The Box Office Buzz and Tracking Thread (December 2021 - July 2023)

[Eric Furiosa]

Just now, datpepper said:

 

I believe the studios have made this mistake 3 times now in the past year, turning a perfectly fine space into a wasteland and handing another studio a huge W. Happened in September (King's Man and/or Jackass would've been nice during the mid/late portions of that month), again in January (Ok, not exactly a great spot, but something should've taken the old Morbius weekend), and yet again in March. No idea why they keep making the same error over and over.

Studios in general have a bad capitalist mindset of short-term profits and fear of the future. When COVID spikes, they only think about the short-term and run away from it. Plus in some respects, they can just plop it on their streaming service, get some headlines, and then call it a day. And also studios don't care about theatrical and are only begrudgingly accepting they need it. Not to say they won't abandon it again in due time.

 

Sure it may seem silly this happens again and again, but garbage capitalism means the big studios can make the same mistakes again and again and never get hurt from it. It's funny if it wasn't so terrible.

[filmlover]

Studios make too much money from theatrical to abandon it. They no longer have any excuses now that the pandemic has largely subsided.

 

The one that seems to have changed is that the dumps no longer come to theaters, creating holes in those traditional dead zones of January and late August. The news the other week of Enchanted 2 undergoing extensive reshoots even though it's not coming to theaters had me going "hmm, no wonder they're just dumping that on D+ with likely little fanfare."

[misterpepp]

21 minutes ago, Eric the Living Vampire said:

Studios in general have a bad capitalist mindset of short-term profits and fear of the future. When COVID spikes, they only think about the short-term and run away from it.

 

Oh of course, and I could forgive them for thinking September was going to be awful, but by the time we got around to January and especially March, you'd think there would've been some sort of improved foresight for their own sakes.

 

You know, this conversation got me thinking about how if Morbius kept its Jan 28 date, we would've had the C+-scoring, toxic-WoM-induced front-loading of both that movie and Moonfall back-to-back. Heh...

Edited April 4, 2022 by datpepper

[Movies4Life]

5 minutes ago, filmlover said:

Studios make too much money from theatrical to abandon it. They no longer have any excuses now that the pandemic has largely subsided.

 

The one that seems to have changed is that the dumps no longer come to theaters, creating holes in those traditional dead zones of January and late August. The news the other week of Enchanted 2 undergoing extensive reshoots even though it's not coming to theaters had me going "hmm, no wonder they're just dumping that on D+ with likely little fanfare."

At least Chip N Dale's new movie on Disney+ has people talking, though

[filmlover]

Summer looks the time where we will officially be getting a steady flow of new movies again after two years worth of delayed movies finally seeing the light of day.

 

June 3 is looking to be the only empty weekend at the moment, I guess no one wanted to be saddled between Top Gun and Jurassic World.

[misterpepp]

3 minutes ago, filmlover said:

June 3 is looking to be the only empty weekend at the moment, I guess no one wanted to be saddled between Top Gun and Jurassic World.

 

Would be a great place for counter-programming, though. Have felt for a while now that a horror title should be placed there. Maybe not something high-profile, but some horror movies Lionsgate is sitting on (Cobweb, perhaps? Or maybe even Devil's Light) would work there as quick one-week-wonder cash-ins.

[BestPicturePlutoNash]

Soderbergh and Bradley Cooper in last few months have said studios will not give up theaters because the potential jackpot of theatrical revenue is just too golden. Cooper said creatives on streaming films such as Netflix do not make as much money either. I think studios panicked about covid spikes because of the unprecedented nature of situation and did some internal tracking. Sony probably knew Uncharted was gearing up to hit and Spider-Man was still bringing in cash, for example 

[earthtne]

1 hour ago, CJohn said:

Ambulance is a mega bomb and FB3 is the end of the franchise.

 

Save us Sonic.

No, FB3 is not the end of a franchise.

 

cope and seethe. 

[BestPicturePlutoNash]

Just now, datpepper said:

 

Would be a great place for counter-programming, though. Have felt for a while now that a horror title should be placed there. Maybe not something high-profile, but some horror movies Lionsgate is sitting on (Cobweb, perhaps? Or maybe even Devil's Light) would work there as quick one-week-wonder cash-ins.

A24 should put Bodies Bodies Bodies there or August. I think it would be a huge hit. High concept horror comedy with a cool cast. SXSW raves. And Everything Everywhere is tracking to be a breakout so studio momentum 

[misterpepp]

Just now, BestPicturePlutoNash said:

A24 should put Bodies Bodies Bodies there or August. I think it would be a huge hit. High concept horror comedy with a cool cast. SXSW raves.

 

Totally forgot they had that coming up. Would be a great spot for it.

[filmlover]

7 minutes ago, datpepper said:

 

Would be a great place for counter-programming, though. Have felt for a while now that a horror title should be placed there. Maybe not something high-profile, but some horror movies Lionsgate is sitting on (Cobweb, perhaps? Or maybe even Devil's Light) would work there as quick one-week-wonder cash-ins.

Elvis was supposed to come out on that weekend at one point but was moved back. I guess they wanted to be sure it would have some PLF screens on lock (it will be playing in Dolby Cinema).

[Legion Again]

Everyone is too afraid of competition from my birthday 

[Cmasterclay]

Ambulance is a high concept action movie with two name stars (obviously mixed as draws) and a huge director. It's the kind of thing that used to regularly, regularly open to low 20s. I'm not saying it would have opened to 40m+ OW or anything, but movies like that have opened to 20+ for decades.

[filmlover]

14 minutes ago, Cmasterclay said:

Ambulance is a high concept action movie with two name stars (obviously mixed as draws) and a huge director. It's the kind of thing that used to regularly, regularly open to low 20s. I'm not saying it would have opened to 40m+ OW or anything, but movies like that have opened to 20+ for decades.

Those movies usually had immense star power behind them, which is no longer the case for cinema in 2022. Gyllenhaal is a respected actor obviously, but has never been a reliable box office draw, while one could make a case that Yahya and Eiza are still largely unknown to audiences unless you point out where you've seen them before.

[Eric Furiosa]

22 hours ago, Eric the Living Vampire said:

Sonic the Hedgehog 2 Greater Philadelphia Area Seat Report T-5 and Counting

	Sellouts	Showings	Seats Sold	Total Seats	Perct Sold
TOTALS	0	62	1025	11185	9.16%

 

Total Seats Sold Today: 95

 

Comp

0.573x of Shang-Chi T-5 (5.05M)

0.807x of Venom 2 T-5 (9.36M)

1.278x of Ghostbusters: Afterlife T-5 (5.75M)

2.283x of Uncahrted T-5 (8.45M)

 

Adjusted Comp

2.749x of Sonic the Hedgehog T-5 (8.25M)

Sonic the Hedgehog 2 Greater Philadelphia Area Seat Report T-4 and Counting

	Sellouts	Showings	Seats Sold	Total Seats	Perct Sold
TOTALS	0	62	1162	11185	10.39%

 

Total Seats Sold Today: 137

 

Comp

0.586x of Shang-Chi T-4 (5.15M)

0.814x of Venom 2 T-4 (9.44M)

1.301x of Ghostbusters: Afterlife T-4 (5.85M)

2.376x of Uncharted T-4 (8.79M)

 

Adjusted Comp

2.800x of Sonic the Hedgehog T-4 (8.4M)

 

There's a real division between the 5M range and the 8M range by comps. I guess that means we're going inbetween? Regardless, we're in for a strong debut this weekend.

[BruiseCruise]

162m OW here we come

 

[Eric Furiosa]

22 hours ago, Eric the Living Vampire said:

Fantastic Beasts 3 Greater Philadelphia Area Seat Report T-12 and Counting

	Sellouts	Showings	Seats Sold	Total Seats	Perct Sold
TOTALS	0	75	529	15949	3.32%

 

Total Seats Sold Today: 34

 

Comp

0.541x of Shang-Chi T-12 (4.76M)

0.841x of No Time to Die T-12 (5.3M)

0.739x of Dune T-12 (3.77M)

0.321x of Eternals T-12 (3.05M)

1.093x of Ghostbusters: Afterlife T-12 (4.92M)

Fantastic Beasts 3 Greater Philadelphia Area Seat Report T-11 and Counting

	Sellouts	Showings	Seats Sold	Total Seats	Perct Sold
TOTALS	0	75	598	15949	3.75%

 

Total Seats Sold Today: 69

 

Comp

0.566x of Shang-Chi T-11 (4.98M)

0.900x of No Time to Die T-11 (5.67M)
0.795x of Dune T-11 (4.05M)

0.351x of Eternals T-11 (3.33M)

1.137x of Ghostbusters: Afterlife T-11 (5.11M)

[lorddemaxus]

The last non-Transformers Bay hit was Pearl Harbor. Even Netflix didn't seem too impressed with how 6 Underground did. I like Bay than most but not surprised that Ambulance isn't doing well. 

[Eric Furiosa]

1 hour ago, Cmasterclay said:

Ambulance is a high concept action movie with two name stars (obviously mixed as draws) and a huge director. It's the kind of thing that used to regularly, regularly open to low 20s. I'm not saying it would have opened to 40m+ OW or anything, but movies like that have opened to 20+ for decades.

Still, Pain and Gain, which had two of the biggest box office powerhouses of that time, and Bay off the peak of Transformers' popularity, barely got to 20M in 2013. Even adjusted, you get to about 25M. What exactly is the big hook/draw for Ambulance that can help it match Pain and Gain?

[watcher1232]

Bay, like Emmerich, is a remnant of a bygone era. Star-studded action/disaster films or just high concept action/disaster films don't sell anymore. This isn't that big of a surprise.