The Box Office Buzz, Tracking, and Pre-Sale Thread

[HummingLemon496]

2 minutes ago, lorddemaxus said:

This is Timmy's Titanic moment. Get on the 20x train folks!

INB4 ATSV gets kicked out of the top 3 DOM

[abracadabra1998]

1 hour ago, HummingLemon496 said:

Very and no

Any mention of Aquaman in this thread is a bat signal for @HummingLemon496  I swear 

[PrinceRico]

Audience reactions are coming in for TCP. Sounds like an A+ Cinamscore . Any prediction on how great legs could be. 

Edited December 10, 2023 by PrinceRico

[keysersoze123]

On 12/8/2023 at 9:26 PM, keysersoze123 said:

Wonka MTC1

Previews - 21650/474511 393312.40 2259 shows

Friday - 19775/725869 340248.89 3386 shows

 

Still ambling along. Not much of an acceleration. 

Wonka MTC1

Previews(T-5) - 22944/475581 415709.14 2265 shows

Friday - 21382/726694 367206.96 3391 shows

[MovieMan89]

3 hours ago, lorddemaxus said:

This is Timmy's Titanic moment. Get on the 20x train folks!

Oh, this is the greatest show!

[Relevation]

I’m sorry but the 10x+ legs predictions for Wonka are insane imo

 

Movies opening on the mid-December pre-Christmas weekend do not get even close to double digit multis, regardless of WoM. Almost every release on this weekend in the last decade has finished somewhere in the 4-6x multi range with nothing going higher than Alvin & the Chipmunks: The Road Chip’ 6.0x multi. Wonka will probably play more closely to stuff like Jumanji: The Next Level and Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, movies with multis in the 5.3-5.8x range. Expecting anything above 6x for Wonka is just setting yourself up for disappointment, this isn’t a heat of Christmas mid-week release monolith like The Greatest Showman or Puss in Boots: The Last Wish.

[JustLurking]

1 hour ago, Relevation said:

I’m sorry but the 10x+ legs predictions for Wonka are insane imo

 

Movies opening on the mid-December pre-Christmas weekend do not get even close to double digit multis, regardless of WoM. Almost every release on this weekend in the last decade has finished somewhere in the 4-6x multi range with nothing going higher than Alvin & the Chipmunks: The Road Chip’ 6.0x multi. Wonka will probably play more closely to stuff like Jumanji: The Next Level and Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, movies with multis in the 5.3-5.8x range. Expecting anything above 6x for Wonka is just setting yourself up for disappointment, this isn’t a heat of Christmas mid-week release monolith like The Greatest Showman or Puss in Boots: The Last Wish.

fwiw, worth remembering this christmas szn is really lacking the big juggernaut that hampers some of these movies' legs: there is more space for a film like this to blow up over the holidays if audiences feel into it

 

...but I would still say I agree with your general point, as I am more in "I'll believe it when I see it" mode here, expecting strong legs but not out of this world like greatest showman, leading to a decent but unremarkable DOM total but a really solid overseas haul saving the day, with the film really taking over the holidays in Europe

[AniNate]

Issue with Wonka is it already has too much hype. Any movie that would get 10x legs is likely one you wouldn't expect it from. Migration seems like the much better candidate given there's not much hype for it right now but reviews and audience reception out of Europe are looking very good at the moment.

[vafrow]

On 12/9/2023 at 5:19 AM, vafrow said:

 

Expand  

 

Wonka, T-6, western GTA (southern Ontario)

 

Theatres: 5

Total Sales: 46

New Sales since last update: 0

Growth: 0%

Showtimes: 19

Radius 19km

 

Tickets/Showtimes by timeslot:

Late afternoon: 5/4

Early Evening: 37/8

Late Evening: 11/7

 

Tickets/Showtimes by format

Regular: 0/0

Dolby: 25/6

VIP: 16/4

IMAX: 12/6

4DX: 0/3

 

Comps

0.232x of HG:BoSS for $1.3M

 

Fairly late in the game for a zero sales day. 

 

Expand  

 

Wonka, T-5, western GTA (southern Ontario)

 

Theatres: 5

Total Sales: 56

New Sales since last update: 3

Growth: 5.7%

Showtimes: 19

Radius 19km

 

Tickets/Showtimes by timeslot:

Late afternoon: 8/4

Early Evening: 37/8

Late Evening: 11/7

 

Tickets/Showtimes by format

Regular: 0/0

Dolby: 25/6

VIP: 16/4

IMAX: 12/6

4DX: 3/3

 

Comps

0.225x of HG:BoSS for $1.3M

 

Only sales were in the 4dx screen. Still not much going on here.

[Borobudur]

Too bad Wonka didn't respond much to great reaction. Is it because the movie isn't memeable? It is time for Tim for recreate that Gene Wilder iconic Willy Wonka meme. 

[vafrow]

On 12/9/2023 at 5:44 AM, vafrow said:

Expand  

 

Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom, T-13 (Day 1ish), western GTA (southern Ontario)

 

Theatres: 5

Total Sales: 22

New Sales since last update: 22

Growth: na

Showtimes: 19

Radius 19km

 

Tickets/Showtimes by timeslot:

Late afternoon: 3/4

Early Evening: 19/8

Late Evening: 0/7

 

Tickets/Showtimes by format

Dolby 3D: 0/6

Dolby:  0/1

IMAX: 0/3

IMAX 3D: 15/3

4dx: 0/3

VIP 3D: 0/2

VIP: 3/1

 

Comps

0.063x of The Marvels for $0.4M

 

First off, a day one comp isn't really a fair comparison to The Marvels, but it's all I had. Plus, most of Aquamans sales are from IMAX 3D sales, which have been open for a few days.

 

Because of that staggered opening for sales, it's probably hurt thd initial demand, but, it's clear there hasn't been a big contingent waiting for more showtimes.

 

Back to being a day 1 comp, when I thought this would only open up sales at T-8 or so, I was debating at using FNAF, which had the late sales cycle here, but that's not a comparison that's going to help it. 

 

Advance sales for this region has been in a funk here, with everything doing much worse than the big release before since FNAF.

 

Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom, T-12 (Day 2ish), western GTA (southern Ontario)

 

Theatres: 5

Total Sales: 29

New Sales since last update: 7

Growth: 32%

Showtimes: 19

Radius 19km

 

Tickets/Showtimes by timeslot:

Late afternoon: 6/4

Early Evening: 21/8

Late Evening: 2/7

 

Tickets/Showtimes by format

Dolby 3D: 0/6

Dolby:  0/1

IMAX: 2/3

IMAX 3D: 18/3

4dx: 0/3

VIP 3D: 0/2

VIP: 9/1

 

Comps

0.081x of The Marvels for $0.5M

It grew, but when it's comping that low, it's inevitable.

 

I don't have data at the level that I need it for Blue Beetle, but I was tracking it. Just off of high level, my feel is that it's probably doing about the same as that. 

[M37]

7 hours ago, Relevation said:

I’m sorry but the 10x+ legs predictions for Wonka are insane imo

 

Movies opening on the mid-December pre-Christmas weekend do not get even close to double digit multis, regardless of WoM. Almost every release on this weekend in the last decade has finished somewhere in the 4-6x multi range with nothing going higher than Alvin & the Chipmunks: The Road Chip’ 6.0x multi. Wonka will probably play more closely to stuff like Jumanji: The Next Level and Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, movies with multis in the 5.3-5.8x range. Expecting anything above 6x for Wonka is just setting yourself up for disappointment, this isn’t a heat of Christmas mid-week release monolith like The Greatest Showman or Puss in Boots: The Last Wish.

I generally concur with this sentiment, but will say I don't think its quite as hard of a ceiling on legs. Of late, that pre-pre-Xmas slot has been ceded to big IPs (Star Wars and before that Hobbit), where OW is naturally bigger and legs smaller, and usually pushing the more family friendly films to open the following week (Friday or even Wed). And in the few years without those tentpoles (2018, 2011, 2010), there's been a glut of films all cannibalizing each other, and this year there really isn't much to choose from.

 

Fwiw, Ferdinand in 2016 did have a 6.3x (opening vs TLJ), and won't be totally shocked if Wonka also manages to push up over 6x given the lack of competition (and the strong Xmas day presales) but do agree those 10x - or even 7x+ - projections are not based on proper analogs

[TwoMisfits]

58 minutes ago, Borobudur said:

Too bad Wonka didn't respond much to great reaction. Is it because the movie isn't memeable? It is time for Tim for recreate that Gene Wilder iconic Willy Wonka meme. 

 

I think my biggest question/concern on Wonka - is it TOO saccharine as a movie to appeal to 13-45 year old males, so you self-limit your audience from the start?  With Wonka portrayed as pure and nice as Santa and this already being a musical without hit music, will this pretty much be 25+ women with kids and Timmy fans?  Leaving dad and teen bro home...

 

Edit to Add:  This goes the opposite for Aquaman - and did WB know it would play this way, thus they don't mind both blockbusters out at once b/c one will never draw 13-45 males, and one will never draw 25+ females...

Edited December 10, 2023 by TwoMisfits

[filmlover]

Wonka could still leg it out to well over $100M+ even with a $20-25M launch but some of the more outlandish predictions for it never seemed based in reality to me. This always had less going for it than Charlie and the Chocolate Factory did back in '05 (Depp as Willy Wonka fresh off of Pirates 1 was arguably one heck of an incredible selling point at the time, also '05 just being an entirely different era for moviegoing at this point).

[PrinceRico]

Wonka will have good legs but do agree some of these prediction are crazy. Hopefully the movie can atleast hit 20 million opening because things are looking dire for its opening.

Edited December 10, 2023 by PrinceRico

[vale9001]

1 hour ago, TwoMisfits said:

 

I think my biggest question/concern on Wonka - is it TOO saccharine as a movie to appeal to 13-45 year old males, so you self-limit your audience from the start?  With Wonka portrayed as pure and nice as Santa and this already being a musical without hit music, will this pretty much be 25+ women with kids and Timmy fans?  Leaving dad and teen bro home...

 

Edit to Add:  This goes the opposite for Aquaman - and did WB know it would play this way, thus they don't mind both blockbusters out at once b/c one will never draw 13-45 males, and one will never draw 25+ females...

 

 this honestly seems simply a disneyan family movie for everyone. Not like the new Barbie 🧐

 

. 

I think people are are very over dramatic. 25-30M it's a good launch when people know it's gonna be there all holyday. I rememeber a drama last year for Avatar opening at "just" 134M and then families just showed up during the holidays.

Edited December 10, 2023 by vale9001

[M37]

3 minutes ago, vale9001 said:

 

 this honestly seems simply a disneyan family movie for everyone. Not like the new Barbie 🧐

 

. 

I think people are are very over dramatic. 25-30M it's a good launch when people know it's gonna be there all holyday. I rememeber a drama last year for Avatar opening at "just" 134 and then families just showed up during the holidays.

That's because Avatar 2 was being compared more towards the tentpoles (SW and NWH), and it instead performed somewhere in-between that and a true family movie

 

But it doesn't change the math that a family friendly 5-6x multi off a $25-$30M OW gets you way below where some people's expectations lie for Wonka; I do not currently see a path to even sniffing $200M domestic, barring some last minute surge in sales, a huge IM over 10x, or a lack of competition driven outlier multiplier over the holidays. Right now the under vs Puss in Boots ($185M) would be a good bet, needing an unexpected run to make it a bad beat

 

That kind of result isn't terrible for this year, in the JW4 to Fast X range, especially as overseas markets seem to be performing much better, but certainly not a breakout either

[Borobudur]

3 hours ago, TwoMisfits said:

 

I think my biggest question/concern on Wonka - is it TOO saccharine as a movie to appeal to 13-45 year old males, so you self-limit your audience from the start?  With Wonka portrayed as pure and nice as Santa and this already being a musical without hit music, will this pretty much be 25+ women with kids and Timmy fans?  Leaving dad and teen bro home...

 

Edit to Add:  This goes the opposite for Aquaman - and did WB know it would play this way, thus they don't mind both blockbusters out at once b/c one will never draw 13-45 males, and one will never draw 25+ females...

The same can be said to Barbie but that quickly "forcing" these demo to come out after the movie become a cultural and meme juggernaut. Wonka being a non-action flick already capping its upper limit from the start and that is why the creativity of the marketing becoming more important but so far marketing has been "conventional", totally ignoring the meme effect onto Barbie.  Barbie proved that teen boys can come out for a female-led movie if that movie is eventful enough, especially if every gf dragging their bf to see the movie.

[vafrow]

4 hours ago, M37 said:

That's because Avatar 2 was being compared more towards the tentpoles (SW and NWH), and it instead performed somewhere in-between that and a true family movie

 

But it doesn't change the math that a family friendly 5-6x multi off a $25-$30M OW gets you way below where some people's expectations lie for Wonka; I do not currently see a path to even sniffing $200M domestic, barring some last minute surge in sales, a huge IM over 10x, or a lack of competition driven outlier multiplier over the holidays. Right now the under vs Puss in Boots ($185M) would be a good bet, needing an unexpected run to make it a bad beat

 

That kind of result isn't terrible for this year, in the JW4 to Fast X range, especially as overseas markets seem to be performing much better, but certainly not a breakout either

 

My take is that the aggressive forecasts on Wonka are essentially working backwards from that assumption that Wonka is the film that's most likely to break out.

 

If someone subscribes to the belief that the holiday period will always see one movie hit a really big high, it can make sense. It's either this or Aquaman, and no one is betting on the superhero film these days.

 

But going ground up, it's hard to see the pathway, as you've articulated.

 

It feels like this project is being burdened by the expectations of the light calendar. And that can boost projects a bit, but, we're talking about some help on the margins.

[keysersoze123]

Wonka is not a SH or fan driven movie. it will behave like a family driven movie. So presales are just one data point. Of course there is a definite ceiling on where it ends up OW. But for now I would not compare these to franchise movies.