Monday, June 27, 2011

Box Office Round Up: Pure Randomness

Picture of Captain Kirk arm-wrestling Captain Kirk is always related 

Cars 2 was number one to nobody's surprise. But like I said, it could have made any amount of money, and I wouldn't be surprised. It brought in $66 million, which I am sure Disney is happy to have. That puts the opening just a little bit less than Finding Nemo, Up, and the Incredibles, but slightly more than Wall-E and Cars 1. 

If you recall, the original Cars was the first movie made after the Disney-Pixar merger, and the stock holders were less than pleased to see it make only $60 million. It went on to make $460m worldwide, and Star Wars-level money in merchandise. Oddly enough, Cars was not that big of a hit overseas, so the filmmakers this time around added in more foreign cars and stars (aka Jeff Gordon is in the US version, but is replaced by Sebastian Vettel in the German release, Fernando Alonso in the Spanish edition, etc.) so that should help them in the long run.

Again, Cars 2 is looking good money-wise. But it is nowhere near Toy Story 3 which opened to $110 million only 53 weeks ago, and in less theaters to boot. However, Cars is striking out with the critics as it sits at only 33% at Rotten Tomatoes. Let's compare to Toy Story 3 again, who sat at MORE than three times 33% for 197 reviews before it finally got a grumpy critic. And he received death threats for his review. Cars is not Toy Story.

The big winner is actually Bad Teacher. The R-rated comedy which was advertised almost solely on a Lebron James joke made $31.6 million for the number two spot. The Hangover was the king for R-rated comedies (until Hangover 2 came out anyway), and it didn't make much more its opening weekend at $45 million. If Disney was "happy" with with $66 million, Sony must be "ecstatic" with this. Neither of these two budgets have been released yet, but I can only imagine the entirety of Bad Teacher cost the same as one scene in Cars. And they both combined cost less than Green Lantern. Speaking of which... 

Disney is happy, Sony is ecstatic, and Warner Bros is suicidal. Green Lantern finished third with $18 million. That is a massive 66% drop from its low opening weekend. After ten days, it has yet to reach $90 million, and $90 million is still less than a third of its projected budget. 

Mr. Popper's Penguins also dropped hard, falling 45% to fifth (Super 8, which I still really need to see, held at #4) for a $10 million weekend/$40 million ten day total.

X-Men was sixth with $6 million/$133m life to date on a $160m budget. If it wasn't for Green Lantern and Mr. Popper, this would be the biggest flop of the year.

The year's highest grossing movie, Hangover 2, was seventh for $5.5m/$243m ltd, but right on its heels is Bridesmaids, making $300,000 less than Hangover -- despite being out for two extra weeks -- for a $146m total, and it has outlasted heavy hitters like Kung-Fu Panda 2 and Pirates 4. Did I mention its budget is only $32 million? Bridemaids is looking to be this year's big winner.

3 comments:

  1. I heard Cars 2 wasn't too good, focused too much on Mater or something. First Pixar flop? (Critically, not commercially.)

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  2. None of the movies out this summer have really gotten me exicited. sad to say I saw Thor... and was dissapointed. Dont think Ill see cars 2 or bad teacher. oh well... there is still hope. Guess Ill just wait for Harry Potter.

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