Posts Tagged ‘The Grace Card’

The Weekend Report — March 6

Sunday, March 6th, 2011

Gold Star … Silver Star

The lizards of Rango slithered easily into audience hearts with an estimated $38.7 million that topped weekend viewing charts. Three other new wide releases entered the marketplace with the “what if” antics of The Adjustment Bureau ranking second with $20.9 million and the modern fairy tale Beastly following with $9.7 million. The romantic Take Me Home Tonight captured few hearts with a $3.4 million gross.

Limited and exclusive debuts were largely uninspired with the coming of age HappyThankYouMorePlease generating $29,700 on two screens and Thai award winner Uncle Bonmee grossing $25,400 from four venues. Box office for the 3D presentation of opera favorite Carmen from England’s Royal Opera weren’t reported.

The infusion of new titles expanded sales by 24% from the prior weekend but couldn’t compete with last years $116.1 million bow for Alice in Wonderland. Revenues slumped by 34% from 2010 and the year to date is lagging behind the prior year’s pace by 16%.

The enthusiastic reviews for the 3D animated gunslinger yarn Rango did little to bolster interest for the film’s non-family audience and the film bowed on the low end of industry estimates. Generally positive reviews for the sci-fi romance The Adjustment Bureau place that film on the high side of tacking predictions.

Conversely tracking for both Beastly and Take Me Home Tonight veered radically from expectations with the latter expected to out perform in its debut. With the former predicted to do no better than $6 million, you can guess the rest.

With the exhibition sector’s convention just three weeks away (now re-named CinemaCon) one can expect some hard questions being bruited. It’s decidedly not a period of warmth between theater owners and the studios and waning audiences; particular among the key under 25s will certainly heat up the issue of making new releases available on other platforms including home screens.

Oscar sheen (a distant relative of Charlie) appeared to dim rapidly for all save The King’s Speech. Though it’s hardly a new phenomenon, the shorter award season (and threat of an even shorter one in the near future) is likely to create the employ of new strategies to exploit films reliant on statuettes and the like this year.

Weekend (estimates) March 4 – 6, 2011
Title Distributor Gross (average) % change Theaters Cume
Rango Par 37.8 (9,660) NEW 3917 37.8
The Adjustment Bureau Uni 20.9 (7,350) NEW 2840 20.9
Beastly CBS 9.7 (4,980) NEW 1952 9.7
Hall Pass WB 8.8 (2,990) -35% 2950 26.8
Gnomeo and Juliet BV/eOne 7.0 (2,350) -48% 2984 83.8
The King’s Speech TWC 6.5 (2,890) -12% 2240 123.8
Just Go With It Sony 6.4 (2,200) -39% 2920 88.1
Unknown WB 6.4 (2,210) -49% 2913 52.9
I Am Number 4 BV 5.7 (1,970) -48% 2903 46.5
Justin Bieber: Never Say Never Par 4.2 (1,880) -55% 2254 68.8
Take Me Home Tonight Relativity 3.4 (1,710) NEW 2003 3.4
Big Mommas: Like Father, Like Son Fox 3.2 (1,950) -58% 1642 33.2
Drive Angry Summit 2.1 (930) -59% 2290 9
The Fighter Par/Alliance 1.1 (1,840) -33% 575 92
Black Swan FxSrch 1.0 (1,440) -26% 681 105.1
True Grit Par .94 (1,300) -52% 725 168.6
Cedar Rapids FxSrch .77 (3,280) 16% 235 3.3
Tangled BV .74 (1,760) 76% 421 195.7
The Roommate Sony .59 (970) -70% 606 36.8
The Grace Card IDP .51 (1,450) -50% 352 1.7
Barney’s Version eOne/SPC .40 (1,900) -27% 211 5.7
No Strings Attached Par .36 (850) -75% 425 69.6
Weekend Total ($500,000+ Films) $127.75
% Change (Last Year) -33%
% Change (Last Week) 24%
Also debuting/expanding
Of Gods and Men SPC .26 (7,420) -16% 42 0.73
The Illusionist SPC 77,500 (1,020) -48% 76 1.9
HappyThankYouMorePlease Anchor Bay 29,700 (14,850) 2 0.03
Uncle Bonmee Strand 25,400 (6,350) 4 0.03
Bereavement Paradigm 22,300 (1,120) 20 0.02
Detective K CJ Ent 13,500 (13,500) 1 0.01
I Saw the Devil Magnolia 12,100 (6,050) 2 0.01
The Year Dolly Parton Was My Mom Mongrel 9,400 (1,880) 5 0.01
The Human Resources Manager FilmMove 8,300 (2,770) 3 0.01
Domestic Market Share (Jan. 1 – March 3, 2011)
Distributor (releases) Gross Market Share
Paramount (8) 283.2 19.60%
Sony (9) 267.7 18.50%
Buena Vista (5) 198.7 13.70%
Warner Bros. (12) 157.7 10.90%
Universal (5) 135.8 9.40%
Weinstein Co. (3) 112.8 7.80%
Fox (5) 78.8 5.50%
Fox Searchlight (3) 73.6 5.10%
CBS (2) 29.3 2.00%
Relativity (2) 24.8 1.70%
Focus (2) 20.3 1.40%
eOne/Seville (7) 10.9 0.80%
Sony Classics (5) 8.7 0.60%
Summit (3) 8.5 0.60%
Other * (68) 35.2 2.40%
* none greater than 0.4%
Top Domestic Grossers (Jan. 1 – March 3, 2011)
Title Distributor Gross*
The King’s Speech * TWC 99,641,843
True Grit * Par 97,285,477
The Green Hornet Sony 96,820,070
Just Go With It Sony 81,700,070
Gnomeo and Juliet BV/eOne 76,782,010
No Strings Attached Par 69,289,473
Justin Bieber: Never Say Never Par 64,551,441
Little Fockers * Uni 63,484,205
Black Swan * FxSrch 63,240,197
Tron: Legacy * BV 53,579,845
The Fighter * Par/Alliance 51,877,355
The Dilemma Uni 48,475,290
Unknown WB 46,509,264
I Am Number 4 BV 40,738,416
Yogi Bear * WB 40,506,801
The Roommate Sony 36,260,283
Tangled * BV 33,709,950
The Rite WB 32,464,547
Big Mommas: Like Father, Like Son Fox 29,969,678
The Mechanic CBS 28,812,145
* does not include 2010 box office