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October 27, 2007
Friday Estimates by Klady - 10/26
Based on Klady’s estimate, Saw IV has the best Friday opening of the series, surpassing Saw III’s $14.5 million. We’ll see whether it holds to be the series’ best opening. For all the talk about horror porn losing its box office power, it is likely that the Saw series, at least for now, has franchise power more than genre power working for it.
Similarly, New Line’s Final Destination series has had progressively bigger openings with each release and FD3 had the highest gross of the series (beating the original by les than a million dollars). The secret to a lot of series seems to be that DVD is now strengthening the brands enough to keep solid box office through a number of really crappy releases. And the real win for Lionsgate, as it has been for New Line, is that they keep the product cheap, killing off talent each time, not being on the hook for big fees because a star needs to keep getting paid, like Chris Tucker and his crazy Rush Hour pay days.
Dan In Real Life may find some legs in a season of heavy dramas and horror films. It’s not a great movie, mostly because it is an extremely derivative movie. But it’s not likely to send anyone running from the theater in a bad mood either.
Again, Dan points up one of the silly notions of box office watching lately… that a $11.5 million opening weekend is some kind of embarrassment for Steve Carell and that his status as a box office star in the making has been undermined. His third opening as a headline star will be his weakest opener and no doubt, his weakest showing when the gross is totaled out. But with a fluke to start (40YOV) and a massively overbudget mess that the studio sold to the death to follow (Evan Almighty), finding Carell’s sweet spot is still a work in progress. Realistically, this kind of opening for this actor on a movie being sold on his face and name only is quite solid and supports arguments for a quote of about $8 million. Remember, opening is opening… it is not about the movie. And he opened this film. The notion that $20 million is the only number that is really an opening is, simply, myopic and idiotic.
The 30 Days of Night drop is pretty much as expected.
The fact that The Game Plan is holding as it is makes everything look awfully bright for Bee Movie next weekend. Family audiences are more than a little desperate.
Klady must have typoed with 95k per screen on Before The Devil Knows You’re Dead. It’s not possible in one day. But 9500 per leading to a weekend of $27,000 or so per screen is solid, but not in line with movies like Lust, Caution and The Darjeeling Limited. On the other hand, it is a step above Lars & The Real Girl. Basically, it doesn’t answer the biggest questions. But a decent start.
Speaking of Lars, according to Box Office Mojo, yesterday’s leap to 296 screens from 21 was not terribly successful. The film should gross around $700,000 over the weekend. But the per-screen of around $2400 is a real concern. As a point of comparison, there is concern about Into The Wild’s box office potential after doing $6k per on 153 screens and again at $3249 on 658 screens. Frustrating.
And for the record, Wild did $490k, again on 658 screens, again estimated by Box Office Mojo, dropping 28.1% vs last Friday and should be just under $9 million total by Sunday’s end. A decent hold, but the ultimate number is still a bit of a mystery. The film will soon be Paramount Vantage’s #2 grosser under John Lesher. But can it hope to match Babel’s $34 million? Unclear. It is well behind Babel’s 6 week mark of $16.8 million, but Babel had also gone wider. More unclear. Time will tell.
Posted by poland at October 27, 2007 02:39 PM
Comments
See, the reason people keep going back to Saw and Final Destination is that they know what they're gonna get and it's something they can't get anywhere else in such an easily digestible fashion. Still, I reckon this one will dip below $80mil in final tallies.
Dan isn't even on 2000 screens, which is perplexing to say the least.
Posted by: KamikazeCamelV2.0 ![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.mcnblogs.com/thehotblog/nav-commenters.gif)
at October 27, 2007 07:23 PM
So no one wants to see Lars and ITTW? It's not surprising. ITTW still has the whole "RICH KID PISSING HIS LIFE AWAY" and "SEAN PEAN" vibe. While Lars has a premise that may be sweeter than Lemon Pepsi, but it's still a whacky freakin premise. This leaves both of these movies sort of hanging out there, loved by critics (and loathed), but without finding it's audience.
Nevertheless; the SAW SAGA continues to rack up money. Compared to other flicks. These at least rip-off Phone Booth and have a villian people love. It will be interesting to see how the final two installments far, and if they can keep this pace up over the long haul.
Posted by: IOIOIOI at October 27, 2007 09:59 PM
If memory serves, nobody particularly wanted to see Letters from Iwo Jima last year either.
Posted by: KamikazeCamelV2.0 at October 28, 2007 12:46 AM
Camel; a lot of people do not want to see a lot of flicks. The bastages.
Posted by: IOIOIOI at October 28, 2007 01:38 AM
IOI, not sure what you mean by 'final two' since we are now guaranteed a Saw V, VI, and VII.
Posted by: jeffmcm at October 28, 2007 02:51 AM
Jeff; there are supposed to be SIX in the SAGA. If they changed that with four, then they are going for a SEPTRILOGY! Which would be... rather precedented in the genre of horrour. Nevertheless; I do love that there's a huge franchise out there, that I have no attachment to in the least. It's sort of refreshing in a way.
Posted by: IOIOIOI at October 28, 2007 03:09 AM
Drove three hours yesterday to take my family to see Nightmare Before Xmas in 3-D. Ok conversion, but the trailer for the live-action 3-D picture with Brendan Fraser looked way cooler. The $5000 per screen Nightmare pulled in a couple of weeks ago suggests that people want something special in a theatrical experience. Just look at the numbers for Monster House and Polar Express. The 3-D screens pulled in WAY more money.
Perhaps the draw of the Saw franchise is like Dave implies-they get the storyline on DVD, then the new picture gives them more of the same on the big screen. Coming soon...Saw 6 in 3-D!
Posted by: doug r at October 28, 2007 10:02 AM
"Jeff; there are supposed to be SIX in the SAGA. If they changed that with four, then they are going for a SEPTRILOGY! Which would be... rather precedented in the genre of horrour."
You're kidding, right? HALLOWEEN, FRIDAY THE 13th and NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET have all not only hit seven but passed it; I think Jason's been in at least 11 by now.
Posted by: Cadavra at October 28, 2007 01:21 PM
Cad; go read it again. It's a bit of business.
Posted by: IOIOIOI at October 28, 2007 06:01 PM
It's hard to tell.
Posted by: jeffmcm at October 28, 2007 06:28 PM
"rather precedented". It would read "rather unprecedented" if he was implying it never happens.
Posted by: KamikazeCamelV2.0 at October 28, 2007 09:23 PM
There was a review posted somewhere (can't find it now) explaining that the reason why people continue to see the Saw films is that each sequel helps you to understand the previous film, but also leaves its own questions unanswered.
Posted by: White Label at October 29, 2007 11:30 AM
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