Box-Office Wrap-Up: Barbarians, Vampires and Spy Kids are No Match for the Ladies of 'The Help'
Not one of four new releases made a mark at the box-office
The Help
The one thing that really could help this film out is a massive box-office haul. However, I don't know how high it can go. It may stick around for a while, and it will definitely cross $100 million, but can it bring in much more?
Cummulative Total: $71.8 million
RottenTomatoes Score: 73%
Laremy's rank: Laremy picked it to finish #1 and his prediction of $18 million was $2.4m off for a percentage error of 11.76%.
Laremy's rank: Laremy picked it to finish #2 with $16.72 million, which is $0.42m off for a 2.58% error.
However, to be fair to Conan and Fright Night, Spy Kids isn't all that impressive when you take into consideration the previous installment brought in $33.4 million back in 2003. I guess Spy Kids 3D left such a rancid smell in audience's noses they weren't about to see what 4D and Arom-a-scope would do to their sniffers. Can't blame 'em.
As far as reader predictions go, John Debono's $12.3 million prediction takes the cake.
Laremy's rank: Laremy picked it to finish #5 with $11.53 million, which is $0.47m off for a 3.92% error.
Laremy didn't have a lot of confidence in this film as it was, but even his tiny prediction ended up being too high. John Debono, however, once again damn near nailed it with a $10.6 million prediction. Someone get that guy an Oracle job!
Laremy's rank: Laremy picked it to finish #4 with $13.56 million, which is $3.56m off for a 35.6% error.
Laremy's rank: Laremy picked it to finish #7 with $7.82 million, which is $0.18m off for a 2.25% error.
Luckily for DreamWorks and Touchstone this one only cost $30 million, which means once all things are said and done it should come out the other end just fine.
On the prediction side of things, Laremy was way off and the readers were all over the board. Some even had it coming in #1 with one person saying, "Fright Night will beat Help… Why? Fright Night's got David Tennant, who will bring in the 'Doctor Who' audience." That "Doctor Who" audience must be the only audience that showed up if that's the case.
A reader going by the name Bustray, however, wasn't fooled and his $7 million prediction was the closest on the board.
Laremy's rank: Laremy picked it to finish #3 with $14.01 million, which is $6.11m off for a 77.34% error.
Laremy's rank: Laremy picked it to finish #6 with $8.83 million, which is $1.13m off for a 14.68% error.
Laremy's rank: Laremy picked it to finish #8 with $7.53 million, which is $1.23m off for a 19.52% error.
Laremy's rank: Laremy picked it to finish #9 with $6.4 million, which is $1.3m off for a 25.49% error.
Laremy's rank: Not Ranked
Next week sees three new releases coming to theaters in the form of Don't be Afraid of the Dark, Our Idiot Brother and Colombiana. Of the three I have seen two of them already and I'm not expecting major results from any of them. The widest release among the lot, based on early theater projections, will be Colombiana with 2,500 theaters, but Screen Gems isn't screening that for critics here in Seattle until 7 PM the night before release. Never a good sign.
Are we looking at another weekend where The Help will take the top spot? If it falls another 21.4% it's looking at a $16.09 million weekend. Think one of those new releases can beat it?
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I'm so glad that Crazy Stupid Love has been holding up well. Really enjoyed that movie.
Next weekend The Help will likely win again. Don't Be Afraid of the Dark and Columbiana will hit lower double digits and Our Idiot Brother will do $5-6 million. Midnight in Paris will be back in the top 10 with $3-4 million.
wroooooong
What a messy weekend indeed!!
I saw a trailer for Columbiana this week and it just looks like a generic shoot-em-up in that bog-standard Luc Besson way that's guided The Transporter series.
I don't think it's going to do much for the rep of Zoe Saldana which is a shame, because I think she's better than what the flick appears to look like.
There's probably not going to be any standouts next weekend either.
Arnold Schwarzenegger is the greatest Conan of all time. Jason Momoa looks more like Tarzan than Conan.
It is unfortunate that 5 Days of War, an important film about the 2008 Russia-Georgia conflict, only got a limited release in the U.S. and has already gone straight to DVD here in the UK. It has Renny Harlin directing and a stellar cast which was the best of any of the new releases this week – Rupert Friend, Val Kilmer, Andy Garcia, Dean Cain, Emmanuelle Chriqui, Heather Graham, Antje Traue, Rade Serbedzija. It would have been interesting to see how it would have done commercially if released nationwide.
5 Days of War (or 5 Days of August) was major disappointment for me. It was an ambitious project but in the end it's just one more war drama with plenty of cliches and political propaganda..
Don't underestimate the female demos. I can't wait to see Twilight break the openning weekend record. Just to see what the demos of the oppostie sex will do.
Twilight will never break Harry Potter's record, sorry.
Why not? The second one made 142 million in the first three days and that was without 3D. It can break that current record.
Nope, I agree, Breaking Dawn won't break HP's record. It may just be me, but I think part of the fandom is waning. Eclipse didn't have as big an opening weekend as New Moon. There is so much fighting in the fandom, and it has turned a lot of the fans off the series. Not to mention that the films have not lived up to the books. Splitting BD into two films and having them open a year apart is a risk that might come back to bite Summit in the ass.
It didn't bite Warners in the ass for splitting the last part of the HP series apart. And the openning for the last film was effected by the summer release date. And the midweek opening. If they had opened that film on a Friday instead of a Wednesday it would've openned ridiculously higher.
The size of the Twilight fandom does not compare to the size of the HP fandom. Deathly Hollows sold 24 million books in its first 24 hours of release — at that time, the whole Twilight series hadn't sold anywhere near that much. Publishing may never again see that kind of phenomenon again.
HP is a better story that plays to a bigger audience — Twi is a teen romance. Don't get me wrong, I've been a fan of both — I loved the Twi books, but I can tell the difference between a good story and an epic tale of good vs. evil. HP is the highest grossing franchise in film history.
I really don't think Breaking Dawn will compare. Summit went cheap with their franchise, even when it made HUGE amounts of money, and it shows. BD will be the same as the others, disappointing.
Just one more point. HP7.2 had the epic battle of Hogwarts — characters died. Tears and triumph.
What will there be to build on in Breaking Dawn Pt. 2? Bella as a vampire? OK, that will be good for about 15 minutes, and I'm being generous there.
SPOILERS:
If you've read the book, you already know that it builds to a great showdown between the Volturi vs. the Cullens, various vamps and the wolves. Then, at the last second, all is resolved and everyone goes home. No battle. It's worse than the ending of The Stand.
I see Our Idiot Brother taking the top spot next week, but it will be a weak weekend. Prob earn 12-17 M at #1
it won't.
I'm not surprised to see Conan and Fright Night bomb. I gave them the benefit of the doubt cause I did think there were a few previous comps that indicated they had more potential, but I'm not surprised that people turned away. An interesting aside on those two is that their 3D percentages were in the mid-60% range, which is better than all 3D films this summer except Final Destination. However, a glance around several theatres within a 50 mile radius of me show that a lot of them offered both films in both dimensions, but only on one screen each. And generally, the matinees were 2D and the evening shows (when films like this will do most of their business) were in 3D. I guess that's one way to try and keep the gimmick relevant, though it obviously doesn't work if you have both options all day, as we've seen on all the other 3D films this summer. Of course it could have also turned people away when they showed up and saw the films were only playing in 3D. We'll never know of course, but could they have done better if more theatres had offered both dimensions all day?
Re: next weekend…we're getting into mega-garbage time for Hollywood. The Help will probably repeat with around $15 million. Colombiana could get that high I suppose, but I rather doubt it will. Don't Be Afraid and Our Idiot Brother will be non-issues, with Don't Be Afraid especially being hurt by the release date. Drop that in October instead of the dead zone around Labor Day and its OW potential probably doubles. I'm even more interested to see how Labor Day weekend plays out, with three wide releases that all seem to have very little appeal, plus continually dwindling holdovers. Might be a contender for one of those rare weekends where the winner makes less than $10 million.
I'd bet on Don't Be Afraid of The Dark for next weekend, but I don't know, The Help seems to be holding up pretty well.
I smelled from a mile away that the latest Spy Kids movie would not do well. Many though it was a stinker, and wouldn't watch it even if they were drunk as skunk, despite the movie being shown in Aroma-Scope.
You guys thought this weekend was a mess? Next weekend has the potential to be even more abysmal than this one. I mean, if a 4D movie and two 80's remakes didn't perform well, why would this unappealing batch do any better? Here are my early predix:
1) THE HELP
U$14.5M (-29%)
2) DON'T BE AFRAID OF THE DARK
U$10.6M
3) RISE OF THE PLANET OF THE APES
U$10M (-38%)
4) COLOMBIANA
U$7.9M
5) OUR IDIOT BROTHER
U$7.2M
Help conquers America while in the UK, Cowboys and Aliens got it's ass kicked by The Inbetweeners Movie.
There's an Inbetweeners movie?
I like the show, but don't know if it's enough to carry a feature film.
The movie has already hit British soil and has broken box office records for the biggest opening for a British comedy movie (eclipsing Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason).
In October, The Inbetweeners Movie will be released in Australia and Russia.
As far as the plot is concerned the boys go on holiday abroad.
In other words it's pretty much the same set up as Kevin and Perry go Large, Holiday On the Busses, the movie version of Are You Being Served and of course the Sex & the City and Hangover sequels.
Thanks — I am actually looking forward to seeing this on dvd. It probably won't open here in theaters in the states.