June 7th, 2012
Getting caught up on the Blu-ray sales chart after a massive overhaul of the database, which hopefully you didn't notice too much. We're splitting the two weeks into two articles, otherwise they would be just too cumbersome. We start with the week ending May 20th, which featured six new releases on the chart. Top spot went to The Grey with 375,000 units sold, but in terms of revenue, it was in second place with $7.50 million. Its opening week Blu-ray share was 51%, which even just last year would have been momentous, but now is standard for a first-run release for any action or adventure film.
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June 5th, 2012
After a major change on the back end of site, we have two weeks of home market numbers to get to, starting with the week ending on May 20th. New releases dominated the chart taking the top three spots and four of the top six. The Grey earned first place with 360,000 units / $6.12 million. This is a fine start given its theatrical run, but not an exceptional one.
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May 14th, 2012
It's not a bad week, for this time of year, with three films that are selling well, and two of those earned really good reviews. Unfortunately, I'm still waiting for those screeners. Also, after those three big releases, there's a sharp drop-off in sales strength and we quickly find releases that would be overlooked most weeks. As for the best of the best, both Chronicle and The Grey are contenders for Pick of the Week, but like I said, I don't have the screeners to judge the extras. Therefore, I'm giving that title to Being John Malkovich Criterion Collection Blu-ray.
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January 18th, 2012
Martin Luther King, Jr. Day long weekend was mostly filled with good news, with all three films doing at least respectable business, while we had a couple holdovers which beat expectations. Contraband was surprisingly strong earning top spot with relative ease. And while it couldn't match The Green Hornet's debut from last year, the overall box office was very solid at $132 million over three days and $163 million over four. The three-day total was 5% lower than last weekend, but 1.5% higher than last year. The four-day total was 2.6% higher than last year. It's obviously way too early to judge 2012's box office run, but at the moment it is 14% higher than last year's pace at $483 million to $423 million.
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January 15th, 2012
With Beauty and the Beast disappointing slightly over the 3-day MLK frame, Contraband will take first place by a fairly comfortable margin, according to studio estimates released on Sunday. The action movie is set to pick up about $24.1 million, per Universal, while Disney pegs Beast's Friday-Sunday total at $18.5 million. Joyful Noise will bring in a solid, if slightly disappointing, $11.3 million for Warner Bros..
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January 12th, 2012
This weekend is Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, which is not one of the biggest long weekends at the box office. (It is just too close to Christmas / New Year's to really help boost the box office significantly.) There are three films opening wide, Beauty and the Beast 3D, Contraband, and Joyful Noise, plus another film, The Iron Lady, which is expanding enough that it could reach the top ten. I don't think any of them will match last year's winner, The Green Hornet, which pulled in $33.53 million during its opening weekend. However, one can hope all three wide releases reach their potential and 2012 will come out ahead of 2011.
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January 10th, 2012
The winners of our The Devil's in the Details contest were determined and they are...
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January 10th, 2012
The $10,000 club was again crowded this week and, as expected for this time of year, it was filled almost entirely by holdovers. Iron Lady remained the top film with an average of $35,275 in five theaters and it should start hitting major milestones very soon. Pina's average grew, again, reaching $27,676 in three theaters. Hopefully it will start expanding quickly, before its momentum fades. Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close earned an average of $16,521 in six theaters. Its mixed reviews haven't taken too much of a toll, yet. A Separation doubled its theater count, but its per theater average remained relatively steady at $15,440. The overall box office leader, The Devil Inside, was next at $14,763. Finally, Once Upon a Time in Anatolia opened with $10,652 in one theater.
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January 10th, 2012
Wow. That was a shock. The first weekend of 2012 was amazingly strong. Not only did the only new wide release start off much, much stronger than expected, but almost all of the holdovers also held on better than expected. Maybe a lot of people made New Year's resolutions to watch more movies. Compared to last week, the box office was down just shy of 10% to $139 million; however, it was a post-holiday weekend, so this dip was to be expected. In fact, it was rather shallow. Compared to last year, the overall box office was up 25%, which is fantastic. Let's hope this is a sign of things to come.
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January 8th, 2012
The Devil Inside came out of nowhere to win this weekend's race at the box office, according to studio estimates released on Sunday. Its $34.5 million debut is well ahead of expectations and will likely place it second or third on the list of all-time January opening weekends when final numbers are released on Monday. (See full list of January record weekends.) This performance is a welcome boost to overall business, which is coming off a disappointing 2011. Total box office for the weekend should be about 30% up from this weekend last year.
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January 5th, 2012
After the depressing box office results of 2011 (to be fair, the box office did reach $10 billion for the third time in a row, which is no small amount of money, but week after week we saw year-over-year declines) the industry is pretty desperate to turn things around and we do have some reasons to be hopeful this weekend, mainly because the comparable weekend last year was so bad. Most analysts think The Devil Inside will top last year's lone wide release, Season of the Witch, so if the holdovers can do their part, maybe we can start the year with a win. Then again, I've been hopeful before the weekend many, many times recently, only to be crushed when the box office numbers come in.
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January 1st, 2012
2011 ended, and really that's the only good news we got from the entire month of December. That's not snark either. Of the eleven films opening or expanding wide that month, six will definitely miss expectations by significant margins and with the other five it is too soon to tell, (it depends on how well they hold up during the New Year's Day long weekend). Only Mission: Impossible: Ghost Protocol can be considered a pleasant surprise, and even then it might not match original expectations. Looking forward, the only really good piece of news for this January is that last January was a pretty bad as well. Only two films, The Green Hornet and No Strings Attached, beat expectations by significant margins, while The Dilemma bombed hard enough to nearly wipe out those gains. This time around, the biggest hit will likely be Beauty and the Beast's 3D re-release, but even then, I doubt it will do as well as The Lion King's 3D re-release. There's a good chance the year will start off on a sour note, just like 2011 ended.
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December 30th, 2011
2012 starts with just one wide release, The Devil Inside, which makes it easy to pick a target film for this week's box office prediction contest. However, the buzz is soft, which tends to make it harder to predict the opening weekend numbers. In order to win, one must simply predict the opening weekend box office number for The Devil Inside.
Whoever comes the closest to predicting the film's opening 3-day weekend box office (Friday to Sunday), without going over, will win a copy of The Simpsons: Season 14 on Blu-ray.
Meanwhile, 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 copy of Archer: Season Two on Blu-ray.
Entries must be received by 10 a.m., Pacific Time on Friday to be eligible, so don't delay!
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