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

[dallas]

4 hours ago, MovieMan89 said:

I’m here for 2 Bro 2 Serious being a bigger bomb than Marvels at this point. It’s the only fitting end for 2023 in CBMs. 

I don't think it even can bomb harder with holiday legs. 

[Porthos]

On 12/10/2023 at 11:31 PM, Porthos said:

 

It's blowing the fuck up here is how it's doing.

 

Consider this a one-off

 

 

On 12/10/2023 at 11:31 PM, Porthos said:

The Color Purple [T-15]

2398/10046 [23.87% sold] [77 showings]

 

2.21218x Oppenheimer at T-15

1.32276x Barbie at T-15

8.5643x KotFM at T-15 (lol)

REMEMBER TO TAKE A HUGE CHUCK OF CHANGE OUT OF THE COMPS FOR ALL DAY SHOWINGS (more on this below)

 

 

The Color Purple [T-10]

3026/11573 [26.15% sold] [90 showings]

 

PLF:                             817/3623 (22.55% sold) (27.00% of all tickets sold)

Early Bird/Matinee:   1514/4779 (31.68% sold) (***50.03%*** of all tickets sold)

(it's also Senior Day for those chains that observe, ftr )

 

2.02003x Oppenheimer at T-10

1.03347x Barbie at T-10

9.03284x KotFM at T-10 (again, lol)

REMEMBER TO TAKE A *REALLY* HUGE CHUCK OF CHANGE OUT OF THE COMPS FOR ALL DAY SHOWINGS (see matinee percentage above)

 

And despite what I initially said about MI7 Tue ONLY being a good-ish comp, it isn't yet due to the differences in pre-sale patterns:

 

4.55038x MI7 TUE ONLY at T-10 [31.85m] [lolololollol]

 

And I hadn't quite dug deep enough into the level of matinee showings when I made my comment, so I think even a chunk of change needs to be taken out of a potential Discount Tuesday comp, especially considering this might skew at least a little to seniors.  Or at least "take the under" as the saying goes.

 

Still, no matter how this is sliced, this is still blowing the fuck up in Sacramento. 

 

Enough so that...

 

0.94978x JWD at T-10 [17.10m]

 

is a reasonable comp despite the insane extra number of days of pre-sales that JWD had.

 

(FTR, MCU films [pre-The Marvels at least] and TGM are still in a whole other category and thus not really good comps)

[Mulder]

1 minute ago, dallas said:

I don't think it even can bomb harder with holiday legs. 

To get holidays legs requires people wanting to see your movie. 

[vafrow]

On 12/15/2023 at 4:44 AM, vafrow said:

 

Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom, T-7, western GTA (southern Ontario)

 

Theatres: 5

Total Sales: 88

New Sales since last update: 7

Growth: 9%

Showtimes: 23

Radius 19km

 

Tickets/Showtimes by timeslot:

Late afternoon: 11/5

Early Evening: 69 /9

Late Evening: 8/9

 

Tickets/Showtimes by format

Dolby 3D: 16/6

Dolby:  3/1

IMAX: 11/3

IMAX 3D: 25/3

4dx: 2/3

VIP 3D: 2/2

VIP: 29/1

Regular 3D: 0/3

 

Comps

0.201x of The Marvels for $1.3M

0.419x of HG:BoSS for $2.4M

0.186x of FNAF for $2.0M

Avg: $1.9M

 

Ticket per showtime comp

1.97x Blue Beetle for $6.5M

 

We're into single digit growth, which is not going to help it catch up. It stayed pretty perfectly even with Marvels and HG. It continues to fall against FNAF as expected.

 

Despite the methodology shakiness, the BB comp is the most interesting though. By T-7, BB sold 27% of what it sold by T-1. Im skeptical if Aquaman can hold that pace.

 

Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom, T-6, western GTA (southern Ontario)

 

Theatres: 5

Total Sales: 109

New Sales since last update: 21

Growth: 24%

Showtimes: 23

Radius 19km

 

Tickets/Showtimes by timeslot:

Late afternoon: 17/5

Early Evening: 82 /9

Late Evening: 10/9

 

Tickets/Showtimes by format

Dolby 3D: 18/6

Dolby:  6/1

IMAX: 14/3

IMAX 3D: 28/3

4dx: 7/3

VIP 3D: 2/2

VIP: 34/1

Regular 3D: 0/3

 

Comps

0.239x of The Marvels for $1.6M

0.478x of HG:BoSS for $2.7M

0.184x of FNAF for $1.9M

Avg: $2.1M

 

Ticket per showtime comp

 

2.08x Blue Beetle for $7.5M

 

Much better day today. Progress against all comps due to a 24% growth rate. It might be the WB trio deal kicking in. We'll see how the next few days go.

[dallas]

14 minutes ago, Mulder said:

To get holidays legs requires people wanting to see your movie. 

I don't think you get it. If Aquaman opens at $24-25M, 3x legs are practically a guarantee. After that, it's a matter of when it passes The Marvels. 

[JustLurking]

Aquaman will have a really depressed sunday due to christmas eve so missing a 3x in the holidays would need a cataclismically bad WOM.

[dallas]

3 minutes ago, JustLurking said:

Aquaman will have a really depressed sunday due to christmas eve so missing a 3x in the holidays would need a cataclismically bad WOM.

Yep. Personally I think this gets a B+ CS, but I can see a path to an A- or even a B

[Mulder]

29 minutes ago, dallas said:

I don't think you get it. If Aquaman opens at $24-25M, 3x legs are practically a guarantee. After that, it's a matter of when it passes The Marvels. 

I wouldn't call anything a guarantee in this climate tbh. 

[dallas]

7 minutes ago, Mulder said:

I wouldn't call anything a guarantee in this climate tbh. 

This movie would literally have to get like a B- Cinemascore to miss the 3x. 

[Legion Again]

3x is guaranteed but 24 opening definitely is not

[dallas]

1 minute ago, Legion Again said:

3x is guaranteed but 24 opening definitely is not

It will be close to 24. 

[vafrow]

Given how 2023 has been filled with examples of superhero films establishing new ground on low multipliers, I wouldn't rule out a sub 3 for it.

 

We've not had a lot of cases like this with a big budget action film right before Christmas that people are so indifferent towards.

 

The closest I can think of is Matrix Resurrections, which debuted on a Wednesday, so you can't do an apples to apples comparison. But, with it only grossing $37M, if it had Aquamans calendar and release date, it would have probably opened to around $15M, giving a multiplier in the 2.5x range.

 

Now, Aquaman is probably more accessible than  Matrix Resurrections. And there's no competition like No Way Home. Plus, the Omicron wave likely had an impact on the legs (here in Ontario, theatres were shut down for the month of January).

 

Still, it gives us some template for worst case scenario. And we don't have any reactions yet on this. We don't know if this will be fun bad or bad bad.

[Super]

1 hour ago, vafrow said:

Given how 2023 has been filled with examples of superhero films establishing new ground on low multipliers, I wouldn't rule out a sub 3 for it.

 

We've not had a lot of cases like this with a big budget action film right before Christmas that people are so indifferent towards.

 

The closest I can think of is Matrix Resurrections, which debuted on a Wednesday, so you can't do an apples to apples comparison. But, with it only grossing $37M, if it had Aquamans calendar and release date, it would have probably opened to around $15M, giving a multiplier in the 2.5x range.

 

Now, Aquaman is probably more accessible than  Matrix Resurrections. And there's no competition like No Way Home. Plus, the Omicron wave likely had an impact on the legs (here in Ontario, theatres were shut down for the month of January).

 

Still, it gives us some template for worst case scenario. And we don't have any reactions yet on this. We don't know if this will be fun bad or bad bad.

And Resurrections was a simultaneous release on HBO Max so I don’t think that could ever be a good comp.

[M37]

4 hours ago, Mulder said:

To get holidays legs requires people wanting to see your movie. 

Not really, because the “want to see” level is already baked into the opening that precedes the holidays. It’s much more about how the Christmas effect depresses films opening right before, and then boosts them for 10 days after; demand is delayed 

 

Minimum of 4x off 3-day OW, I’d take the over on 4.5x, and based on historical comps and minimal action/male-skewing  competition thinking closer to 5x … but that still doesn’t get me to much over $100M in total (presuming the OW does in fact break $20M) 

[TheFlatLannister]

11 hours ago, abracadabra1998 said:

Because I could't help myself after the idea was thrown out here:

 

The Color Purple at T-11 in Minneapolis: 1492/7831 (19.05%) vs:

• 10.58x Wish TUE previews at T-11: 141/8794 (1.6%): $19.05 Million
• 2.2x MI7 TUE previews at T-1: 679/17340 (3.92%): $15.38 Million

Napoleon had only been on sale for 4 days so not worth it. Paw Patrol blew up a little closer to release so I will probably add it at T-7. Still not sure about MI7 because of the PLF differences but I might roll with Wish Tuesday and Paw Patrol OD as comps from now on.

 

EDIT: Saw @Porthos post after posting this. True about the PLFs catching up (a bit, still lagging here a bit at least, as I think Aquaman will be pulling quite a few), and good point about using them more for the final week. I still think Paw Patrol is a good one to keep in mind closer to release as well because of it being OD and selling a crap ton of pre-sales (locally at least)

I tried Napoleon yesterday and it spit out something like ~$30m

 

i tried MI7 and TMNT and they both spit out ~$20m 

[filmlover]

The Boys in the Boat is getting mediocre reviews. At least we already have one movie that's guaranteed to make no kind of dent of any kind this Christmas.

[Tinalera]

Aquaman 2

Thurs Dec 21 Fri Dec 22 (T-7 Thurs, T-6 Fri)

Toronto and Montreal Canada

 

Toronto	# theatre	#show	Seats Sold	Seats Rem	Ttl seat	Percent
Thurs	4	16	218	6752	6970	0.0312
Fri	4	26	98	6114	6212	0.0157
Montreal	# theatre	#show	Seats Sold	Seats Rem	Ttl seat	Percent
Thurs	3	9	61	2435	2496	0.0244
Fri	3	12	82	3286	3368	0.0243

 

Not a great comp (MCU vs DC but heres GOTG 3 for comparisona at T-8

 

Guardians of the galaxy 3

Thurs May 4 and Fri May 5 (T-8)

Toronto and Montreal Canada

 

		# theatre	#show	Seats Sold	Seats Rem	Ttl seat	Percent
Toronto	Thurs	3	40	1299	7146	8488	0.1530
	Fri	4	49	959	9514	10473	0.0915
Montreal		# theatre	#show	Seats Sold	Seats Rem	Ttl seat	Percent
	Thurs	3	33	882	7909	8791	0.1003
	Fri	3	23	550	6202	6752	0.0814

 

Shazam 2 for T-9

 

hazam 2

Thurs Mar 16 and Fri Mar 17 (T-9)

Toronto and Montreal Canad

		# theatre	#show	Seats Sold	Seats Rem	Ttl seat	Percent
Toronto	Thurs	4	18	98	4162	4260	0.0230
	Fri	3	16	71	4508	4579	0.0155
		# theatre	#show	Seats Sold	Seats Rem	Ttl seat	Percent
Montreal	Thurs	3	15	60	3725	3785	0.0158
	Fri	3	18	45	4841	4886	0.0092

 

 

Soooo make that what you will

 

 

 

 

[TwoMisfits]

So, I don't usually post early sets, but I wanted to give a look at my PLF 14, which has already set 8.5 of its 14 screens for Christmas.  Surprisingly (or not surprisingly after looking at foreign strength this month), it will have new foreign films opening this holiday - that's a 1st ever for this theater.  And it may have more new movies to open, so you can see what films might get for the Christmas week and what is/is not already staying...

 

New

The Color Purple - 1 screen - this will increase, so keep bringing down those "open" screens for holdovers

The Boys in the Boat - 1 screen

 

 

Returning

Aquaman - 2 screens - they upped this from their original Xmas day number - 1 PLF / 1 reg - WB is exhibiting power this Xmas

Wonka - 1.5 screens - .5 PLF/1 regular - they upped the early presales by .5 PLF yesterday, which is funny b/c it's not doing particularly well on PLF, but I guess they want something folks will pay for no matter what

Migration - 1 screen (this is 6 shows, so the power of a short movie)

Anyone but You - 1 screen

Salaar - .5 screen - shares evening PLF on Wonka (another surprise) and has all evening shows 

Dunki - .5 screen - all evening shows

 

It's obvious that morning/afternoon shows are being saved on a screen for a holdover animated.  But, there's 5.5 screens left, with TCP almost certain to get 1 of those 5 and Migration and/or Trolls/Wish getting .5 for early shows.  So, keep counting down for the hope that other Nov/Dec movies can get held (or get opened, since this seems to be missing a bunch of Dec 22/25 openers)...

[dallas]

So, I've taken a quick look at Migration, and across the 6 theaters I'm tracking, it's only sold 18 tickets 😬 I'm kinda scared for this movie. Unless WOM is stellar, then I'm afraid this is dead on arrival. 

[HummingLemon496]

5 hours ago, Legion Again said:

3x is guaranteed but 24 opening definitely is not

Really? So what's the range for OW then?