“...It has to make $80 million to break even, if it cost $40 million...”
How so??? That would be $40 million profit, would it not?
I tried to see if anyone else gave a good explanation... but the gross receipts at the box office only tell how much money was received from tickets sold, not how much money was made. I do not know what percentage of the gross that the film company gets from ticket sales in this case. That can vary and is not what is being measured.