spatulashack

Donna Langley wooed James and ultimately Universal got the rights but part of the contract stipulated that Focus Features handle the marketing and distribution of the film. For whatever reason James felt the studio's specialty division would be a better fit. Universal brass disagreed but in the end they relented. The merger of Focus and Film District complicated things since Peter Schlessel essentially took his entire Film District team with him causing the majority of Focus executives to be let go. The NEW Focus Features wasn't what James had signed up for so she eventually allowed Donna and her team at Universal to handle all aspects of the release. Despite the huge opening and the fact that the movie was indeed best suited for a big standard release and marketing campaign, the entire ordeal no doubt caused James to become more protective of the sequels. Don't quote me on this but something tells me that a new contract had to be written up in order to move distribution over to Universal proper which may have inadvertently given James more control than Donna and Universal originally intended. In the end, I'm sure the success of the film will render most of this irrelevent and everyone will quickly come to an agreement to get both sequels into production before the end of the year.

I assure you, it's accurate.

Have these been posted yet? Fifty Shades: 4.21 (+1%) Kingsman: 2.29 (+3%) Spongebob: 1.01 (+3%) American Sniper: 1.15 (+11%) Jupiter Ascending: 0.58 (-1%) Paddington: 0.46 (+9%) The Imitation Game: 0.34 (+9%)

Interstellar 0.78 (+5%)

I'd agree but that B Cinemascore and the "dark" ending may have an effect in the long run. Not that it matters. Disney's over the moon with the results as it is. Same with Universal and Unbroken. Both films should hit "plan" number by next week and the rest is gravy.

Tuesday! The Hobbit 8.0 (+6%) Into the Woods 6.54 (+7%) Unbroken 5.42 (+5%) Night at the Museum 5.31 (+19%) Annie 4.4 (+15%) Hunger Games 2.40 (+8%) Big Hero 6 1.68 (+19%) Imitation Game 1.63 (+5%) The Gambler 1.63 (+6%)

In theory yes but so will walk-up business for Ouija.

I'll tell you this much, I'm not sure what Anita Bush is talking about when she claims the Ouija matinee numbers are "leading the pack". It's odd verbiage since the Ouija matinees are below both Gone Girl and Fury right now. Even if I take into account all tickets purchased and not just the matinees, the gap narrows but John Wick is still technically "leading the pack." I have no doubt Ouija will pull ahead this evening and her Friday estimates seem reasonable to me but I don't like the fuzzy and dishonest way she posts these updates.

All I can say is I use a combination of two different proprietary sources and my own internal numbers. The number estimates deadline is using takes into account tickets purchased in advance for showtimes beyond the matinees.

It's still early but: Ouija matinees are essentially identical to Carrie at this point John Wick looks strong right now and is nearly doubling Ouija matinees but that is to be expected since Ouija is a teen horror/thriller and won't start taking off until late in the day.

Men, Women and Children is by no means a great film but who in their right mind thought releasing it on the same day as Gone Girl was a good idea? Same goes for The Good Lie. All three films pull a similar audience. Both Paramount and Warner Bros. are completely clueless when it comes to scheduling a limited roll-out and it's most likely because they prematurely shuttered all of their specialty film divisions back in 2008. Sony Pictures Classics has no problem getting great per-screen averages on even marginal films because they know the business. They use counter-programming to their advantage and they pay close attention to the theatres they book. Paramount royally screwed up the releases of Young Adult and Labor Day as well. I'm going to assume Reitman signed a three picture deal with the studio after Up in the Air or he would have jumped ship long ago.

To be fair, a low budget horror film with a 15 million Friday gross isn't really all that newsworthy. The first Purge grossed 17 million on Friday with no connection to a franchise. Even The Devil Inside grossed 16 million on Friday. It's a great first day to be sure and the studio is probably thrilled but an adult drama like Gone Girl opening to what may be a 40 million weekend is pretty incredible. Hollywood rarely makes movies like this anymore and they are difficult to sell even when based on a known novel. Walk Among the Tombstones had a similar tone and tanked. 13.2 is a huge Friday number for this genre.

Looks like 15.3 at this point.

To be honest, that isn't really all that surprising. Drive was sitting at 93% on RT and got a C- cinemascore. This movie was always going to be divisive. I still think it will have steady holds and perform like an other adult skewing drama.

That 15-17 million range provided by Rth for Gone Girl looked perfectly reasonable at the time of day he posted it. It was doing insane business on the east coast at the time. Gloomy thrillers sometimes lose steam when they head west. It's looking more like 13.3 as of this morning which is nothing to sneeze at.

It's about 15% behind Conjuring at the same time of day but a movie like Annabelle is too hard to judge in matinees since most horror business is done at night

Let's not jump to that. It's doing very well but remember that Gravity's numbers on Friday began to skyrocket midday. Both films skew older but Gravity also performed well with the 20-somethings and it kept the momentum going into the late night. I don't believe Gone Girl will be doing that but who knows at this point.

Gone Girl is doing insane early business today. For comparison, matinee numbers so far are currently 300% greater for Gone Girl than Prisoners and just 10% less than Gravity.

It's still too early to really say. I can say that it's about 60% ahead of The Call at the same time of day. If you were to apply that to The Call's opening Friday you'd get about $9.8 million.

Judging by the numbers I'm seeing, I don't see it winning the weekend. It's currently a tad behind the first Dolphin Tale at the same time of day. It's still possible but I'd put my money on No Good Deed winning the weekend with Dolphin Tale pulling ahead the following week.

It's less about Elba and more about a general hunger for this particular "woman in danger" genre which always manage to surprise people and do business. I believe internal comps for this one was The Call which so far seems spot on. Expect Jennifer Lopez's The Boy Next Door to do decent business as well come January.

Sorry about my hiatus. The numbers were just too depressing for me to report on.

Thursday! Ninja - 4.27 (-16%) Guardians - 4.22 (-13%) Let's Be Cops - 3.22 (-38%) The Hundred-Foot Journey - 1.16 (-16%) Into the Storm - 1.16 (-14%) Lucy - 0.89 (-19%) Step Up All In - 0.49 (-19%) Hercules - 0.45 (-19%) Get on Up 0.37 (-15%) Dawn of the Planet of the Apes - 0.37 (-23%)

Wednesday! Let's Be Cops- 5.3 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - 5.0 (-33%) Guardians of the Galaxy - 4.82 (-27%) The Hundred-Foot Journey - 1.37 (-20%) Into the Storm - 1.35 (-34%) Lucy - 1.10 (-27%) Step Up All In - 0.59 (-35%) Hercules 0.57(-29%) Dawn of the Planet of the Apes 0.52 (-28%) Get on Up - 0.46 (-26%)