possible.
You are likely a little high on Jedi and low on DM3. 300M is theirs to lose, the last two entries cleared 300 easily and the next one has the whole summer to run with no animated challengers until Columbia shamefully releases something called the Emoji movie. Depending on how the territories break down, Jedi on a 250 budget with 150 marketing and grossing 1.5 billion will still return more than DM3 with 125 budget and likely 100 million marketing.
Though of course marketing numbers are completely pulled out of my….um hat. How are they still spending these giant numbers on marketing, wasn’t the web supposed to bring all these costs down? And honestly why would they spend very much, does any of the audience NOT KNOW when the new star wars movie drops? Or is this all a Peter paying Paul thing where they buy add space and prop up their related networks?
” Everyone else? Shouldn’t try, and that includes Warners. Who should have split that King Arthur money, into three or four smaller movies. Why they think, that they are I’m the same ballpark as Disney, is contually baffling. Owning DC, doesn’t mean you know what to do with it. ”
I almost want to give that an AMEN.
According to Mojo, the highest grossing movie based in Medieval times is Robin Hood Prince of Thieves at $165m. So why spend $175m? Insane.
The embarrassment is that this opened under the last King Arthur with Clive Owen, itself a box office failure based on its budget.
And once again, all this origin story bullshit. Why not just do Knights of the Round table, that’s the version we all want to see, assemble a good cast, heck, throw a bad ass woman in there, to update the genre, keep your budget below $75m. For all its flaws, and notwithstanding that it at least saved a little face by its international numbers, we didn’t spend an entire movie watching The Rock’s Hercules become Hercules. When will studios figure out we’re past all that shit. TV shows spend 30secs establishing their characters in the opening credits, I don’t want to spend 90 minutes or more watching someone become Spiderman, or Batman or King Arthur.
TLJ, is actually going to give people, who they want… Skywalker action! It’s going to beat TFA, but not by much. Unless, there is a nice Chinese actress in it , but you know… That’s not happening.
Dm3, is just fucking terrible looking. Minions, was fucking fun, for what it’s worth, but DM3 is just negating, what those fucking films, are supposed to be about, and who the fuck wants an evil twin? Again, it screams Ice Age, in terms of where the box office is going.
Hell. They could just reboot fucking Excalibur, because that movie is ridiculously wonderful.
Just as with Costner’s Postman how do you spend that type of money on guys on horses in the middle of nowhere. Throughout film history guys on horses in the middle of nowhere is always the cheapest thing to shoot. Miller took the step forward of shooting guys in cars in the middle of nowhere on the cheap.
Magical King Arthur is a goddamn Hammer film, Ritchie screams Hammer filmmaker, make it like one.
I don’t doubt Universal/Illumination at this point. My 9-year-old adores every single movie they’ve made. Minions and The Secret Life of Pets = surrounded by him and hundreds of other kids laughing their heads off for 90 minutes. Kids just love their movies and their parents will take them even if they have less than no desire to see DM3.
So I see hackers have a Disney movie and are demanding a ransom. They should hold off paying. Some hackers took King Arthur and are now offering WB 300 bitcoins to take it back!
“the last two entries cleared 300 easily and the next one has the whole summer to run with no animated challengers until Columbia shamefully releases something called the Emoji movie. ”
Yikes, I know everyone disrespects CARS and DreamWorks, but I wouldn’t be so dismissive to the point of pretending they don’t exist.
So the GUARDIANS hold ended up being the best of any MCU sequel, the best of any Marvel comics sequel since X2: X-MEN UNITED (discounting the Wednesday released Spidey 2), and on par with the first movie.
And look at those SNATCHED and BATB numbers, the latter of which careened back into the Top 5 in its 9th weekend after a -6% hold! Mother’s Day is doing all kinds of weird things to numbers lately.
Sorry, wasn’t clear, Underpants and Skidmarks open before DM3. It doesn’t have the entire summer to itself but wont have another big family opener on week three or four like other animated films this year.
lol, Underpants and Skidmarks. And that’s true, though internationally they’re going for a more pump and dump strategy whereas the other two are taking a more staggered approach, so not sure if that’ll have an impact on worldwide. Probably not given it’s Illumination!
Guys I didn’t say that DM3 was going to be BETTER, just that it could be more profitable.
No Illumination title has even cost $100 as of yet which is pretty crazy with CGI animation and the films are now at least a $600m WW no matter WHEN they open, they just don’t give a fuck! Secret Life of Pets opened two weeks after the sequel to one of the biggest, most beloved animated films of all time and STILL did almost $900 million worldwide. Sing opened the week after a damn Star Wars movie and still did over $600 million worldwide.
And yeah for Warner Bros to give $175 million to Guy Ritchie to do a King Arthur movie after they already dumped a $100 mill on him for The Man From UNCLE was beyond idiotic – as I’ve always said, Warner Bros is an auter-friendly studio that will always give its directors plenty of rope to hang themselves for better or WORSE: the results can vary from exceptional (Mad Max Fury Road, Gravity, Inception) to disastrous (Jupiter Ascending, Pan, King Arthur).
And yes that loyalty/pseudo-logic followed them to the DCEU – maybe hiring Zack Snyder for one or two but THREE of the first five movies was a recipe for the kind of backlash they just got a small taste of when parents were raising hell about Batman Returns 25 years ago….even then they cut Burton off after two. And even Marvel Studios cut off Favreau and Whedon after two….
FATE going back to F5 and F6 box office levels just shows how big the Paul Walker effect truly was on F7.
Well…here in the states palmtree.
Thought it was a given, but yes.