The OtherArena

[Bob Morris]

I have no idea why I'm starting such a thread already... Eagles/Vikings game has been a pretty solid one so far, but maybe it's because I don't think either team will get past the conference semis.

So anyway, the contenders for the Summer Box Office 2009 crown.

X-Men Origins: Wolverine - Coming out the first Saturday in May, which means its steam will be lost by Memorial Day weekend, maybe long before if it gets mediocre reviews. Who knows how well Gavin Hood will be able to keep Hugh Jackman on a tight leash. I think it can reach $150 million on the X-Men fanboys, but not much more than that unless it gets great reviews.

Star Trek: If this franchise is going to continue in the theaters, it depends on how well the Trek fanboys receive this origins movie about Kirk and company. It's a big challenge considering how much the Trek fans love the likes of William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy, and when it comes to a successor, they first think of Patrick Stewart leading a new cast. Likely a $150 million franchise, getting to $200 million if well received.

Terminator Salvation: They're still trying to get mileage out of the Terminator? Well, it's got Christian Bale in the lead and I imagine there will be some who will be curious to see if he can headline another franchise alongside Batman. This one comes closer to Memorial Day and may exceed the first two movies I've mentioned if it gets good reviews. Probably will be in the $150 to $200 million range.

Up: Every Pixar movie seems to be a lock for $200 million these days. This time around, it comes out Memorial Day weekend, so its numbers may be boosted, particularly if it gets strong reviews.

Land of the Lost: They'll be trying to lure in those who grew up on the 1970s series. It's got Will Ferrell in the lead and he has his fanbase. That being said, Ferrell movies are generally good for $100 to $150 million if well received, but they don't often reach $200 million.

Transformers 2: I'm surprised they didn't go for Memorial Day weekend with this one... I don't know if it could set the new record for that weekend, but I figured they would want to pull in a lot of people and go for one of the big weekends. Whether it gets to $300 million depends on how much the fanbase likes it, given that the first one got mixed reviews. But it should be good for an easy $200 to $250 million.

Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs: I don't think the Ice Age franchise is good enough to win the crown, but there ya go. I'd project about $150 million.

Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince: The Potter movies are generally good for $200 million. But I don't know if it will do enough to claim the summer box office crown. It might draw more people, given the movies get darker and more mature, but we'll see.

G.I. Joe: Personally, I would not have released this in the same summer as the second Transformers movie as the fanbases have a lot of overlap... and they may only be willing to plunk down money for one or the other. It comes out in August, so it would need a strong opening and strong reviews to pull in more money in the final weeks of the summer. I think it can reach $200 million, but not sure if it can get higher.

Not familiar enough with other flicks that are set to release, so there might be a surprise in the making. But for now, I'll predict Transformers 2 wins the 2009 summer box office crown.

[Iron Chad]

I'm as big a Will Ferrell fan as there is, but I'm getting a distinct "Bewitched" vibe from "Land of the Lost". I hope I'm wrong, but I'd rather pay 10 bucks to watch Ferrell and John C. O'Reilly act stupid for 90 minutes than about anything else Ferrell does.

-Chad

[jdw]

Okay... I'm starting to get ridiculously fanboy geeked up over Star Trek. :)


John

[Iron Chad]

[jdw]

I'm pretty open minded to JJ as I've never watched Lost or Alias or Felicity. :)

I might worry if JJ had this vision of a 5 movie series and at some point it wanders off the bend like the Sopranos. But for one movie, I suspect he can pull it off. :)

Empire's review:

Star Trek (TBC)

I confess that I don't terribly mind that it lacks Big Ideas. The last two series of films seemed to run around on them as they ran out of steam. I'd just as soon have a little adventure, and hit Big Ideas the next time around. They don't need to Save The World every time out. :P


John

[jdw]

Big $87M opening for Wolverine. Frontloaded with a big $35M on Friday (including the Thursday Mindnight showing). Behind the two Spidey's for early-May opening days, and Iron Man from last year. About $5M ahead of the opening Friday from X-2.

I don't see it having Iron Man legs. The schedule is loaded:

05/08 Star Trek
05/15 Angels & Demons
05/21 Terminator Salvation
05/22 Night at the Museum 2
05/29 Up (Pixar)

Star Trek coming next week is aimed at a very similar fan base as Wolverine.

A good second weekend means Wolverine gets to $200M. A huge drop and it will come in under.

John

[jdw]

Star Trek opened to a $72.5M estimate. Not sure if this is a strong positive given:

$85,058,003 Wolverine
$72,500,000 Star Trek
$70,950,500 Fast and Furious
$59,321,095 Monsters Vs. Aliens

Perhaps not a negative, but one would have thought this would do a little better.

It will be interesting to see what legs it has, and how many older fans like me are waiting a week to see it for the theaters to clear.

Wolverine was down 68.3% this weekend to $27M. Not far off the -66.9% of X-3. X-2 was -53.2% the second week.

After two weeks:

$175,348,409 X-3
$147,677,021 X-2
$129,624,000 Wolverine

X-2 got to $214.9M. With the mass of movies coming in the next few weeks, the tough economy and being almost $20M behind X-2 already, I don't see Wolverine getting to $200M.

Trek would need a strong second week to give it a chance.

John

[chadlaca]

I think it gets that second big weekend. Unlike "Wolverine," I think "Star Trek" is the type of film that'll a) have great word of mouth, and b) get return business. Far more so than the recent openings you compared it to. Will be interesting to see what happens. :)

Chad

[jdw]

Very good second weekend for Star Trek:

$43,034,547 (-42.8%)

Or more telling:

$46,204,168 Angels & Demons
$43,034,547 Star Trek

Star Trek took it on Saturday and Sunday, only losing Friday when A&D opened. It was about $200K behind on Monday.

It's up to $152M, so $200M is a lock. It passed Wolverine *today*, which we'll see when the Tuesday numbers get released. Monsters vs. Aliens is #1 for the year at $191,084,637 and still plugging away at the weekends. Trek will pass that.

How long it holds #1 depends on what's coming up behind it, and how well these legs hold up. I don't think it has $300M legs given the opening. $250M would be terrific legs... that might be a big much. You're going to need $250M+ to be #1 in the summer because Potter can fall out of bed and do that:

$317,575,550 Potter 1
$261,988,482 Potter 2
$249,541,069 Potter 3
$290,013,036 Potter 4
$292,004,738 Potter 5

I also think Transformers will open strong. It may not have the numbers of the first one, but it should go past $200M with ease. And Terminator is a big one to watch.

On the other hand, this relaunch of Star Trek has a chance to be like the relauch of Batman. The next one may be bigger (though not *that* big).

John

[Bob Morris]

Latest updates on major summer movies:

Up (opening weekend): $68.2 million
Terminator Salvation (second weekend): $90.5 million
Star Trek (fourth weekend): $209.5 million
Angels and Demons (third weekend): $104.7 million
X-Men Origins: Wolverine (fifth weekend): $170.8 million

Up had a bigger opening day than Wall-E, which ended up at $223.8 million. So Up has a good chance to reach $200 million.

So far, it's Star Trek in the lead for the summer box office crown, and it's still doing respectable business after four weeks. It was fifth in box office for this past weekend and doing much better than Terminator and Angels in terms of its legs.

Star Trek won't reach $300 million, but it could approach $250 million.

Terminator has a $200 million budget and won't reach that mark at this rate, so you can chalk that movie up as a bomb.

[Bob Morris]

Friday numbers

1. The Hangover: $16.5 million
2. Up: $13.5 million
3. Land of the Lost: $7.2 million

Hangover is going to claim the weekend box office crown. Saturday's numbers will tell the tale as to what its final weekend number will likely be.

Up surpassed $100 million. It seems like it may take a large drop this weekend, so it may not make $200 million.

Land of the Lost may not be categorized as a bomb, but its number will certainly be disappointing.

Night at the Musuem 2 has surpassed $117 million. It might get close to $200 million.

And Star Trek is still doing quite well. Up to $216 million and $250 million is within its grasp.

Transformers 2 may not get the summer box office crown without a strong opening, considering that Star Trek has been faring quite well.

[jdw]

Potter is a safe bet to get the #1 unless:

* Trek maintains killer legs

* Transformers comes close to matching their first one

* a phenom pops up out of the other to be released movies

All of those are possible. It's also that the Potter phenom is over with the release of the 7th book.

But the most likely is that Potter has a $100M opening weekend and powers to $275M+ at the box office.

No one has yet set the pace that Iron Man did that others had to chase down. I think it sets the table for Potter.


John

[jdw]

[jdw]

Estimates:

$44,244,000 Up
$43,275,000 Hangover
$19,524,000 Land of the Lost

I wouldnt' be surprised if the Up number ends up being a bit low. $13M/$17.9M/$13M is a little low of a Saturday bump that Pixar typically does. The Sunday number is pretty consistent to what I was mentioning above about Pixar movies doing very well on Saturday/Sunday relative to most movies. They rarely frontload their weekend numbers into Friday, and instead get good family number right throught he whole weekend.

On just the estimate, it's $10M up on WALL-E, $28M up on Ratatouille, and $20M above Cars. It really is starting to look like it's going to top WALL-E's $223.8M, and it has a decent shot at the $244M that Cars did. Pixar movies always have good legs. Ratatouille opened with just $47M and still got to $200M. The $60M to $63M that Cars and WALL-E did weren't earth shattering - a number of movies did better opening weekends those years. But they chug along making money.

We tend to forget that Nemo was like that, just to the next level. $70M wasn't earth shattering. But it just ponder money out week after week.

I don't think this is a phenom like Nemo. But if those weekend number move a little north when the official numbers come on, and it continues to do good weekday numbers this week as some of the schools get out, and we see it hold well next weekend (just a 35% drop this weekend on the estimates), then we're talking about a $250M movie. Given the state of the economy, those would be Pixar's most impressive numbers since Nemo.

The numbers for Land of the Lost look really bad. This would be two out of three bombs for Will, as Semi-Pro pulled in only $33M after a $15M opening.

John

[Bob Morris]

Definitely a good showing for Up. I stand corrected on Friday numbers.

Perhaps Ferrell needs to stay away from movies based on TV series of years past... Bewitched didn't fare well with critics, for example, and it clocked in at $63 million. Land of the Lost may limp to that number, but it won't get any higher.

Ferrell seems to do better with comedies that are based on an original concept rather than a "remake" of something:

Elf - $173 million.
Talladega Nights - $148 million
Blades of Glory - $118 million
Step Brothers - $100 million

I suspect part of it also ties into Ferrell needing a flick that generates a good buzz from critics. I'll need to look up that info later, but I do remember Talladega and Blades getting mostly good reviews.