March 11th, 2020
It’s another terrible week on the home market. There are a couple of Oscar-bait releases to talk about, but neither are Pick of the Week contenders, at least in my opinion. There are no movies that are anything more than midlevel hits. The best new release of the week, at least in my opinion, is Love, Chunibyo & Other Delusions: Ultimate Collector’s Edition Blu-ray.
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February 27th, 2020
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It’s a strong, but shallow, week on the home market. There are only eight releases in the main list and a couple of them wouldn’t normally make the cut. However, nearly all of them are worth picking up and several were close to Pick of the Week contenders. That said, Knives Out was a clear choice for Pick of the Week. I will likely also be buying Food Wars, Three Fantastic Journeys by Karel Zeman, and others, but Knives Out is way ahead of the competition.
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February 10th, 2020
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The Oscars were handed out last night and unlike most years, I wasn’t able to live-blog the awards. This is a real shame, because it was one of the best Oscar nights I can remember and there were very few awards that made me legitimately angry, unlike many years in the past. There was even a surprise winner for the full night, as Parasite earned the most wins with four Oscars. It is incredibly rare for a foreign-language film to pull off that feat.
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February 5th, 2020
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Our annual Oscar Prediction contest is underway so now is the best time to look at the nominees and try and figure out who the favorites are and which films should just feel honored to be nominated. We are continuing our shortened schedule with Best Leading Actress. In this category, there is an absolute favorite and I will be so pissed if she doesn’t finally win.
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February 4th, 2020
Our annual Oscar Prediction contest underway so now is the best time to look at the nominees and try to figure out who the favorites are and which films should just feel honored to be nominated. We are continuing today with Best Supporting Actress. In this category, there is an absolute favorite, a long shot with a shot, and then everyone else.
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January 15th, 2020
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It’s rare for a film to remain in the $10,000 club for three weeks in a row, especially when they expand. However, 1917 managed this rare feat at the weekend with an average of $10,775, despite now playing in well over 3,000 theaters.
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January 13th, 2020
The Oscar nominations were announced on Monday, and the results were... well, there were some puzzling results. Joker led the way with eleven nominations. ... A film with 69% positive reviews earned the most nominations. It’s not the worst-reviewed movie to earn a Best Picture Nomination—after all, Bohemian Rhapsody was nominated just last year. However, this film is arguably the worst-reviewed movie to ever earn the most nominations in a single year.
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January 9th, 2020
There were three films in the $10,000 club, all of them holdovers. 1917 led the way with an average of $56,154 in 11 theaters, which is 7% higher than its opening weekend. I’m very excited for its wide expansion this weekend. On the other hand, Just Mercy fell to an average of $19,154 in four theaters. That’s still good, but perhaps not good enough to thrive in wide release. We finally got numbers for Ashfall as its distributor was closed over the Christmas break. The film earned an average of $16,198 in two theaters during its third weekend of release.
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January 2nd, 2020
Only four limited release announced box office numbers for the final weekend of 2019, but all four were in the $10,000 club. 1917 led the way with an average of $52,383 in 11 theaters. That was over the three-day weekend. It earned over $1 million during its five-day debut. Just Mercy was well back with an estimated average of $27,250 in four theaters over the three-day weekend. Ip Man: The Finale will probably turn out to be poorly named, because the movie earned over $1 million over the three-day weekend and earned an average of $20,850. I’m sure someone is trying to figure out how to continue the franchise, despite the Finale part of the name. Clemency was next with an average of $17,682 in two theaters. The final film in the $10,000 club was Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, which earned an average of $16,430 during its second weekend of release.
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December 31st, 2019
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The last weekend of the year had some good news and some bad news. Unfortunately, Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker was part of the later, as it fell 59% to $72.39 million over the weekend. However, this was still a dominate performance at the box office, earning more than the next three films combined. It helped the overall weekend remained strong at $197 million. Granted, this is 20% lower than last weekend, but more importantly, it is 5.0% higher than the same weekend last year. Furthermore, 2019 cut the deficit with 2018 by about $100 million since The Rise of Skywalker came out and now it is fighting with 2016 to be the second biggest year at the box office of all time. It is true that the year is still behind 2018 by a massive 4.5% / $520 million at $11.04 billion to $11.56 billion, but not being able to maintain a record pace for two years in a row is hardly a serious concern. Even if you look at ticket sales and take into account inflation, then 2019 was a reasonably good year, as it isn’t too far behind 2017 and hardly the worst we’ve seen in the past decade. There are reasons to be optimistic going into 2020.
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December 24th, 2019
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Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker recovered a little bit from Sunday’s estimates to earn $177.38 million for the full weekend. While it is always better to beat estimates, this isn’t a large enough margin to really matter in the long run. Its reviews and its B plus are fine for a blockbuster, but aren’t going to help draw in more moviegoers, unlike The Last Jedi. Internationally, the film made $197.7 million in 52 markets to give it a worldwide opening of $375.1 million. It enjoyed the third-biggest weekend in December, the third-biggest day in December, and it is already the 21st biggest worldwide release in 2019. Granted, most thought it would open faster than this, but the film is, at worst, a profitable disappointment.
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December 22nd, 2019
There are some mixed results on the weekend chart with some films topping expectations, while others are struggling mightily. Fortunately, the former category includes Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, which is topping my prediction, albeit by a very small margin at $175.5 million, well below the $190 million projections based on Friday’s estimates. Yesterday, it looked like Rise of Skywalker would have similar legs to The Last Jedi. Granted, this film’s reviews and its B plus rating from CinemaScore are weaker than the previous film, but this one will have more help with the holidays. Christmas break has begun, so that should have boosted Sunday’s numbers, but sadly, that doesn’t appear to be the case. However, and this is an important point, the film is still doing fantastic business, with the third-biggest December weekend ever, and it should be a monster hit in the end.
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December 21st, 2019
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Despite earning weaker-than-expected reviews, Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker is going to have no trouble topping my prediction for the weekend, as it earned an estimated $90 million on Friday, putting it on pace for $190 million over the full weekend. Granted, not everything is rosy, as the film only managed a B plus from CinemaScore. That’s not fatal, but it certainly won’t help its legs. On the other hand, the lack of direct competition and the Christmas break will certainly help it sell many more tickets over the next two weeks.
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December 19th, 2019
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This weekend, Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker opens, and it is widely expected to be one of the biggest hits of the year. However, its reviews are merely mixed and this is dragging down expectations. Cats was confusing box office analysts since the first trailer was released and now that its reviews are a mess, things are not looking any better. Finally, Bombshell is expanding wide, but it looks like it won’t be a major factor at the box office this weekend and will have to rely on long legs to carry it to profitability. Meanwhile, this weekend last year, Aquaman earned $67.87 million over the weekend. The Rise of Skywalker should earn more than that during its opening day, helping 2019 end on a wildly successful note.
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December 19th, 2019
Uncut Gems led the way on the per theater chart with an average of $107,448 in five theaters. The only film to earn a better average this year was Parasite; however, while that film earned an average of $131,072 during its opening weekend, it was playing in only three theaters, so Uncut Gems arguably has the better opening. Bombshell also had an explosive opening with an average of $79,789 in four theaters. The number one film of the weekend, Jumanji: The Next Level, was next with an average of $14,017. The final film in the $10,000 club was A Hidden Life with an average of $10,077 in five theaters.
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December 15th, 2019
Jumanji: The Next Level is not only beating predictions, but is also topped projections based on Friday’s estimates. The film’s weekend estimate is $60.1 million, which is easily more than the rest of the top ten combined. It is also 66% higher than the Welcome to the Jungle’s opening weekend, although that film had a Wednesday opening, so it isn’t a fair comparison. Internationally, the film is nearly as impressive, earning $85.7 million on 39,900 screens in 52 markets for totals of $152.5 million internationally and $212.6 million worldwide. This includes a monster opening in the U.K., where it earned $12.6 million over the five-day weekend, including previews. This is 32% ahead of the previous installment in the franchise. Overall, the new film is 33% ahead of Welcome to the Jungle’s performance in the same group of new markets. If you look at is box office so far, add in its solid reviews and the Christmas break and we are looking at a $1 billion worldwide run. Sony had a really bad three-year streak a few years ago, but this is the second year in a row where they have been back in form.
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December 13th, 2019
We are getting really close to the cut-off for Oscar qualifying, which means there are a number of films hoping to win Oscars that are coming out in the next few weeks. This also means if a film isn’t gunning for Oscars, like Bombshell or Uncut Gems, it will likely fall between the cracks. That said, this is where the VOD market can come to the rescue for films like After Class, Code 8, or Colewell.
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December 12th, 2019
The Screen Actors Guild announced their nominations this week and we are starting to see some patterns with similar names appearing over and over again. This time Bombshell led the way, earning four nominations, but four other films earned two or more nominations.
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December 11th, 2019
The Golden Globes nominations are the second major Awards Season set to come out. It is still very early in the year and the predictive value of the Golden Globes is a little suspect, but there are still some things to learn here. (This is especially true on the TV end, as there’s talk about how strange the nominations are this year.) Marriage Story led the way with six nominations, just ahead of The Irishman and Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood, both of which picked up five nods.
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December 1st, 2019
Frozen II wasn’t the only box office hit to debut in November, but it was by far the largest. It helped save November and kept 2019 from turning completely sour at the last minute. As for December, we have several potential $100 million hits, plus a couple of monster hits. There are some who think Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker will be the biggest domestic hit released in 2019, but most think it will have to settle for second place. Jumanji: The Next Level should also be a monster hit, even if it doesn’t come really close to its predecessor. As for last December, Aquaman was the undisputed champion, earning almost as much as the next two films combined. Jumanji could top Aquaman at the box office, while we could also have more $100 million films than we had last year. Add in Star Wars and the year should end on a really positive note, making up for the extended slumps we had to deal with through a lot of the year. 2019 won’t be able to close the gap entirely, but it will do enough that we will be able to celebrate.
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October 17th, 2019
Real-life drama starring Charlize Theron, Nicole Kidman, and Margot Robbie opens December 20 ... Full Movie Details.
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August 22nd, 2019
Real-life drama starring Charlize Theron, Nicole Kidman, Margot Robbie, and John Lithgow opens December 20 ... Full Movie Details.
A revealing look inside the most powerful and controversial media empire of all time; Fox News, and the explosive story of the women who brought down the infamous man who created it.
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