March 14th, 2018
It’s Oscar week on the home market with several Oscar nominees and winners. Many of these films, like Call Me by Your Name and I, Tonya, are contenders for Pick of the Week. The actual winner of this title is The Shape of Water on Blu-ray Combo Pack or 4K Ultra HD Combo Pack. It’s not the biggest release on this week’s list, as that honor goes to Star Wars: The Last Jedi, but that’s only coming out on Video on Demand.
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March 13th, 2018
I, Tonya was a player during this most recent Awards Season earning a lot of nominations and even picked up several wins. The film will finish with $30 million domestically, which is great for a limited release. Did it deserve this success?
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March 4th, 2018
It’s Oscar night and we will be live blogging the show. We will announce the winners and have our reactions as they happen, while keeping track of how our readers did in predicting the outcomes.
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March 4th, 2018
It’s Oscar night and we will be live blogging the show. Before that, let’s take a last look at the nominations with a few annotations. Nominees in Italics are those that have received the most votes from our readers so far in our Oscar contest (which is open to new entries until noon, Pacific, today—enter now!). Bold films are those films I think will win. Meanwhile, those that are Underlined are those I want to win. Not all categories have underlined nominees, because not all categories have someone I’m cheering for, or because there are two nominees I couldn’t pick between. For example, I will be happy no matter who wins Best Supporting Actress. One last note: The contest is still going and the leading for Best Picture Switched from The Shape of Water to Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri to tied over the time I was writing this story. This is the closest I’ve ever seen it. Guessing the best picture correctly will go a long way to winning.
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February 27th, 2018
With our annual Oscar Prediction contest underway, 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. Today we look at the two Screenwriting Categories, starting with Best Adapted Screenplay. We haven’t had a single competitive category so far, but that changes today. ... with the Best Original Screenplay. Best Adapted Screenplay is a one-horse race.
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February 19th, 2018
It’s another slow week; however, I prefer to think of it as the calm before the storm, as there are several blockbusters and Oscar contenders coming out over the next few weeks. That’s not to say there are no big hits or Oscar contenders on this week’s list. The Florida Project and Loving Vincent are both up for an Oscar, while there are some massive hits coming out on VOD, like Thor: Ragnarok. As for the Pick of the Week, it was an easy choice: The Florida Project on Blu-ray.
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January 23rd, 2018
The Oscar nominations were announced starting at just after 5 am Pacific time. They do this every year and no one has been able to adequately explain why to me. At least there were some interesting results this year. The Shape of Water led the way with 13 nominations, which is one below the current record and nearly as many as the next two films combined. Overall, there were seventeen films that earned two or more nominations.
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January 17th, 2018
Phantom Thread was the only film in the $10,000 club this past weekend, earning an average of $18,513 in 62 theaters.
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January 7th, 2018
The Golden Globes winners were announced on Sunday and there were a few surprises worth talking about, starting at the top. I was not expecting Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri to be the big winner of the night, but it was with four wins. Only two other movies, The Shape of Water and Lady Bird, won more than one award during the night.
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January 4th, 2018
The Writers Guild of America is the latest group to announce award nominees. There are a lot of categories that WGA hand out awards for, but only three of them are for theatrical releases. The list of nominees include several major Awards Season players, and not a lot of surprises. The Big Sick, Lady Bird, The Disaster Artist, Get Out, The Shape of Water… We've seen almost all of these films appear on lists of nominations before.
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December 27th, 2017
The Post dominated the Christmas weekend, earning an average of $58,446 in nine theaters, $84,673 if you include Christmas Day. The second best result of the four-day weekend was Phantom Thread, which earned an average of $31,818 in four theaters on Christmas Day alone. Last week’s winner, The Last Jedi, earned an average of $16,911 during its second weekend of release. The final two films in the $10,000 club were I, Tonya and Along With The Gods: The Two Worlds with averages of $11,169 and $10,914 respectively.
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December 19th, 2017
The Last Jedi became the biggest wide release of the year on the theater average chart with $51,987, overtaking the previous leader, Beauty and the Beast, which had an opening weekend average of $41,508. Last week’s number one film, I, Tonya was pushed into second place with an average of $34,256 in five theaters. The film clearly has more room to grow. Call Me by Your Name was well behind with an average of $16,398 in 30 theaters. There were two more holdovers in the $10,000 club: The Shape of Water at $10,828 in 158 threatres and Darkest Hour at $10,090 in 84.
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December 14th, 2017
2017 is behind 2016’s pace by over $400 million and and this weekend is the last chance it has to cut that deficit by any real margin. This weekend, Star Wars: The Last Jedi debuts and it is practically a guaranteed monster hit. Rogue One made just over $400 million in the 2016 calendar year, while The Force Awakens earned just over $650 million. The Last Jedi is widely expected to earn somewhere in-between those results. In the meantime, there is one other wide release, Ferdinand, which is the textbook definition of counter-programming. The studio is just hoping it doesn’t get lost in the crowd. This weekend last year, the total box office was $211.57 million. I give The Last Jedi about a 50/50 chance of topping that by itself.
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December 13th, 2017
The Screen Actors Guild were the third group to announce their nominations for this awards season. So far there have been three different films earning the most nominations. Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri picked up four nominations, which is extra impressive, as there are only six theatrical categories.
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December 12th, 2017
There was another Oscar contender on top of the theater average chart this weekend, as I, Tonya earned an average of $66,039 in four theaters. Call Me by Your Name was the next best film with an average of $31,761 in nine theaters. The film isn’t expanding as fast as one would expect, given its theater average, but this could be because the studio doesn’t think it has mainstream appeal. The Shape of Water was close behind with an average of $27,843 in 41 theaters and it has already earned some measure of mainstream success. The final film in the $10,000 club was Darkest Hour with an average of $13,989 in 53 theaters.
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December 12th, 2017
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It was a good weekend at the box office, relatively speaking, as most films in the top five beat expectations. Granted, this was mostly by tiny amounts, but it added up. We still fell 20% compared to last week to $84 million. This is 1.2% higher than the same weekend last year and we were expecting a similarly close loss, so this is a surprise victory. The year-over-year numbers are almost identical to last week, with this year down by 4.1% or $420 million when compared to last year. Right now 2017 has pulled in $9.79 billion, while 2016 had a running tally of $10.21 billion.
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December 11th, 2017
The Golden Globes nominations are the second major Awards Season set to come out. Sort of. (WGA announced the nominations for TV, radio, etc., but not their theatrical nods.) It is still very early in the year, so it is hard to say if there are any real snubs, or if there are any real favorites. The Shape of Water led the way with seven nominations, while The Post and Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri were right behind with six a piece.
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December 10th, 2017
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Coco remains the number one movie at the box office this weekend by a considerable margin, mainly due to a lack of serious competition from new releases. Disney’s animated adventure will gross about $18.3 million this weekend, for a domestic total of $135.5 million. The film will also pile up another $55.3 million internationally, taking its worldwide cume to $389.5 million. It still has some big openings to come, including Brazil, Korea, the UK, and Japan in January, so it has some way to go, although its progress will be eclipsed by The Last Jedi for the next few weeks.
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December 9th, 2017
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Coco surprised no one by earning first place on Friday. It earned $4.27 million, giving it a running tally of $121.48 million after 17 days of release and putting it on pace for $19 million over the weekend. Good news: This is a little better than expected. Bad news: Next weekend could be a mess, as the film will not only have to deal with monster competition, but direct competition as well. If it can avoid being demolished at the box office next weekend, then it will stick around in the top ten for the rest of the year. Even if if does get demolished, it still has a shot at $200 million domestically, but it will be close.
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December 8th, 2017
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There is only one wide release this weekend, Just Getting Started. However, it is barely opening wide and is widely expected to miss the top ten. This means the top five will barely change from last week and Coco should have no trouble remaining on top of the chart. This weekend last year, Office Christmas Party opened in second place, behind Moana. Office Christmas Party was hardly a monster hit, but it was strong enough to keep 2017 from winning the year-over-year comparison. Hopefully, it will still be close.
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December 6th, 2017
It was another stellar weekend at the box office, at least as far as the theater average chart was concerned. The Shape of Water earned an average of $83,282 in two theaters. This is the fourth best of the year so far. Call Me by Your Name was right behind with an average of $73,890 in four theaters. This is by far the best result of the year for a holdover, more than doubling Lady Bird’s sophomore stint. However, Lady Bird expanded its theater count during its second weekend of release, while Call Me by Your Name did not. The Disaster Artist was close behind with an average of $63,755 in 19 theaters. You could argue this was the best result of the week, because the film was playing in many more theaters than the two films above it. Wonder Wheel was well back with an average of $28,111 in five theaters. Normally this would be an amazing start, but this week it won’t make an impact and it could fade away by the end of the year. Finally, Darkest Hour was the final film in the $10,000 club earning an average of $27,093 in four theaters during its second weekend of release.
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December 3rd, 2017
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The weekend after Thanksgiving is usually when the studios take a breather before the big Christmas season, and this year is no different, with no new wide releases, and relatively minor shuffles on screen use at the theaters. It’s therefore little surprise that Coco holds on at the top of the chart, and its strong reviews and season-friendly nature help it to extend its lead over Justice League. Coco is headed towards $26.114 million this weekend, according to Disney, for $109 million or so to date. That’s down 49% from last weekend. Justice League, meanwhile, drops a more troubling 60% to $16.58 million, for $197 million after three weekends.
More exciting action lies among the limited and expanding releases, however…
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December 2nd, 2017
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Coco beat expectations by a tiny margin on Friday, earning $6.28 million. This is 67% lower than its opening Friday, but its opening Friday was also a Holiday, so that’s to be expected. Look for $27 million over the full weekend, which is a little lower than Moana’s second weekend of release, but the gap between the two is closing. Given Coco’s reviews and its A+ from CinemaScore, it might start catching up by this time next week.
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December 1st, 2017
It’s an incredibly busy week with about 30 films coming out. However, the vast majority of them have too few reviews to be worth talking about. In fact, there would have been more entries in the secondary VOD than the main list, except I bent the rules a little. There are still some releases that are certainly worth checking out, including The Disaster Artist, The Other Side of Hope, A Bad Idea Gone Wrong, and The Shape of Water. If I were to pick just one, it would easily be The Shape of Water.
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November 22nd, 2017
The Independent Spirit Awards nominations were announced yesterday and thus the 2017 Awards Season begins. The movie with the most nominations is Call Me by Your Name, which opens on Friday. This is amazingly good timing. It’s not the only film that should get a financial boost.
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November 14th, 2017
Comedy directed by and starring James Franco opens December 1 ... Full Movie Details.
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