Weekend Thread: Free Guy 18.79M (34% drop!) | PAW Patrol 13M, Jungle Cruise 6.2M | Protégé 2.9M, Night House 2.87M, Legendary Flop Reminiscence 2M (Worst opening for a movie in 3K theaters!)

[CJohn]

Openings like the Reminiscence one are why the theatrical model is in serious danger. 3.200 theaters, stars, appealing concept and you get a 2M OW? Yikes.

 

Great hold for Free Guy tho (you have to add this to the post or else you get points for literally giving your opinion which isn't all rainbows and sunshines).

Edited August 22, 2021 by CJohn

[Firepower]

1 hour ago, ThomasNicole said:

After weeks of meltdowns seeing 70% drops every week now we get an overperformer that drop only 33% on second weekend (could be 30% if Disney overestimate Sunday drop), all this in the middle of Delta peak.

 

This movie have potential to reach 130M if keeps dropping this way.

Which means Delta might not be a good excuse to continue delaying movies.

[Maggie]

2 minutes ago, Firepower said:

Which means Delta might not be a good excuse to continue delaying movies.

We still don't have a movie over 200M, which those fall/winter blockbusters absolutely need

[Firepower]

1 hour ago, Maggie said:

I'm talking about blockbusters. Free Guy is a small movie with small earnings

Small movie with 130 mln budget...

[TwoMisfits]

36 minutes ago, wildphantom said:

Free Guy’s performance is a textbook example of what a movie would never have without theater exclusivity. 
 

Word of mouth and headlines about how well it’s doing. It creates a storm of people wanting to see it. The more exclusive it is the more of an event it is. Which ultimately means even better performance when it does come to digital etc as if you didn’t see it you’ll still associate it with success, then buy it/rent it. 
 

Day and date is so much more of a here today, gone tomorrow situation.  There’s just no comparison.  As soon as you hit digital you’re just another commodity vying for attention before you disappear behind the next million thumbnails. 
 

Movies are special when treated as such. 

 

Before we go wild on Free Guy...it is also following the path almost all "premier" comedy movies have set before...smaller openers and longer legs than say, horror or superheroes...

 

If it were to be otherwise, it would have been against genre type...we've had so few comedies of note with any real box office open during Covid, we may have forgotten how they tend to work:)...

Edited August 22, 2021 by TwoMisfits

[Firepower]

5 minutes ago, Maggie said:

We still don't have a movie over 200M, which those fall/winter blockbusters absolutely need

Maybe Venom 2 will break 200M barrier.

[TwoMisfits]

PS - My kids are now jumping - spouse wrote me and said they are 3 of 13 total kids at 1pm on a steaming hot Sunday...that's not gonna be sustainable for that business, either, and I'll be curious if we see kid indoor activities either reclose or go back to single shift, weekend only, "hold down the costs at all costs" affairs...not totally movie related, but indicative of "families aren't up for indoor kid entertainment"...

 

I'll be curious if some theaters also bring back more "buy out the theater" showings for fall...they kinda got really reduced in the summer, I guess as kids had outdoor outlets, like pools and parks...with those reduced for fall and viral numbers up, I wonder if Cinemark goes back to saving full screens all day for this (and not just the early showings of late)... 

 

[CJohn]

9 minutes ago, Maggie said:

We still don't have a movie over 200M, which those fall/winter blockbusters absolutely need

Eternals will do it, if it doesn't have PA.

[ThomasNicole]

If Shang Chi open over 60M, this could be the first 200M "post-pandemic" movie since it will have 45 days without any major competition.

[Maggie]

4 minutes ago, CJohn said:

Eternals will do it, if it doesn't have PA.

 

1 minute ago, ThomasNicole said:

If Shang Chi open over 60M, this could be the first 200M "post-pandemic" movie since it will have 45 days without any major competition.

I have more faith in Shang Chi than Eternals. Empty September for Shang chi, while i'm not feelin Eternals at all. Could be wrong tho

[ThomasNicole]

2 minutes ago, Maggie said:

 

I have more faith in Shang Chi than Eternals. Empty September for Shang chi, while i'm not feelin Eternals at all. Could be wrong tho

Eternals buzz is gigantic, all the data points that.

 

Unless the world totally collapse again, it's probably going to be big.

[Borobudur]

24 minutes ago, Firepower said:

Which means Delta might not be a good excuse to continue delaying movies.

SC better further reinforce this notion. Luckily they have FG released in August, we need one to wash away TSS disaster. 

[Menor the Destroyer]

10 minutes ago, Maggie said:

 

I have more faith in Shang Chi than Eternals. Empty September for Shang chi, while i'm not feelin Eternals at all. Could be wrong tho

Eternals has more initial buzz than Shang-Chi for sure. Competition may hurt but usually more buzz outweighs more competition. 

Edited August 22, 2021 by Menor

[Chicago]

24 minutes ago, ThomasNicole said:

If Shang Chi open over 60M, this could be the first 200M "post-pandemic" movie since it will have 45 days without any major competition.

That would be an ambitious multiplier 

[Cmasterclay]

Shang Chi probably needs at least 70m 3-day to hit 200, which I would have been doubtful of in pre-pandemic times. But it is selling well. 

 

If Delta has started to ebb or remained relatively steady without major changes by then, I do think NTTD can do 200 domestic.

[Eric the IF]

I was thinking for a while that No Time to Die was going to be the first film to hit 200M and topple Bad Boys 3 (something about that just seemed poetic considering this was the first movie to delay itself way back when), but I do kinda feel like Respect's awful hold makes me nervous about older moviegoers coming back. I know there's the argument that there hasn't been anything super appealing for that demographic, which is fair, but I think there's been studies and polls showing older demos are much more cautious about Delta and heading out in general IIRC, and even though I didn't care for the movie, there's nothing objectionable for its target audience that WOM is that bad. The specialty market also isn't doing all that great, which generally skews more adult (something like Green Knight skews towards the younger, A24 hipster crowd). I dunno, I just think movies skewing older are gonna have a rough time, which that spells bad news for something like Bond (and also Top Gun, Ghostbusters, Gucci, West Side Story, etc.).

 

I'm sure I might just be overly cautious about that though and obviously headlines should be more positive by October

[CJohn]

The last Bond movie passed the 200M like a year after it opened or some shit like that thanks to an endless push. Why would this one do more during a pandemic?

 

I was thinking 65/175 a few days ago. A similar run to F9, just with a better 2nd weekend hold (that idea was kind throwed away after Venom moved tho).

Edited August 22, 2021 by CJohn

[Maggie]

19 minutes ago, CJohn said:

The last Bond movie passed the 200M like a year after it opened or some shit like that thanks to an endless push. Why would this one do more during a pandemic?

 

I was thinking 65/175 a few days ago. A similar run to F9, just with a better 2nd weekend hold (that idea was kind throwed away after Venom moved tho).

AQP2 OVER Bond club?

[Krissykins]

Here in the UK, James Bond will probably outgross all of the 2021 releases, with ease, in the space of 10 days. 

[Blankments]

Free guy saved the movies we love to see it