SATURDAY PM/SUNDAY AM: This is one of those weekends which can only be described as box office hell 
for me. Because the three top pics are neck-and-neck for #1 this weekend. Final film order may come down to Sunday late shows on the West Coast. All four newcomers are low- to medium-budget movies, but none opened to more than $14M this weekend. And total filmgoing likely won't add up to a lot more than $87M, which is down a big -20% from last year. 'It's a close race to mediocrity with no winners,' one movie exec snarked to me.
Warner Bros is claiming Clint Eastwood's baseball father-daughter melodrama Trouble With The Curve (3,212 theaters) is #1 this weekend. Not so fast. My sources already were calling it a 'big disappointment' Friday. But it received a +32% Red State bump on Saturday to make it more competitive. A lot of uninformed types are going to claim this icon's movie is underperforming because of the 82-year-old Clint's rambling Republican National Convention performance with that empty chair. Oh, puh-leeze. First of all, his movies don't open big and usually platform (unlike this). But they do have long legs. Two movies he both directed and starred in most recently ' Gran Torino and Oscar-winner Million Dollar Baby ' went on to earn over $100M. This latest won't get near that. This time, Eastwood's longtime collaborator Robert Lorenz at the helm. Its reviews are mediocre even though audiences gave it a 'B+' CinemaScore which should help word of mouth. But baseball pics lately do only passable box office even though Warner Bros hired a sports consultant to build awareness. The studio targeted older audiences ' and launched the trailer with Hope Springs ' since it's not like Amy Adams or Justin Timberlake fill cineplex seats. Can Eastwood anymore? Ask me Sunday.
Some have #1 this weekend Relativity's run of the mill horror flick, House At The End Of The Street (3,083 theaters) which went up +17%-+20% from Friday to Saturday because its star Jennifer Lawrence has stayed warm at the box office. And audiences gave it a middling 'B' CinemaScore. Relativity for $2.5M acquired U.S. rights to market and distribute domestically, while Film Nation and A Bigger Boat independently produced the film with a budget just under $10M. Film Nation handled foreign sales and international distribution, and Alliance Films is distributing in Canada. Relativity claims an opening of $11M-$12M keeps the pic 'on track for profitability across ancillary distribution channels including Netflix deal, home entertainment, television and digital sales'. (Isn't it interesting how Relativity always claims it never loses money on its movies?) Relativity drafted off Lawrence's built-in fan base by using The Hunger Games' home entertainment release on August 18th with targeted media and executed grassroots promotions. Because of her, Relativity targeted women.
Also in the mix for #1 is Open Road's handheld-camera End Of Watch (2,730 theaters). The small distributor was even getting congratulatory calls from competitors Friday after 'extremely strong' West Coast late show numbers. It, too, went up from Friday to Saturday ' +13%-+15%. That's a surprise considering it's R-rated which limits its grosses, it's playing in less theaters than rivals, and it's starring Jake Gyllenhaal who's been box office poison for major studio movie openings. But this cop drama is exactly the kind of smaller character-driven indie project he does well and his followers enjoy. It received great reviews and an audience-rated CinemaScore of 'A-' that will expand word of mouth. Maybe End Of Watch can rival Open Road's biggest to date, The Grey ($51.5M theatrical run). Made for only $7.5M, pic was acquired by Open Road for around $2M in February after execs saw it at a buyer's screening at the Arclight and made the deal that night. P&A was around $20M. Written and produced and directed by David Ayer (Training Day, S.W.A.T, The Fast & The Furious), Gyllenhaal is an executive producer. Pic also stars Michael Peña and Anna Kendrick. Producers are John Lesher, Nigel Sinclair, Matt Jackson and Ayer.
And then there's Lionsgate's British/South African co-production low-budget reboot of John Wagner and Carlos Ezquerra's cult favorite comics Dredd 3D (2,506 locations). It did dreadful on Friday and went up +12% for Saturday but still fell to 6th place behind Sony/Screen Gem's holdover Resident Evil: Retribution. Comic-Con fans seemed to accept this new Dredd as the real deal last summer, unlike the Sly Stallone version. Reviews were good, and audiences gave the pic a 'B' CinemaScore which won't help or hurt word of mouth. Karl Urban stars as the titular character with Olivia Thirlby in an R-rated dark and gritty pic without lycra or gold codpieces. But his exaggerated Clint Eastwood-style line readings may not have been obviously satirical enough. The bad news for Reliance Entertainment is that Deepak Nayer and Stuart Ford who put the picture together committed Reliance to fund the $40M gap and backstop the P&A. The good news for Lionsgate is that it has minimal risk. The studio is only responsible for P&A costs. Interestingly, LG's marketing campaign created a comic strip prequel to the film with the publisher 2000 AD as well as a Motion Comic that was released online. Dredd 3D also opened the Midnight Madness section of the Toronto Film Festival and as well as Fantastic Fest in Austin. But there was never much of an effort to widen the film's appeal or the audience for it. Directed by Pete Travis from a screenplay written by Alex Garland, the film is produced by Andrew Macdonald, Allon Reich, and Alex Garland. Best about the film are those stunning slow motion photography sequences.
Meanwhile, The Weinstein Company's critically acclaimed and Oscar buzzed The Master expanded into 788 theaters after breaking art house records for its opening last weekend. Friday's take was a so-so $5,450 per screen average but grosses went up a big +48% for Saturday.
Related: 'The Master' Breaks Art House Records; 'Resident Evil 5' Tops 'Finding Nemo 3D'
1? Trouble With The Curve (Warner Bros) NEW [3,212 Runs] PG13
Friday $4.1M, Saturday $5.5M, Weekend $13.2M
1? House At The End Of The Street (Relativity) NEW [3,083 Runs] PG13
Friday $4.6M, Saturday $5.4M, Weekend $13.2M
1? End Of Watch (Open Road) NEW [2,730 Runs] R
Friday $4.6M, Saturday $5.3M, Weekend $13.2M
4. Finding Nemo 3D (Disney) Week 2 [2,904 Runs] G
Friday $2.3M, Saturday $4.6M, Weekend $10.0 (-40%), Cume $30.5M
5. Resident Evil 5 3D (Screen Gems/Sony) Week 2 [3,016 Runs] R
Friday 1.9M, Saturday $2.9M, Weekend $6.7M (-68%), Cume $33.5M
6. Dredd 3D (Lionsgate) NEW [2,506 Runs] R
Friday $2.2M, Saturday $2.5M, Weekend $6.3M
7. The Master (Weinstein Co) Week 2 [788 Runs] R
Friday $1.3M, Saturday $2.0M, Weekend $4.7M, Cume $5.8M
8. The Possession (Lionsgate) Week 4 [2,598 Runs] PG13
Friday $815K, Saturday , Weekend $2.7M, Cume $45.3M
9. Lawless (Weinstein Co) Week 4 [2,614 Runs] R
Friday $704K, Saturday , Weekend $2.3M, Cume $34.5M
10. The Bourne Legacy (Universal) Week 7 [1,431 Runs] PG13
Friday $479K, Saturday , Weekend $1.7M, Cume $110.5M
Editor-in-Chief Nikki Finke - tip her here.
No comments:
Post a Comment