Gopher

Pre-Christmas weekdays this year won't be as good as last year's. I think very few schools are out before Wednesday.

12.785m for MI4. -17% Sunday drop, pretty good considering everything else dropped high 20s/low 30s.

Still waiting on Paramount... 1 Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows $39,637,079 -- 3,703 -- $10,704 $39,637,079 1 Warner Bros. 2 Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked $23,244,744 -- 3,723 -- $6,244 $23,244,744 1 Fox 3 New Year's Eve $7,310,413 -44% 3,505 0 $2,086 $24,716,167 2 Warner Bros. / New Line 4 The Sitter $4,608,681 -53% 2,752 2 $1,675 $17,929,987 2 Fox 5 The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part 1 $4,197,893 -46% 2,958 -646 $1,419 $266,327,974 5 Summit 6 Arthur Christmas $3,554,286 -45% 2,929 -343 $1,213 $38,501,631 4 Sony / Columbia 7 The Muppets $3,520,926 -50% 2,808 -520 $1,254 $70,994,571 4 Disney 8 Jack and Jill $1,228,843 -60% 1,910 -877 $643 $70,506,629 6 Sony / Columbia 9 Happy Feet Two $1,077,329 -71% 1,780 -1060 $605 $58,909,873 5 Warner Bros. 10 Tower Heist $901,025 -62% 1,315 -754 $685 $75,788,740 7 Universal 11 Immortals $851,371 -65% 1,216 -1083 $700 $81,889,376 6 Relativity Media The Descendants $3,268,357 -25% 878 2 $3,723 $28,645,909 5 Fox Searchlight

Call me whatever you want, it won't make Clash of the Titans any less painful to sit through.

Avatar was a much bigger competitor to SH1 than MI4 is to SH2, so that rule doesn't really work...

Looks like another loud fart of a movie.

Absolute best case scenario for Alvin is Yogi Bear's multiplier, which would bring the movie towards 140 million. I'm expecting 120-130 million, half of the Squeakquel's admissions. Sherlock doesn't have a chance at 200m, if it's really lucky it'll recover next week and get past 160m. Unless Wednesday really surprises us, MI4 is poised to be the event movie of Christmas after a terrific launch this weekend and what feels like some great word of mouth. Dragon Tattoo's a wild card from my perspective. Tintin and Zoo will do more modest numbers. War Horse will do well but not huge or anything.

giteshpandya Gitesh Pandya Final opening wknds a tad bit lower than estimated - #Sherlock$39.6M & #Alvin $23.2M. Both hoping for holiday legs. Alvin and the Chipmunks: $23,244,744 The Sitter: $4.608.681

CRAZY GOOD finale. Lewis and Danes deserve Emmy nods for their work in the last two episodes alone.

Hathaway and Cotillard are nice steps up from Holmes and Gyllenhaal, no? Loved the prologue and the trailer got me pumped. July 20th, oh my god. Nolan! Nolan! Chris Chris Nolan! Nolan! Chris Chris!

It also had a 5-day opening.

Some of the best orchestrated action sequences I've ever witnessed. The Burj Khalifa scenes were unbelievable.

MI4 in 425 theaters opens to as much as New Year's Eve in 3500 theaters. Hah.

This looks like a step back for Dreamworks after a relatvely impressive run of movies (Dragon, Megamind, KFP, Puss, I'll leave Shrek out of this).

I do. Carnage bombed. Artist and Tinker Tailor are hanging in there.

Solution? Give it a special award. DH2 isn't Potter at its best. Nothing in the film particularly deserves any non-technical nomination, but they've been doing this for ten years. No franchise has approached the scope of Potter. That demands recognition.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z98vawSOlK4Good advice for theaters everywhere

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-mEfsU0EPSQHe's really done it this time. I swear I got emotionally giddy near the end.

Mojo's up- Friday, December 16, 2011 >Yr >Mo >Wk >>Next Day TD YD Title (Click to View) Studio Daily Gross % +/- YD / LW Theaters / Avg Gross To-Date Day 1 - Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows WB $14,700,000 - - 3,703 $3,970 $14,700,000 1 2 - Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked Fox $6,800,000 - - 3,723 $1,826 $6,800,000 1 3 - Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol Par. $4,110,000 - - 425 $9,671 $4,110,000 1 4 1 New Year's Eve WB (NL) $2,530,000 +139% -50% 3,505 $722 $19,936,000 8 5 2 The Sitter Fox $1,435,000 +90% -61% 2,752 $521 $14,756,000 8 6 3 The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 1 Sum. $1,300,000 +92% -47% 2,958 $439 $263,430,000 29 7 - Young Adult Par. $1,105,000 +3,452% +1,132% 986 $1,121 $1,545,000 8 8 4 Hugo Par. $966,000 +85% -39% 2,532 $382 $36,414,000 24 9 6 The Descendants FoxS $930,000 +116% -29% 878 $1,059 $26,308,000 31 10 7 The Muppets BV $854,000 +100% -49% 2,808 $304 $68,328,000 24 11 5 Arthur Christmas Sony $840,000 +89% -41% 2,929 $287 $35,787,000 24 12 10 Jack and Jill Sony $360,000 +88% -59% 1,910 $188 $69,638,000 36 13 9 Happy Feet Two WB $255,000 -5% -70% 1,780 $143 $58,088,000 29 14 8 Immortals Rela. $238,000 -13% -67% 1,210 $197 $81,276,000 36 - 14 My Week with Marilyn Wein. $156,000 +64% -28% 244 $639 $5,652,000 24 - 12 J. Edgar WB $105,000 -22% -71% 703 $149 $35,437,000 38 - - Shame FoxS $89,000 +162% +6% 51 $1,745 $1,013,000 15 - - The Artist Wein. $73,400 +82% -5% 17 $4,318 $1,114,000 22 >Yr >Mo >Wk >>Next Day Is it fair to call Muppets a relative disappointment now? I can't believe that Disney wasn't expecting 100 million from this. And Shame died, bah.

Arrested Development's one of the greatest sitcoms produced and I'll happily say that Running Wilde and Sit Down, Shut Up were terrible television. Hurwitz himself said that he put less effort into those shows than he put into AD.

I'd like to say there's some established principle that would explain why the box office has gone to shit, but I don't really know. At the end of the day, it may be specific to the movie. No one loved Sherlock Holmes or Valentine's Day or the Squeakquel, so their sequels would drop off precipitously. But that rule doesn't really carry over to MI4 or other movies. I think it's just fatigue of the theater experience (high ticket/parking/concession prices), particularly with families, which not only fuel kiddie movies but the biggest tentpoles, too. For the first time in nine years, no family movie will reach 200m domestic. Last year, six family movies made 200m. That's big. And all 3D is doing right now is hiding how bad admissions for tentpole kidpics really are. Having said that, barring some kind of economic collapse, I think Avengers, TDKR, and The Hobbit are all safe. Those define 'must-see' movies.

If it has the same exact run as Alvin 1 from here on out, it makes 113 million. Unadjusted for inflation, that's half of the Squeakquel!Alvin is this year's Yogi Bear and Sherlock is this year's Fockers. I imagine that MI4 will be our Tron Legacy and War Horse, Tintin or Tattoo will be our True Grit.

But who wants to rush out and see the prologue (that's playing in less than 20% of MI4's current sites) besides people like us? This hasn't been advertised or anything. I didn't even know that a regular trailer was playing with digital IMAX prints of MI4.

It's amazing how much utter crap goes through the pilot process that no one even gets to see. I can assure you more than half of those shows won't be on TV next September.

Alvin is fine. It's looking at 8-10m today, give it the same multiplier the original had in 2007 (with a better Sunday drop from snowstorms) and that's a 28m-34m weekend. Holidays will take it to 140m-160m- not what the last two did, but even without a sucky year for kidpics, it couldn't keep doing 200m forever. Sherlock 2 will have a Tron Legacy type of run and 500m+ worldwide. It's also fine. I want to know if that 4.1m MI4 figure includes the 1.1m from 9PM/midnight shows. Everything's still in place for a breakout movie. Will it be MI4 when it expands on Wednesday? Will it be Dragon Tattoo? War Horse? Tintin (probably/definitely not)?