Posted on 12/17/2005 11:10:22 AM PST by dangus
A gross of $11,000 per screen is quite good. If you're an autumn Wide Release, opening on 3500 screens across the country. When a movie opens on only 69 of the nation's largest theaters in a few dozen of the largest cities, with almost all of your target audience within range of those theaters, it's pretty bad.
Brokeback Mountain played in fourteen times more theaters this Friday than last Friday, and made less than four times as much money, only $760,000. It looks like the movie will make considerably less than its $15 million budget before the Academy Awards come out. How many tens of millions of dollars in free promotion, reduced pay and credibility were spent on this film?
King Kong also appears to be a flop. I've seen this movie: Peter Jackson has mastered many movie-making techniques with the Lord of the Rings, and the movie is an amazing spectacle with much positive and true to say about human nature. But Jackson did not learn how to discipline his budgeting or story-telling. His movie is also bloated, over-long, too violent, very horrific and a bit tooo preposterous.
The early part of the movie centers around a movie director too obsessed with his story, prone to overkill, and swindling a movie company out of far more than they would have been willing to spend. Given that actor Jack Black even slightly resembles Peter Jackson, I can't help but to wonder if how consciously auto-biographical the film is. It will make many, many, many times more than Brokeback Mountain, and still become known as a flop. I sincerely hope Peter Jackson learns the right things from the experience; he is very talented, very passionate, and, from the messages of his movies, very decent. King Kong made $14 million last night... It will probably easily pass $100 million, but land short of its $200 million budget. On the other hand, it is precisely the sort of movie that translates well overseas, and does well on DVD. But it will not be the Box Office savior hoped for.
Chronicles of Narnia will apparently need a rebound in the Christmas vacations to be profitable. Except for a literally rushed ending, it's almost perfect, a purely magical delight. But it seems to have very weak legs; it's not surprising since everyone who wanted to see this movie knew they did so a long time ago, and most rushed out to see it immediately. Today's movie markets don't allow for the sort of excellent word of mouth that Narnia is getting.
That word of mouth means probably good DVD sales, and strong anticipation of a sequel, so Narnia's Box Office is by no means a failure... just it'll take some time to become profitable. Narnia sold about $9 million worth of tickets, down over 60% from last Friday.
But there doesn't seem to be any great challenger to Narnia for the Holiday season. The Family Stone opened weak ($4 million), Harry Potter is mostly played out ($1.5 million), as are Walk the Line ($1 million) and Yours Mine and Ours (under $1 million) Syriana also fell hard, too... ($1.6 million).
Don't look for any saviors at the box office next week either... Cheaper by the Dozen 2, Fun with Dick and Jane, The Ringer, and Rumor Has It all open, but none look too strong
Since the story is about two gay shepherds, I think BAAAAAAAA is about right....
Wrong,we will. It will be recycled in to a musical, Ya know, Gay singing cowboys.
Those budgets for pudding do get expensive....
I guess what I would say is that it is not an allegory for Christianity and Christ. It actually was a story ABOUT Christianity and Christ. But I guess it depends on how you define allegory.
A movie where Sarah Jessica Parker plays a conservative. I guess Hollywood is still working on the "suspend your disbelief" thing. Will they wake us up when they get there?
When does a buddy's butt look better than your favorite sheep?
Paint Your Wagon provided more than enough singing cowboys for me, gay or otherwise, to last a lifetime.
I'll go see Narnia during its first run and plan to see Harry Potter again. None of the other films mentioned interest me, although I might get Kong on DVD when it is released.
BUT I DON'T WANT TO!!!
King Kong was actually quite good. Maybe not as good as the hype, but very good, nonetheless.
Yes, this will be THE movie that reverses Hoolywood's enormous decline.
I guess you could say it isn't only the Mountain that is broke.
narnia was soooo coooooooool!
and the best part for me was the director did not hide all the cool scenes in shadows and darkness.
it's amazing what the light of day can reveal!
Hollwyood isn't in decline. It's just that domestic box office doesn't mean as much as it used to...
RANGE WAR!!!
The set of guys willing to plunk down $20 to see a gay cowboy movie is pretty small.
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