September 6th, 2016
It is a big week with a ton of home market releases, including several that were contenders for Pick of the Week. There were two limited releases in that group, Love and Friendship and Tale of Tales. Love and Friendship got better reviews, but Tale of Tales’ Blu-ray is more interesting in my mind. Star Trek 50th Anniversary TV and Movie Collection is a great Blu-ray box set and would make an amazing gift. As for the Pick of the Week, that was an easy choice: The Iron Giant: Signature Edition on Blu-ray. Although if you are a hardcore fan, then the Ultimate Collector’s Edition might be worth the $75.
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June 21st, 2016
Finding Dory not only earned first place on the weekend box office chart, but it also earned first place on the theater average chart with $31,373 per theater. Homeless Billionaire was next with $19,771 in its lone theater. Tickled earned an average of $10,949 in two theaters. Meanwhile, Central Intelligence was right behind with an average of $10,130.
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June 9th, 2016
If this weekend is as bad as some fear it will be, it could begin to cause a panic among some studio executives. Two of the three wide releases are sequels and there are some who expect both to fail to match their predecessors by significant margins. If this happens, we will have six sequels failing to match expectations during a four-week stretch. Worse still, there are more than six additional sequels left to open before the end of summer. (Finding Dory seems safe, but the rest could flop as well.) The Conjuring 2: The Enfield Poltergeist should come out on top at the box office, but with less than the original made. Now You See Me 2 will likely continue Lionsgate's losing streak. Meanwhile, Warcraft could do well enough in China to justify a sequel, which is great news, because it will likely bomb here. This weekend last year, Jurassic World opened with $208 million. There's no way the entire box office will make that much this year. 2016 is going to get pummeled in the year-over-year comparison.
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May 24th, 2016
While each film in the top five on this weekend's box office chart finished in the right place, none of them matched expectations, save for The Jungle Book, which earned fifth place. The Angry Birds Movie debuted on top of the chart with $38.16 million, which is an okay opening for a family film at this time of year and nothing more. Likewise, Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising struggled compared to its predecessor, but did well compared to its budget. The Nice Guys will need long legs to break even. The overall box office rose 4.5% from last weekend, reaching $137 million, but fell 11% from the same weekend last year. 2016's lead over 2015 shrank to 5.1% or $200 million at $4.14 billion to $3.94 billion. This is a very impressive figure, but might not be enough to keep 2016 in the lead throughout the rest of the year. Jurassic World came out last June and there's little hope any film this June will match it.
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May 17th, 2016
The weekend box office was weaker than predicted at the top, but stronger in the second and third spots. Captain America: Civil War led the way with $72.64 million. This was lower than expected, but still more than the rest of the films combined earned. Money Monster was better than expected with $14.79 million. Overall, the box office was down 45% from last weekend to $130 million, while it was down 29% from this weekend last year. 2016 is still ahead of 2015 by a massive $230 million or 6.2% at $3.97 billion to $3.73 billion. I was worried 2016 and 2015 would be in a virtual tie by now, so this is great news.
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May 15th, 2016
After recording the 5th-biggest opening weekend of all time last weekend, Captain America: Civil War will decline 59% this time around to $72.56 million, according to Disney’s Sunday projection. If that number holds, it will put Civil War 8th on the list of best second weekends, almost exactly tied with Iron Man 3. That comparative slip in the rankings isn’t of huge consequence, given that the film will sail past $300 million domestically on either Monday or Tuesday, and has already racked up $645 million worldwide, putting it on the brink of $1 billion worldwide a little over two weeks after its international rollout. The Marvel juggernaut continues to roll on.
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May 14th, 2016
As expected, Captain America: Civil War dominated the box office chart on Friday, earning $19.44 million. However, this is down 74% from its opening Friday, which is a sharper-than-expected drop. It will bounce back over the weekend to earn $70 million, but that’s a loss of over $100 million from its opening weekend. It is also not enough to get it to $300 million this weekend. It will get there on Monday, on the other hand. Again, I must emphasize that this is only bad when compared to monstrous expectations. Its sophomore decline will be about 60%, which is in line with Age of Ultron. Additionally, Civil War is already the biggest hit for the Captain America franchise at the worldwide box office and will be the first of the three films to reach the $1 billion mark. There’s no reason to be upset at its box office run so far.
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May 13th, 2016
Money Monster earned $600,000 during its Thursday night previews. That's better than Hail, Caesar! ($543,000) or Mother's Day ($250,000). However, it is still nothing to truly celebrate. It still has a chance to match our predictions, but $10 million seems more likely.
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May 12th, 2016
There's not much mystery over what movie will come out on top of the box office this weekend. Captain America: Civil War will repeat as champion, as neither Money Monster nor The Darkness are expected to be box office hits. In fact, both of them combined will earn less in total than Civil War will make over the weekend. Unfortunately, this weekend last year had a one-two punch with Pitch Perfect 2 and Mad Max: Fury Road. Civil War will beat those two individually, but 2015's depth is going to be really hard to top. Fortunately, 2016 has such a lead so far that it can weather this storm.
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May 5th, 2016
Next weekend there is only one movie opening truly wide: Money Monster. (It appears The Darkness is opening in less than 2,000 theaters.) Because of this, it is the only real choice for the target film in this week's Box Office Prediction contest. In order to win, one must simply predict the opening weekend box office number for Money Monster.
Whoever comes the closest to predicting the film's opening 3-day weekend box office (Friday to Sunday), without going over, will win a Frankenprize of previously reviews DVD and / or Blu-rays. I grabbed a few more boxes from storage, so we can do winner's choice again. The choices are, two movies, one TV on DVD release, three single-disc kids DVDs, or two items from the mystery box.
Whoever comes the closest to predicting the film's opening 3-day weekend box office (Friday to Sunday), without going under, will also win a Frankenprize, as described above.
Finally, we will be choosing an entrant from the group of people who haven't won, or haven't won recently, and they will win the final Frankenprize.
Entries must be received by 10 a.m., Pacific Time on Friday to be eligible, so don't delay!
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May 1st, 2016
April started on a soft note and ended weak, but thanks to The Jungle Book, overall the month was actually really good. That's what happens when you get a surprise $300 million hit. This bodes well for May, which is both a slow month and a fantastic month. There are only four weekends and only eight movies coming out, but of those eight films, five have a shot at $100 million. The potential blockbusters are led by Captain America: Civil War, which is not only going to be the biggest hit of the month, but according to a Fandango survey, it is the most anticipated film of the summer. (On a side note, Finding Dory is the most anticipated family film of the summer and Ghostbusters is the most anticipated comedy of the summer. I was surprised by the last result.) Both Alice Through the Looking Glass and X-Men: Apocalypse have real shots at $200 million. One of them could get to $300 million, if they weren't opening against each other. Overall, the month looks excellent. Even better, last May there was only one monster hit, The Avengers: Age of Ultron, and most analysts think Captain America: Civil War will beat it at the box office. (There's also the issue of the misalignment in the weekends, which hurt April, but will really help May.)
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