February 17th, 2009
This felt like a slow week to me, but looking at the list there were 15 spotlight reviews, which is a huge amount for one week. There are a large number of DVDs worth checking out, but looking at the top of the list, I think Christopher Titus - Love is Evol is the best DVD coming out this week, and the winner of the DVD Pick of the Week. As has happened pretty much every week this year, there are so many DVDs on this week's list that is had to be split into two. The second part can be found here.
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January 29th, 2007
I'm still waiting for the first "Must Have" DVD of the year (the first one of those doesn't show up until mid-February), but at least there are more that nearly make the grade this week than so far this year.
Flyboys - Collector's Edition is better than the reviews would indicate, as long as you are in the right frame of mind.
Lucky Louie - The Complete First Season is a great show but a little demented for a mainstream audience, and the same can be said for Viva Pedro - Pedro Almodovar Classics Collection - Buy from Amazon.
But in the end I went with Red Doors - Buy from Amazon as the DVD Pick of the Week.
Perhaps an unexpected choice, but it's a movie that should be seen by more.
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July 11th, 2005
The Slump is dead.
After 19 weeks, it has finally ended.
It has been more than four months since the last time 2005 topped 2004 in the yearly comparison, but that's just what happened this weekend.
Before we start celebrating too much, note that the margin of victory was tiny at just over $500,000.
But at this point a victory is a victory and the movie industry will take them anyway they can get them.
On a week-to-week basis we actually saw pretty good growth, rising by 5.2%, which is strange for a post-holiday weekend.
Year-to-date, 2005 is still off by 8% $4.523 billion to $4.934 billion while the summer is down 11% $2.023 billion vs. $2.281 billion.
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April 3rd, 2005
Million Dollar Baby performed brilliantly this week earning $8.8 million for an international total of $60 million, placing fourth on the international box office charts. In France the film dominated the marketplace with $4.94 million on 450 screens and in Germany the film earned $760,000 in semi-limited release (120 screens) for the best per screen average in the market. On the other hand, the film flopped in Slovakia where it missed the top ten in its debut. On the holdover front, the multi-
Oscar winning front saw its weekend haul climb by 20% in Spain to $980,000 and it's still doing well in Australia, Italy and South Korea.
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March 14th, 2005
The best word to describe this week's predictions is "Overcompensation."
After getting skunked underestimating how well certain films have done in the past many, many analysts overestimated their appeal this weekend. This in part led to a 6.3% drop-off from last weekend and more importantly, a 1.7% drop-off from last year. After sporting a double digit lead just a couple of weeks ago, the Year-to-Date race is a virtual tie at $1.56 billion each.
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March 11th, 2005
There really no doubt about what film will take top spot this weekend, as Robots could triple the second place film. However, after number one there are some interesting stories at the weekend box office race.
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January 25th, 2005
The Oscar Nominations were announced this morning and at first glance it appears that most of the nominations went to films with smaller budgets and box office results.
Box office hits were nearly shut out of the major nominations.
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August 30th, 2004
Every week films get a second chance at success from the home market; or, in some cases, a first chance at success. Here is a list of wide releases, limited releases and a few from the growing TV on DVD section, including the winners of the DVD Pick of the Week,
Star Trek - The Original Series - The Complete First Season -
Buy from Amazon and, for those of you who have a taste for the twisted,
Videodrome - Criterion Collection - Unrated and Uncut -
Buy from Amazon.
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June 21st, 2004
Bit of a mixed week: we had a surprise hit at number one, but the two bigger budget films both struggled. This led to the second really big drop-off in the weekend box office in a row, this time 14.7%. And it that in turn led to the first year-to-year drop in some weeks, and it was a pretty serious decline of 9.4%. With next week looking less than impressive as well, the industry will need Spider-Man 2 to really soar to avoid a prolonged slump.
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May 18th, 2004
In addition to the $46.9 million Troy earned at the domestic box office, the ancient history movie made $54.7 million on 6,722 screens in 47 markets internationally. Some highlights were the $8.5 million in Germany, $6.3 million in Spain, $5.1 million in France and $4.7 million in Australia. And while a $107 million opening weekend seems spectacular, this is a very expensive film to get to theatres. Combine the production budget, domestic P&A budgets, translations / dubbing / subtitles, etc. and the final cost is nearing $250 million. On the plus side, Troy should have better legs and more international appeal than Van Helsing so Warner Bros. should see a profit before the home market. P.S. If this story sounds familiar, you must have a long memory.
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April 27th, 2004
Kill Bill: Volume 2's first foray into the foreign markets proved very profitable. The film earned $18.5 million in 21 markets and increases compared to the debut of the
original in all but one market. Many of those increases were in the double-digit range so it's an impressive start. Unfortunately, one of the largest markets for the first film, Japan, saw a huge 47% drop for Volume 2. This can easily be explained by the fact that half of Volume 1 took place in Japan.
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April 20th, 2004
The Passion of the Christ saw large drop-offs in many international markets but openings in nine others helped stabilize its overall box office. Maybe. I'm getting some conflicting reports on the box office figures. $14.6 or $25 is the two prevailing estimates I've found. I do believe the $25 million is for the whole week while the $14.6 million is for the weekend.
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April 19th, 2004
With just two movies opening wide this should have been a good week, and while the wide releases did ok, the holdovers really suffered. In the end the weekend was down 10.6% from last weekend, and even more telling was its 3.5% drop from last year. Granted, it was Easter this time last year, but it's not that important of a holiday to make a large enough difference.
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April 16th, 2004
For the first time this month we don't have an overload of new movies opening up. However, the two wider releases we do have are in direct competition for the same audience, so the same ticket splitting will still happen. That will make it hard for both films to succeed. There's an addition film opening sort of wide, but at just 1000 theatres don't expect it to make much of an impact.
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April 13th, 2004
It was hardly a surprise that
The Passion of the Christ was able to take top spot over Easter weekend. What is a surprise is the amount; just $26 million is barely an increase from last weekend. There was only one new opening, but it was in Italy, one of the most staunchly Catholic nations. The film did cross $100 million internationally some time during the mid-week, but a serious post-Easter drop-off is expected.
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April 12th, 2004
Only one of the five movies released managed to live up to expectations, and with that I think it's safe to say 2004's winning streak came to an end. The week-to-week drop-off was 9.4%, and while 2004 was up 17% from the same time last year, it's increase of last Easter was much less at just 7.6%. Year-to-date is up 9% but 2004 will have a tough time keeping up with 2003 in May.
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April 9th, 2004
In my
previous weekend prediction story I accidentally left one of the new releases.
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April 9th, 2004
With four movies already in 3000 or more theatres, it was slim pickings for the five movies opening. The top draw could only manage 7th spot on this week's
theatre count charts and one of the new openers couldn't even make the top ten. Even so, a new release should still take the top spot.
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April 6th, 2004
Another 7 openings helped keep The Passion of the Christ in top spot with $25.4 million. And the same pattern is holding true, the smaller the market the better the result. In Spain it opened to $3.2 million, about on par with Gothika's opening at the end of February. In South Korea it opened first with $2.3 million, significantly below the local productions that have been taking tops spot for most of the year. So far the film has earned just over $80 million internationally and over $400 million worldwide.
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April 5th, 2004
April started like a lion, especially compared to last year. The week-to-week increase was an respectable 6.1% while the box office was up an stupendous 28.2% from last year. Year to date 2004 is now up 7% on 2003 with an excellent chance of earning an even bigger lead during the rest of the month since 2003 had a poor April.
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April 2nd, 2004
April starts out like a lion as four movies open wide, two of them are opening mega-wide, (theatre counts over 3000.) And with the box office humming along at double digit increases from last year we could see records broken this week.
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March 30th, 2004
With no new wider releases the top five international box office finished in the same order as last weekend.
The Passion of the Christ again topped the week thanks to number one openings in many markets and even a few records. The biggest slice of its estimated $16 million take came from the U.K. where it finished first, sort of. Including previews its $3.6 was strong enough for first place; if you don't include previews then it drops to third place behind the debut of
Dawn of the Dead and the second weekend of
Starsky and Hutch. The film again had strong results in small markets breaking records in Argentina and Venezuela. Total international run now sits at $58.7 million in 36 markets, good, but certainly not comparable to its domestic total.
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March 29th, 2004
There were a few of surprises this week, some good and some bad. This bag of mixed blessings helped the box office to a flat week-to-week result, moving up of less than $10,000 or 0.007%. Continued weakness this time last year helped 2004 shoot up by 14% but the year-to-date figurers are still only 6% above 2003. Weak mid-week numbers have prevented 2004 from putting real distance between it and 2003.
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March 26th, 2004
Four movies open wide this weekend, or maybe it would be more accurate to say one and three halves as only one film opens in more than 1,600 theatres. This makes the race for top spot not so tough to predict, but the rest of the top ten is wide open. The three smaller openings are hoping for strong word of mouth, but as last week's soft debut for Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind tells us, that's a risky bet.
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March 23rd, 2004
The Passion of the Christ had mixed openings during its fourth weekend in international release. In Latin America is performed very well, where it made two thirds of its $15 million weekend take, breaking records in Chile and Central America along the way. On the flip side it could only manage a paltry $2.3 million in Germany, half of first place
Brother Bear and on par with
Gothika's opening earlier in the year. It would have been more impressive if the situation was reversed. After all, record breaking performances throughout Latin American won't earn as much as a blockbuster performance in Germany. Overall Passions has pulled in $32.3 million in 19, mostly smaller markets.
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March 22nd, 2004
For the first time this year we saw a substantial increase over the box office from this time last year that wasn't due to a single movie. This week we saw a token 1.4% increase from last weekend, but a fantastic 21.5% increase from last year. It is important to keep in mind, however, that Spring was the weakest point in 2003's box office if you take into account Seasonal Adjustments. This weekend last year was when the war in Iraq started, for instance, and this weakness continued till mid-April. So 2004 has a golden opportunity to put some distance between itself and 2003.
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March 19th, 2004
With three movies opening wide we should see a change at the top spot this week. But there are a couple of twists. Firstly, all three movies are rated R, which should help more kid friendly fare at the box office. Secondly, the movie with the best reviews is also opening in the fewest theatres.
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March 16th, 2004
It may have not made it in the Top Five so far in its run, but there's enough interest in
The Passion of the Christ's performance that it warrants a mention.
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March 15th, 2004
It was the third weekend in a row with week-to-week drop-offs, this time it was 18.8%, which is huge for non-post holiday weekend. And only the weakness experienced this time last year is keeping 2004 above 2003's pace. This weekend it was up 10% helping the year-to-date gain increase to nearly 4%. Still not higher than inflation, but it's much better than earlier in the year.
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March 12th, 2004
2004 is starting to slow down again, as this week's group of new movies is quite weak. The only wide release with overall positive reviews really stretches the definition of wide release. And the other two releases have reviews that range from mediocre to really bad.
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March 11th, 2004
While
The Passion of the Christ finished first on the per theatre charts for the second weekend in a row, it the performance of a smaller movie,
Goodbye, Lenin! that stole the show. Its per theatre average climbed nearly 10%. Now a movie having its per theatre average climb after the Oscars isn't surprising. However, Goodbye, Lenin! was ignored by the Oscar nomination committee. So the increase bodes very well for its long term success.
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March 8th, 2004
Another good news bad new weekend. Bad news, the total box office was down 8% from last weekend. Good new, it was up 31% from last year. Good news, 2004 has finally surpassed 2003 year-to-date. Bad news, that's due to inflation as admissions are still lower. Really bad news, the jump is thanks entirely to one movie, or the controversy surrounding one movie.
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March 5th, 2004
We haven't seen two film open with strong prospects since the beginning of February. And with last week's winner still going strong, 2004 should pass 2003 at the box office.
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March 3rd, 2004
There's was not much in the way of good news this week, and what little there was was due to a single movie. The Passion of the Christ topped the per theatre chart and was the only film to top $10,000 per theatre taking in $27,554.
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March 1st, 2004
There was some good news and some bad news this past weekend. First the good news, we saw huge increases at the box office this weekend, both from the previous weekend, (66%) and from last year (48%). Now the bad news; it was all thanks to one movie, which doesn't bode well for the overall strength of the box office. In fact, even after last weekend 2004 is still 3% back of 2003's pace.
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February 29th, 2004
The Passion of the Christ broke all manner of records at the weekend, storming to an estimated $76 million Friday-Sunday gross, and a total of $117.5 million since it was released on Wednesday.
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February 27th, 2004
Thanks to the controversy surrounding
The Passions of the Christ, 2004 should finally start making up some ground on 2003. Even with the Oscars on Sunday 2003, Passions alone will boost the box office. But the other three movies probably wouldn't even register on the radar during a normal weekend.
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February 26th, 2004
During the past week promotional websites for several movies were launched and some older ones added additional content. Here the list of this week's releases, a couple of new sites and few updates including the winner for the week,
Dawn of the Dead -
Official Site . If you know of any new movie websites not on this list feel free to e-mail me with the details.
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February 25th, 2004
February 25th, 2004
The most talked about movie in long time is being released tonight to correspond with Ash Wednesday.
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