Kicking the Condemned while its down

Some may say I take great pleasure in kicking this bomb while its down. These people are correct. this chart represents the greatest drops in theaters between week 2 and week 3. The condemned losing nearly 1800 theaters between weeks is #15 on this list. Just take a look at the company it keeps.

But, hey its all the fault of Lions Gate and that's the bottom line because Emperor McMahon said so.

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The Condemned Week 3

Box Office Mojo gives the weekend take for the Condemned as $280,000 across 508 screens.

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The Condemned continues its catastrophic run in theaters

It was down over 72.4 percent from last week's total, is already out of the top 10 and has yet to make $6 million.

I'd sure like to meet the man who decided this film should compete with films like Spider-man III, Shrek the Third and Pirates 3. Why not open this in like the middle of August when the big boys have all played and the court is empty?

You can read the rest of the gory details here

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The Condemned found guilty of being a bomb

$4 million for #9 at the box office

Some very foolish people in the land of the World Wide Web thought this movie could be #1. These people are idiots, it never had a chance to be #1 and had you asked me before it opened I would've told you that much.

This is going to fade fast with Spider-Man 3 opening next week and that's the start of a big time summer race.

Not sure what the budget was for this one, so I don't know what it will have to do to break even. Rule of thumb is that you must at least double your production budget to break even, more depending on advertising.

Its only hope I'm guessing is strong sales on DVD and such.

I've got 3 words for future WWE films...straight to video.

It gets worse, a breakdown of all 3 films.

The Marine
Theater Count Opening Weekend: 2,545 Theaters
Opening Weekend Box Office: $7,138,744

See No Evil
Theater Count Opening Weekend: 1,257 Theaters
Opening Weekend Box Office: $4.3 million

The Condemned
Theater Count Opening Weekend: 2,310 Theaters
Opening Weekend Box Office: $4,000,000 (Estimated)

Ug-Lee!

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Happy Feet tops box office again 11/24/2006 - 11/26/2006

Another good weekend, this one appears to be a hit.

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Weekend Box Office 10/27/2006-10/29/2006

Saw 3 was #1 by far.
Open Season took 5th
The Marine was #13 with $1.9 million

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Weekend Box Office 09/22/2006 - 09/24/2006

Jackass 2 made $28 million.

Gridiron Gang took in 9.7 million finishing in third.

Everyone's Hero took in $4.7 million for 5th place. Percentage wise it did not suffer a steep drop. With Open Season coming out next weekend, that's not likely to be the case again.

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Box Office for 9/22/2006

How'd the major films do?


Jackass 2 was number 1 with $11.3 million on Friday.
Gridiron Gang slipped to third place and Everyone's hero is down to 7th.

I'll have more when the weekend numbers are posted.

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Not quite Everyone's Hero

Kevin Koch over at The Animation Guild Blog

produces his thoughts on the box office performance of Everyone's Hero this weekend and where it is likely to end up as a result.

In the comments section there is a discussion of what this might mean for the future of STARS animation studio as owned by ITT Entertainment.

Its worth a read.

Last post of mine for the night, I want to make sure Euan's recap of the PPV has enough time at the top of the page for it to be noticed and read

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Disney has success overseas.

http://today.reuters.com/news/articlenews.aspx?type=filmNews&storyID=2006-09-11T080100Z_01_N10473113_RTRIDST_0_FILM-BOXOFFICE-OVERSEAS-DC.XML

will take you to the Reuters article on the success of Pirates 2 and Cars overseas. Cars was the top grossing film overseas last week ending Pirates 2's nine week reign at the top.

Its interesting because:

people projected cars to not do so well overseas because of its uniquely American story.

No, Cars isn't doing Finding Nemo business to compare it to another Pixar hit but I think all things considered its doing pretty well for itself.

Via: Laughing Place

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Weekend Box Office 8/25-8/27/2006

Quick notes.

Invinsible was #1 at the box office this weekend.

Snakes on a Plane fell 57% and took 9th. I expected a bigger fall actually.

Pirates 2 is now the 6th highest grossing film of all time.

Cars passed $240 million and is still an underperformer and if you don't believe me just read JHM every monday.

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Animation at the Box Office for Aug. 18-20.

This comes via: Box Office Mojo by way of Animated News

6 - Barnyard with $7,581,622, averaging $2,349 over 3,227 theaters ($46,088,273 total; 3rd week)

14 - Monster House with $1,970,819, averaging $1,178 over 1,673 theaters ($67,372,407 total; 5th week)

17 - The Ant Bully with $1,041,357, averaging $1,225 over 850 theaters ($24,616,815 total; 4th week)

24 - Cars with $438,906, averaging $1,236 over 355 theaters ($239,618,177 total; 11th week)

27 - Over the Hedge with $267,095, averaging $957 over 279 theaters ($154,482,036 total; 14th week)

44 - A Scanner Darkly with $96,158, averaging $769 over 125 theaters ($5,159,136 total; 7th week)

45 - Garfield: A Tail of Two Kitties with $84,615, averaging $519 over 163 theaters ($28,189,436 total; 10th week)

67 - Ice Age: The Meltdown with $17,043, averaging $415 over 41 theaters ($195,297,762 total; 21st week)

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Is Cars A Lemmon?

C. W. Oberleitner over at O-Meon weighs in on the debate of whether Disney*Pixar's Cars is a box office success or not. This has been a heavy topic of contriversey over at Jim Hill Media

But, it is my experience that anyone reading this is interested in what I think not what the articles I link to say.

So, here is what I think.

Yes, Cars under performed because people expected Finding Nemo like numbers and its not going to happen. But, I don't think that's the fault of the movie itself, I think that is Pixar being a victim of its own success. Every hit expected to out gross the last.

In today's movie world its not enough to simply make money which I have no doubt that Cars has already done and will continue to do, merchandise flies off the shelf for this film. But now, you're not considered a financial success unless you surpass the financial projections that come out even before the release of your film.

I didn't expect Cars to be a Finding Nemo sized hit. The biggest reason is that its a movie about Cars. That doesn't exactly appeal to the widest possible audience. Plus, there was a lot of competition this summer and Nemo benefitted from the fact that people were tired of all the sequels they got in the summer of 2003.

I loved Cars, can't wait for the DVD. I don't know if it is a financial success or not, to me if it turns a profit its a success even if it doesn't turn as big of a profit as was expected.

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Too much competition spelling end of CGI boom?

The above linked article is to today's column over at Jim Hill Media where Jim takes a good look at the performances of all the animated films released this year, looks at those yet to come and asks how a glut of DVD releases may impact the future. Its a good read.

Over at The Animation Guild Blog they try to dispel the theory that there is a glut of films coming out by saying: "Nobody ever says that there is a glut of live action films coming out".

This is not a surprise statement from people in Animation but there's a flaw to it. A more apt comparison would be to a specific type of live action film. We may not ever hear someone say that there are too many live action films being released, but we might hear them say too many comedies, too many superhero movies or sports films or what have you. That's a closer comparison to CGI as its like its own separate genre and not as broad as say calling something live action.

We blogged on this last week with the Variety article, fact is there is just so much coming out and a person or family can only afford to see so much especially with the prices of movie tickets for a family of 4...and we theorize that just like there is too much wrestling on TV that there's going to be burn out, the same is true for CGI.

Here's one thing though, A CGI film that would be different would be a CGI drama because it seems that the majority of films by a wide margin are comedies. A dramatic film might be more likely to stand out.

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Weekend Box Office

Snakes on a Plane was number one, but only with clever number manipulation.

Newline is counting the Thursday totals of 1.4 million to the weekend total putting it over $15 million for the weekend. Take out the Thursday numbers and you have it finishing second to Talladega Nights.

Also, Pirates 2 has passed the $400 million mark becoming the first Disney picture to reach that milestone. Titanic, Spider-man, Shrek 2 and the Phantom Mennis are also in the $400 million club on only 1 theatrical release.

I predict Snakes continues to bomb next weekend with 4 new pictures coming to theaters and this being a movie that doesn't lend to repeat business, it could be a quick fade out of the top 10. Overseas grosses and DVD sales and the like will help it eventually turn a profit, however.

Via: Box Office Mojo

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Snakes at a Box Office

According to Box Office Mojo Snakes on a Plane earned $7.5 million on Friday, including 1.4 million from Thursday preview screenings.

We here in the Old Country will in all likelyhood not see this movie. Anaconda pretty much turned us off to snake movies from the time we watched it until the end of time. We are fans of Samuel L. Jackson but not that big a fan.

I expect the film will do about $20 million this weekend and then have a gigantic drop in business next weekend, possibly as high as 70%. Here's the thing, this is one of those bad movies that everyone will want to see because of how bad it is, but the trouble with that is that it will mean a big opening week and then gigantic falls after that, because once you've seen a bad movie you've seen it. This will not have good repeat business which is important to becoming a blockbuster these days.

It was filmed on the cheap so it will make a profit in the end.

For those that might read this and wonder how I can say this is a bad film without having seen it yet; the fact is that Newline is marketting this movie as a bad film. The internet buzz and the whole curiosity factor behind the movie is how bad will this be? So I'm not knocking it as bad without seeing it, I'm simply going by how the thing is being treated in marketting and by those that write about these sorts of things online.

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