Thanksgiving Predictions

Haven't had a chance to update in awhile, so I'll try to summarize the past two weeks. 2012 did rock solid business in its opening on November 13th with a $65.2 million opening weekend. Now I did overestimate its potential, it should still have a great total of around $160-180 million.

The BIGGEST story by far was the opening of Twilight: New Moon last weekend. It shot past The Dark Knight's opening day with a massive $72.7 million first day, and got the third best opening weekend of all time with $142.8 million, DOUBLING Twilight's first weekend of last year. At this point, I don't see any less than $315 million for New Moon, which would most likely make it the biggest movie of the winter season.


The Blind Side also did amazing business last weekend, with the biggest opening ever for a sports drama! Sandra Bullock proved she is one of the most appealing actresses working this year, with this and The Proposal, even making the much-delayed All About Steve avoid total bomb status. The Blind Side could potentially gross over $150 million over the holiday seasons, easily becoming one of the biggest surprises this year.

With Thanksgiving tomorrow, the box office looks to be very bright. My final weekend predictions:


Rank Movie - Prediction -(Percent Change from last wknd) - 5-Day Gross

1. Twilight: New Moon - $45 million (-68.5%) $67.8 million
2. The Blind Side - $29.5 million (-13.5%) $42.4 million
3. Old Dogs - $22 million (NEW) $32.1 million
4. 2012 - $18 million (-31.8%) $26.1 million
5. A Christmas Carol - $14 million (+14.1%) $20 million
6. Ninja Assassin - $11.3 million (NEW) $19.1 million
7. Planet 51 - $9.6 million (-21.9%) $13.2 million
8. The Fantastic Mr. Fox - $9.1 million (+4371.5%) $12.4 million
9. Precious - $7.2 million (-33.8%) $9.4 million
10. The Men Who Stare At Goats - $1 million (-64.7%) $1.5 million 

Even with two new releases, Twilight: New Moon looks to stay #1 over the Thanksgiving holiday, even though it will fall nearly 70%.  

Old Dogs is marketing as the new Wild Hogs, but I can't see it having the same success. Wild Hogs had a much more appealing trailer and cast (arguably). All of the trailers and TV spots are fast and frenetic, with jokes mostly relating to a very friendly gorilla and some depth perception drug, all which take focus off what the movie is really even about. Still, this type of comedy will have an audience, which should give it over a $30 million 5-Day gross. 

The Blind Side in my opinion will be the story of the weekend. Not only was it huge last weekend, it's barely going to fall at all. 

November 13th - 15th Weekend Predictions

Final Predictions:

1. 2012 - $ 77.0 million (NEW)
2. A Christmas Carol - $ 19.8 million (-34.1%)
3. Michael Jackson's This Is It - $ 7.0 million (-46.8%)
4. The Men Who Stare at Goats - $ 6.1 million (-52.0%)
5. The Fourth Kind - $ 6.0 million (-50.9%)
6. Paranormal Activity - $ 4.6 million (-44.4%)
7. Precious- $ 4.3 million (+129.7%)
8. Couples Retreat - $ 3.8 million (-38.0%)
9. Law Abiding Citizen - $ 3.4 million (-43.4%)
10. The Box - $ 3.4 million (-55.1%)
11. Pirate Radio - $ 1.8 million (NEW)

2012 is headed for some big numbers this weekend. We actually are going to have a very big next three weekends, starting with 2012, New Moon next weekend, and then Thanksgiving weekend following. 2012's marketing campaign has been vast and has definitely made the movie look like the most epic of all disaster movies and an eerie possibility for the future. I don't see any less than a $70 million opening weekend.

Not as confident on the holdovers. Veteran's Day has thrown off some of the regular daily patterns which makes weekend predictions a little simpler. Still, The Box should have one of the biggest dropoffs.

Pirate Radio is bound to sink in my opinion. No buzz or interest. The similarly-themed Taking Woodstock had at least some Oscar-potential at the time and far less competion. I don't see Pirate Radio making much more than $2 million this weekend.

Last weekend's HUGE surprise, Precious, expands into 126 theaters this weekend and will make a minimum of $4 million. It had one of the highest per theater averages ever last weekend in only 16 theaters, nearly breaking into the top ten!

Best and Worst Poster Marketing of Upcoming Movies

Movie posters are an essential piece to every single movie ever released. When done right, a movie poster can provide a great indication of quality to a consumer and get them interested in a movie. On the other side, a bad movie poster doesn't create any attention and the entire point of the poster is lost. Here's what I view as the best posters for movies yet to be released, and just for fun, the worst!

THE BEST

2012 - A truly fantastic yet frightening image of an entire city going underwater. Paints the story perfectly of what could happen if the Mayans were right.

Alice in Wonderland - It won't be released until next spring, but Disney is already doing a great job of showing off their new, colorful zaniness of their live-action Tim Burton-directed Alice in Wonderland with a great poster of Johnny Depp as the Mad Hatter.

New Moon - A great teaser that very simply shows the story focus of the Twilight sequel.

THE WORST

When in Rome - This is about the scariest picture I've ever seen of Kristen Bell. No one would have any idea what this movie is about (or even care) other than a girl wishing to be so giant that she could eat a small taxi-car thing full of six men.

Extraordinary Measures - Words can't explain this awful, boring poster. That line down the back of Brendan Fraser over Harrison Ford's jacket breaks every design rule. Plus to top it off - is it a horror film (the dark red horror movie title font) or an inspirational drama (the tagline of "Don't hope for a miracle. Make One.")??

Avatar - Yes, this is only a teaser poster, but with less than two months away til the actual release date, this is all we have of the large $200+ million budgeted James Cameron film. Just a slightly creepy blue face. At least the trailer is good.

Weekend Preview: November 6th - 8th

November starts off with a bang this weekend, with four new releases looking to stir up some winter business. Jim Carrey's big new animated adventure, A Christmas Carol, debuts tomorrow. Carrey is no stranger to big holiday films, from How the Grinch Stole Christmas ($260 million) to Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events ($118 million). A Christmas Carol is the third motion-caputure style of animation from Zemeckis, following The Polar Express ($180 million) and Beowulf ($82 million). A Christmas Carol should easily catch the #1 postion this weekend. Its had its advertisements everywhere, my only concern is how appealing they are to children. The colors are very dark and it's not Santa-related like The Polar Express. More importantly, the trailers aren't terribly funny. Still, Jim Carrey will still find a large audience which will give A Christmas Carol around a $30 million gross this weekend and a long run ahead throughout Christmas.

Our other 3 releases are fighting to top This Is It's second weekend. The Men Who Stare At Goats has the best chance in my opinion. It has a very funny trailer with a very unique premise. The posters stand out, especially the obvious title. It doesn't have as good of polls as Burn After Reading, but it still should pull around a $16 million opening. 

The Box and The Fourth Kind are looking for horror fans craving more after Halloween. The Fourth Kind has a particularly disturbingly real trailer, a la Paranormal Activity. That will also hurt it as much as it helps it, considering Paranormal Activity has now stolen its thunder and audience. It should pull around an $11 million opening this weekend. The Box headlines Cameron Diaz as its star and centers around a mysterious box that when pressed, gives a couple $1 million, but will also kill someone. If only the trailers focused just on this! Instead, the trailers abandon the "box" halfway through and jump to other random plot points, all the while forgetting to establish Cameron Diaz and James Marsden as real characters. This will make The Box the lowest grossing new release of the four with around $8 million.

My predictions:
1. A Christmas Carol - $29.2 million (NEW)
2. The Men Who Stare At Goals - $16 million (NEW)
3. Michael Jackson's This Is It - $13.5 million (-42%)
4. The Fourth Kind - $11 million (NEW)
5. The Box - $7.8 million (NEW)
6. Paranormal Activity - $7.8 million (-52%)
7. Law Abiding Citizen - $4.5 million (-39%)
8. Couples Retreat - $3.9 million (-40%)
9. Where the Wild Things Are - $2.7 million (-55%)
10. Saw VI - $1.9 million (-62%)


On the holdovers, This Is It should hold relatively well since the initial demand was burned off last week by opening on a Wednesday instead of a Friday. It is also showing very good word of mouth. Paranormal Activity will suffer from good Halloween dailies last weekend as well as two new horror entries. Where the Wild Things Are really can't catch a break, as it will most likely fall over 55% for the third weekend in a row.


Last weekend's accuracy: 87.23% (Ranked # 66 of 465) - Definitely not as high ranked as I wanted to be. I way underestimated Halloween's effect on the family films and used the wrong number for Couples Retreat.