Bluebomb

How did TASM's OD pre-sales stack up with recent blockbusters? Movie OD admissions % diff The Amazing Spider-Man 32,580 The Avengers 47,317 -31.1% Transformers 3 44,161 -26.2% Harry Potter 7-2 62,089 -47.5% Toy Story 3 32,294 +0.9% Pirates 4 21,559 +51.1% Shrek 3 49,634 -34.4% Not great judging from the list. It doesn't mean much except confirm that TASM will make over 3m this weekend. Friday adm. June 29 Rank Title LW TW WKD % chg QD % chg 1 The Amazing Spider-Man 3D -- 52,569 -- -- 2 The Amazing Spider-Man 2D -- 11,902 -- -- 3 Motorway -- 7,157 -- -- 4 The Dictator -- 1,787 -- -- 5 The Bounty -- 1,258 -- -- The Amazing Spider-Man total OD admissions - 64,471 3D share - 81.5% 2D share - 18.5% Good for The Amazing Spider-Man. OD should be about $600,000, maybe slightly more. Very good for Motorway. The Dictator did alright. Terrible for The Bounty. Saturday adm. (so far) June 30 Rank Title LW TW WKD % chg QD % chg 1 The Amazing Spider-Man 3D -- 31,491 -- +14.0% 2 The Amazing Spider-Man 2D -- 4,972 -- +0.1% 3 Motorway -- 2,453 -- +20.6% 4 The Dictator -- 461 -- -5.5% 5 Prometheus 3D -- 364 -- The storm is suppressing pre-sales for all movies today. I think TASM could get to 85,000 admissions for 3D today. When a typhoon hit HK last time, the #1 film at that time, Johnny English Reborn, managed a 6.99 multiplier from pre-sales to final numbers (8,271 -> 57,796). It's obvious that TASM won't achieve the same multiplier but I could see admissions pouring in throughout the day. 2D version should pull in the same or slightly below number of admissions from yesterday. It should be close to about $900,000 for Saturday for a 2-day total of about 1.5m. Typhoon Warning Signal #8 is now in effect. All public transportation is suspended and will remain this way until the #8 signal has gone down. _______________________________________________________________________ Although I wanted to hold off on this piece of news till Monday, it was simply to great to pass up. IMAX theaters opened up showtimes for pre-selling today and the response has been enormous. Most showtimes are already 30-40% full with peak showtimes nearing the 50% mark. The catch? This was only open to those who have a PPS account. Tickets for the rest of the public go on sale on July 2 but I suspect these showtimes will be 70-80% full by then.

Because it's made for the mainland audience. The first one was dubbed into Cantonese for the HK market whereas this one is in Putonghua and HK audiences do not like that.

Amazing Spider-Man is doing well with walk-ins. #8 signal is going up tonight. That means all public transportation is suspended but there will be no showings overnight so we won't have to worry about that. The worst of the weather could be over by the first morning show tomorrow. I also updated the first post with July and August movie release schedules. Check the first post if you want to see which movies are coming out in August. I will only focus on July's movies for now. Release Date Movie Title July 5 Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter Painted Skin: The Resurrection Hotaru the Movie: It's Only A Little Light In My Life Elles Late Autumn July 7 The Flying Machine July 12 W.E. Ice Age: Continental Drift The Four July 19 The Dark Knight Rises When Pigs Have Wings July 26 Step Up Revolution Beloved The Pirates! Band of Misfits One Piece 3D: Mugiwara Chase/Toriko 3D: Gourmet Adventure Doraemon: Nobita and the Island of Miracles - Animal Adventure Wu Dang Next weekend will be pretty bland. Painted Skin 2 seems like a dud. Abraham Lincoln looks bad and vampire movies never do well here. And it's sandwiched between Spider-Man and Dark Knight. The only good thing that will come out of next weekend is Ice Age 4's special screenings. Elles and Late Autumn are limited-semi limited release movies. Amazing Spider-Man will easily repeat on top. July 12 will be Ice Age 4's only week on top. The previous Ice Age movie opened to 1.9m. At the time, it broke animation records. Even though Ice Age 4 is getting advanced screenings the weekend before, I could still see it making 2m OW. It will be virtually unchallenged and a lot of demand for Spider-Man will have dried up. Amazing Spider-Man will still keep screens though so it won't breakout and exceed 3m. 2.5m is a possibility. Other movies that week are a mainland-catering film and an arthouse flick. July 19 is the biggie. The Dark Knight Rises will steal the show and I believe it will break 2D records. 3.5m OW is my prediction at this point. When Pigs Have Wings seems like a limited engagement film. July 26 will be interesting to watch because you've got 3 animation flicks. 2 steady Japanese anime movies (One Piece/Toriko and Doraemon) then you've got Pirates! Band of Misfits in there too. The anime movies won't make a lot of money but I could see Pirates eking out a $200,000 weekend. Step Up Revolution is looking to build on the 3rd movie's success. There doesn't seem to be a lot of demand for this one though. I see only a $500,000 weekend for it. The Dark Knight Rises will reign supreme once again.

The typhoon will enhance OW. It happened last time with Johnny English Reborn opening last September. I'm not really sure by how much though.My weekend prediction right now is 3.8m. Even though pre-sales were nothing special, walk-ins have been brisk. The typhoon might even boost it to 4m.UPDATE: #3 warning signal soon to be in force.

The storm is racing towards HK. It could be at its closest point to HK by tonight.

Wait for what?

Weather will play a big role this weekend. I wouldn't mention it in the title if it wasn't important.

Tropical cyclone warning #1 signal has been issued. Deteriorating conditions expected Friday night into Saturday. Update #2 (Opening day admissions @ Palace APM) Palace APM The Amazing Spider-Man 3D The Amazing Spider-Man 2D Day Time Seats sold Seats available % filled Day Time Seats sold Seats available % filled Jun. 29 9:00 AM 59 286 20.6% Jun. 29 10:00 AM 93 114 81.6% 9:30 AM 27 167 16.2% 12:30 PM 16 114 14.0% 10:15 AM 44 112 39.3% 4:50 PM 23 112 20.5% 11:35 AM 143 286 50.0% 7:40 PM 78 98 79.6% 12:00 PM 6 167 3.6% 12:20 AM 20 112 17.9% 1:00 PM 6 98 6.1% 2:10 PM 30 286 10.5% 2:20 PM 4 112 3.6% 2:30 PM 7 167 4.2% 3:00 PM 6 114 5.3% 3:30 PM 10 98 10.2% 4:40 PM 40 286 14.0% 5:00 PM 6 167 3.6% 5:30 PM 12 114 10.5% 6:40 PM 4 98 4.1% 7:10 PM 103 286 36.0% 7:20 PM 13 112 11.6% 7:30 PM 53 167 31.7% 8:00 PM 51 114 44.7% 9:15 PM 42 98 42.9% 9:40 PM 115 286 40.2% 9:50 PM 21 112 18.8% 10:00 PM 15 167 9.0% 10:30 PM 18 114 15.8% 11:45 PM 8 98 8.2% 12:10 AM 29 286 10.1% 12:30 AM 5 167 3.0% 1:00 AM 4 114 3.5% Total 881 4679 18.8% Total 230 550 41.8% Not much change. I expected stronger sales than that. Disappointing. Thursday adm. June 28 Rank Title LW TW % chg 1 Motorway -- 10,287 -- 2 The Bounty -- 2,986 -- 3 The Dictator -- 2,961 -- 4 Prometheus 3D -- 2,731 -- 5 The Raven -- 2,662 -- Very good for Motorway. Bad for The Bounty. Good for The Dictator. Ok for Prometheus. Poor for The Raven. Friday adm. (so far) June 29 Rank Title LW TW WKD % chg QD % chg 1 The Amazing Spider-Man 3D -- 27,614 -- -- 2 The Amazing Spider-Man 2D -- 4,966 -- -- 3 Motorway -- 2,034 -- -- 4 The Dictator -- 488 -- -- 5 The Bounty -- 400 -- -- OK-ish for Amazing Spider-Man. That is really good for Motorway. The Amazing Spider-Man will lead off with 592 showtimes on Friday (does not include showtimes after midnight). If midnight shows after 12 are added in, it will have over 600 showtimes on Friday.

The only people who won't forget are Raimi fanboys. Normal people don't care and will watch the latest blockbuster.

MIB3 was coming off a poorly received sequel that came out 10 years ago and essentially acted as a revival to the franchise.Spider-Man is a reboot that is coming off a poorly received sequel that came out 10 years ago.

It's possible.I really hope both succeed. #1 tropical cyclone signal just issued in HK. It's basically a precautionary measure to let the people know a storm is coming, get prepared, etc.

June, end of June makes no difference. All of the countries that get TASM starting in June will have their grosses count towards a June release.

Bolded for truth. July is Batman's month because Amazing Spider-Man will have opened in almost all of Asia and in some parts of Europe in June. The only Asian country getting this in July is Malaysia. TASM will crush TDKR OS.

Next Thursday along with Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter.Both won't do much to Amazing Spider-Man.

July 21-24 Weekend actual: "Che Sau (Motorway): $927,145 from 51 locations. Location avg. = $18,179. Territory cume = $927,145" Great number for Motorway! More Friday Amazing Spider-Man schedules Pacific Place New The Amazing Spider-Man 3D - 23 showings Olympian City New The Amazing Spider-Man 2D - 5 showings The Amazing Spider-Man 3D - 20 showings Palace IFC New The Amazing Spider-Man 3D - 18 showings The One New The Amazing Spider-Man 3D - 28 showings Great Friday schedules for Amazing Spider-Man. Opening day for The Amazing Spider-Man @ Palace APM Palace APM The Amazing Spider-Man 3D The Amazing Spider-Man 2D Day Time Seats sold Seats available % filled Day Time Seats sold Seats available % filled Jun. 29 9:00 AM 52 286 18.2% Jun. 29 10:00 AM 42 114 36.8% 9:30 AM 7 167 4.2% 12:30 PM 10 114 8.8% 10:15 AM 25 112 22.3% 4:50 PM 19 112 17.0% 11:35 AM 108 286 37.8% 7:40 PM 68 98 69.4% 12:00 PM 4 167 2.4% 12:20 AM 13 112 11.6% 1:00 PM 6 98 6.1% 2:10 PM 24 286 8.4% 2:20 PM 4 112 3.6% 2:30 PM 4 167 2.4% 3:00 PM 4 114 3.5% 3:30 PM 8 98 8.2% 4:40 PM 34 286 11.9% 5:00 PM 4 167 2.4% 5:30 PM 6 114 5.3% 6:40 PM 4 98 4.1% 7:10 PM 95 286 33.2% 7:20 PM 8 112 7.1% 7:30 PM 30 167 18.0% 8:00 PM 25 114 21.9% 9:15 PM 27 98 27.6% 9:40 PM 111 286 38.8% 9:50 PM 8 112 7.1% 10:00 PM 8 167 4.8% 10:30 PM 11 114 9.6% 11:45 PM 6 98 6.1% 12:10 AM 26 286 9.1% 12:30 AM 4 167 2.4% 1:00 AM 4 114 3.5% Total 657 4679 14.0% Total 152 550 27.6% Slow sales for The Amazing Spider-Man. The Avengers had double the pre-sales at this point in time back on its opening Thursday at Palace APM. Part of the reason for the low sales is not because of lukewarm demand but theaters releasing supposed reserved 3D seats to the public. Like with IMAX, theaters generally have a select number of seats that the public can only buy for 3D movies. IMAX theaters block off the first two-three rows of seats for 3D movies because it's harder to sell. Typically, regular theaters will also do the same and allocate fewer number of seats for 3D movies but it did not happen this time. I crunched the numbers and if we add those reserved seats back in along with the 2D admissions, total admissions for The Amazing Spider-Man would be almost neck and neck with The Avengers pre-sales. That's not to say that The Amazing Spider-Man is doing great, however. Opening day pre-sales for The Avengers' numbers were for Thursday while TASM is being supported by the weekend. I don't think it has a chance of getting the non-holiday OD record with those kinds of numbers even with huge walk-ins. Weekend is doing much better though so 4m is still possible. The typhoon will make admissions hard to track this weekend though. A direct hit by a typhoon on Hong Kong is not such a bad idea if it comes on Saturday. Hong Kong people don't care about typhoons and will head out regardless of the bad weather. It happened last time when a tropical storm struck on the Sept. 29 long weekend, paralyzing the city but giving everyone an extra day off. That day turned out to be the biggest day of the weekend. This new typhoon will be something to watch out for if it does land over HK on Saturday as admissions could skyrocket. Thursday adm. (so far) June 28 Rank Title LW TW % chg 1 Motorway -- 2,797 -- 2 Prometheus 3D -- 1,438 -- 3 The Dictator -- 938 -- 4 The Bounty -- 895 -- 5 The Raven -- 779 -- Decent for Motorway. Not bad for Prometheus/Dictator either. Weak for The Bounty and The Raven.

Friday continues to be a problem for Amazing Spider-Man. I've been tracking opening day admissions for Spider-Man at 1 theater and it's not even close to what The Avengers started off with. Will have a full update later today.No change in typhoon forecast track. Still expected to land close to HK on Saturday.

4m in 3 days is not happening. Even Avengers needed 4 days to do it. Typically they don't but HK is a different beast. HK was the only Asian market that opened at #1 for IA3. It also broke animation records back then.Similar story with TS3 although it did exceptionally well in Japan. Pixar seems to do fairly well in HK. The only animated franchise that hasn't really done well in HK is the Madagascar series but even then Madagascar 2 did OK numbers.The reason why animation movies do so well in HK is because although families are its main demographic, animation movies are also well liked by couples (especially women).

Records updated. Friday schedules Note: All holdover showtimes in brackets are from Thursday. Note 2: Unless otherwise specified, all films are leaving on Thursday. Palace APM New Holdovers Leaving The Amazing Spider-Man 2D - 5 showings Motorway - 3 showings (▼ 10) Din Tao: Leader of the Parade The Amazing Spider-Man 3D - 28 showings The Bounty - 1 showing (▼ 6) Sadako 3D The Raven - 1 showing (▼ 5) The Raid: Redemption First Time - 1 showing (-) Prometheus 2D The Dictator - 1 showing (▼ 3) Prometheus 3D Men in Black 3 3D - 1 showing (▼ 3) Snow White and the Huntsman Festival Walk New Holdovers Leaving The Amazing Spider-Man 2D - 5 showings Motorway - 3 showings (▼ 7) Din Tao: Leader of the Parade The Amazing Spider-Man 3D - 27 showings First Time - 2 showings (▲ 0) Shadows of Love (Wed.) Prometheus 3D - 1 showing (▼ 3) The Bounty The Dictator - 1 showing (▼ 5) The Raven Men in Black 3 3D - 1 showing (▼ 4) Sadako 3D Salmon Fishing in the Yemen Snow White and the Huntsman Prometheus 2D Tsuen Wan New Holdovers Leaving The Amazing Spider-Man 2D - 1 showing Motorway - 2 showings (▼ 7) The Raven The Amazing Spider-Man 3D - 20 showings The Bounty - 1 showing (▼ 4) Sadako 3D First Time - 1 showing (-) The Raid: Redemption The Dictator - 1 showing (▼ 2) Prometheus 3D Men in Black 3 3D The Grand Cinema New Holdovers Leaving The Amazing Spider-Man 2D - 6 showings Motorway - 6 showings (▼ 7) Din Tao: Leader of the Parade The Amazing Spider-Man 3D - 33 showings The Bounty - 2 showings (▼ 5) Sadako 3D Postcard - 5 showings The Dictator - 4 showings (-) The Raid: Redemption Being Flynn - 5 showings (-) Prometheus 3D The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel - 1 showing (-) The Avengers 3D The Raven - 5 showings (▼ 7) Men in Black 3 3D Snow White and the Huntsman - 1 showing (▼ 3) American Pie Reunion The Wings of the Kirin - 4 showings (▼ 5) Shadows of Love What to Expect When You're Expecting - 1 showing (-) Prometheus 2D - 1 showing (▼ 3) How does that compare to The Avengers' opening Thursday schedules? Festival Walk: 20 showtimes for Avengers (3D), 32 showtimes for Amazing Spider-Man (27 in 3D) Palace APM: 27 showtimes for Avengers (24 in 3D), 33 showtimes for Amazing Spider-Man (28 in 3D) Both places Amazing Spider-Man thumped The Avengers in showtimes. That is spectacular. Even though Amazing Spider-Man hasn't matched The Avengers in admissions yet, Sony is going all out with guns blazing. To break it down, The Amazing Spider-Man is getting 4 or 5 screens at all locations that have at least 4 screens. After a good opening weekend, Motorway will be the 1 really lucky survivor this week. First Time is an EDKO movie so it will get Broadway/AMC support. The Dictator is also being kept after its good first 2 weekends. Poll Results The Amazing Spider-Man total? 3-3.99m (2 votes) 4-4.49m (1 vote) 10.5-10.99m (1 vote) >12m (3 votes)

BREAKING: Ice Age: Continental Drift will have special screenings on July 7 and 8 (Saturday/Sunday) ahead of its July 12 release.That is very good news for Ice Age. It's a really popular animated franchise in HK so easing the demand by releasing early previews the week before is a great idea. Amazing Spider-Man will not be heavily affected by this development.

There might be a storm that comes to HK this weekend. I don't know how that will affect the admissions as it's still too early to tell where this tropical cyclone will go.

No, the last 2 years of OWs is what changed what an average/good/great opening is for me. Ever since Avatar, the market has been booming. This year alone, we've seen 7 films hit over 1m OW, 4 of them in 3D. 2012 is currently on par with 2011 in terms of 1m openers. Prometheus DID have a lot of things going for it -- the sci-fi factor, 3D, aliens, and starpower (in this case, I mean, group starpower, not individual starpower). What I mean is that HK audiences know all these faces from recent films. They know Fassbender from X-Men: First Class and Rapace from Sherlock Holmes 2. Both films turned out to be huge hits with HK people. Charlize Theron hasn't been in any big films recently but the general public know her face from SWATH which was released the weekend before so yes, group starpower helped draw quite a number of people in for Prometheus. Any one of those three could have brought people in to watch it. It's the 3rd biggest opening of the year so far but it's far from impressive IMO. A Simple Life, Love in the Buff, Men in Black 3 and Battleship all had OW's that were more outstanding and all of them had less going for it than Prometheus. I thought Prometheus could have pulled in close to 2m with a 5-day opening with SWATH disappointing and MIB 3 in its 3rd weekend but it never capitalized. Overall though, I don't think it's a disappointment. It will make over 3m which is not bad but I don't think its opening is anything special. _________________________________________________________________________ The Amazing Spider-Man will premiere in 48 theaters which means a new theater is opening. It could be the new Airport IMAX but I'm not sure when that will open. Anyways, I am not liking The Amazing Spider-Man's admissions so far. While several theaters are reporting very good pre-sales, other areas especially rural ones have been lagging well behind. Friday night is looking anemic at several theaters. Virtually empty showtimes while pre-sales started more than 1 week ago. The Avengers had a much better start across the board. Weekend is doing much better with more than a 100% jump at some locations. Sunday looks to be the best day so far with Monday not far behind at most places. We could see a mild increase on Saturday combined with a huge spike on Sunday followed by a small drop on Monday. The last big movie to open with a Monday holiday was Thor last year. Although that opened on the traditional Thursday, admissions saw it move up 66% on Saturday, shot up almost double on Sunday and fell a good 15% on Monday. If The Amazing Spider-Man follows a similar trajectory, it could increase below 50% on Saturday to account for opening day demand, increase more than 100% on Sunday and ease lightly on Monday. Meanwhile, IMAX is looking good. Showtimes are about 70-80% full. Motorway might throw a wrench in TASM's plans, however. It's been doing quite well this weekend, amassing more than 30,000 admissions on both Saturday and Sunday. I can't say that it will flame out once Spider Man opens but we could see theaters keep it on another week. Interestingly enough, I went back and looked at the weekends before for Transformers 3 and The Avengers and both weekends saw 3 month lows. It won't be the case with Motorway this week. For screen counts, it's looking like The Amazing Spider-Man will get 4 screens (including 2D). With weaker pre-sales, I'm downgrading my prediction to 3.5-4m (4-day) for now.

Dunno what?I will take the word of the official site over some blog post.

From TASM official website: August 10I think it was recently updated so that seems to be the official word for now.

According to Variety and BOM, it made 1.4m in 5 days. Prometheus should have done more because it had heavy promotion and not much competition. 2 weeks from MIB 3 should have been good enough to open big and Snow White didn't make much of an impact the week before. I think Battleship had more OW admissions than it which is kind of shocking. Sure, Battleship had robots but Prometheus had 3D, aliens, credible director, cool looking spaceships and futuristic setting along with starpower. To make only $250,000 more than Battleship when it had all those factors going for it looks bad.

With Prometheus disappointing, the stage is set for Amazing Spider-Man to explode when it drops in HK on June 29. It has been given special treatment with theaters running special arrangements like putting a 6-minute preview of TASM in front of MIB 3.IMAX: Most peak showtimes are 50% or more in just 3 days of pre-sales. It's safe to say that this will sell out almost the entire weekend.Regular theaters: Some theaters have showtimes that are already more than half full with 1.5 weeks to go.It's safe to say that this will make more than 3.5m in 4 days. Since July 1 (Sunday) is a national holiday but part of the weekend, the holiday will fall on July 2 instead meaning that Amazing Spider-Man will definitely challenge Avengers for the 4-day record. It should pull in more than 3m for the 3-day weekend and it might even claim the non-holiday OD record.TASM will have the weekend to itself, only 1 limited release is coming out on the Thursday of that weekend. The week before will see lots of releases but nothing big. The Avengers' OW suggests that HK has reached its saturation point but TASM will have weaker competition leading into its OW. My prediction right now is 4.4-4.5m in 4 days (Fri-Mon).I'll be back next week with another report.