SPEARE'S TIPS - The Films of 1/14/11

[undeadmonkey]

just looked, tehre are about 4 or 5 people who didn't get the green hornet.

[Buscemi]

Early Friday Numbers (according to Deadline)

1. The Green Hornet 3D (Sony Pictures) NEW [3,584 Theaters]
Friday $10.5M
Estimated 3-Day Weekend $30M, Estimated 4-Day Holiday $35M
2. The Dilemma (Universal Pictures) NEW [2,941 Theaters]
Friday $5.5M
Estimated 3-day Weekend $16.5M, Estimated 4-day Holiday $19.5M
3. True Grit (Paramount) Week 4 [3,459 Theaters]
Friday $3.2M
Estimated 3-Day Weekend $11M, Estimated 4-Day Holiday $13M, Estimated Cume $128.5M
4. The King's Speech (The Weinstein Co) Week 8 [1,543 Theaters]
Friday $2.5M
Estimated 3-Day Weekend $9M, Estimated 4-Day Holiday $11M, Estimated Cume $46.5M
5. Black Swan (Fox Searchlight) Week 7 [2,328 Theaters]
Friday $2.2M
Estimated 3-Day Weekend $6.5M, Estimated 4-day Holiday $9M, Estimated Cume $73.8M
6. Little Fockers (Universal) Week 4 [3,394 Theaters]
Friday $2.1M
Estimated 3-Day Weekend, Estimated 4-Day Holiday $8.5M, Estimated Cume $135.5M
7. The Fighter (Relativity/Paramount) Week 4 [2,414 Theaters]
Friday $1.5M
Estimated 3-Day Weekend, Estimated 4-Day Holiday $6M, Estimated Cume $67M
8. Season Of The Witch (Relativity) Week 2 [2,827 Theaters]
Friday $1.4M (-64%)
Estimated 3-Day Weekend, Estimated 4-Day Holiday $5.5M, Estimated Cume $19M
9. Tron: Legacy 3D (Disney) Week 5 [2,439 Theaters]
Friday $1.2M
Estimated 3-Day Weekend, Estimated 4-Day Holiday $5.5M, Estimated Cume $156.7M
10. Yogi Bear 3D (Warner Bros) Week 5 [2,702 Theaters]
Friday $1.1M
Estimated 3-Day Weekend, Estimated 4-Day Holiday $7M, Estimated Cume $83.7M

[BanksIsDaFuture]

Wow, Kings Speech and Black Swan are killing!

And I expected Little Fockers to not do very well, but it's dropping like a rock.

And I think The Dilemma will do better than $17M 3-day. At least I'm hoping...

[Buscemi]

With Black Swan still making money, that means Fox will never go wide with 127 Hours (which had its wide run back in December canceled because Fox wanted to pump more money into Black Swan and Love and Other Drugs, the latter having already established itself as a flop with with critics and audiences). The film has been established to be better than Black Swan (through Rotten Tomatoes and IMDb ratings) but Fox seems to want to deny it even exists (simply because it doesn't have a lesbian sex scene).

As for The Dilemma, I'm glad it is flopping. Vince Vaughn's ego needs to be deflated (and he should think twice before defending his own homophobic comments). Imagine had they made the film the way it was intended before Vaughn signed on (an R-rated ensemble dark comedy taking place in New York rather than the PG-13 Vaughn vehicle that looks like Couples Retreat 2).

[numbersix]

The film has been established to be better than Black Swan (through Rotten Tomatoes and IMDb ratings) but Fox seems to want to deny it even exists (simply because it doesn't have a lesbian sex scene).

That's a very debatable claim, especially when you're judging it on the erroneous Rotton Tomato score and IMDB (which, for the record is the opposite as Black Swan is 8.6 with more votes, and 127 Hours is 8.3). I don't know why Fox aren't making 127 Hours wide, but I guess they think that ultimately Black Swan is doing better than 127 Hours would have. And that's probably true, especially since Boyle's is getting no award buzz whatsoever.

[transformers2]

I've seen both of them, I think Black Swan is easily better than 127 Hours. Don't get me wrong, 127 Hours is a very good film, it's just that Black Swan is a superior film across the board imo, it absoultely floored me. 127 Hours didn't catch on because audiences didn't connect with the premise, it kind of just feel under the radar, which is why the wide release was canceled. Black Swan is making money because of a ton of award buzz and a lot of advertising.

[Buscemi]

An inspirational true story of survival doesn't connect with audiences but a girl turning into a swan does? If you had given these two films the same advertising dollars and theatres, I willing to bet that 127 Hours would have made more money. Fox just didn't do it because they wanted sex appeal (this is also why they dumped Fantastic Mr. Fox and Idiocracy in favor of more lowest common denominator* films such as Jennifer's Body and The Marine).

*- I am not calling Black Swan a lowest common denominator film. But you can tell that Fox wanted to after seeing the words "Natalie Portman/Mila Kunis sex scene". If it didn't have that scene, Fox wouldn't have pushed the film.

[silversurfer19]

The thing is Boussh, 127 Hours was falling flat on it's face when they started to take it wider. At its widest (433 locations), it started losing money on its previous weeks when it was playing in 140 locations less, it was taking in just $3,700 PTA, I could tell then that the movie was dead, taking it wider would not have helped it at all, it was dead in the water. And evne though I'm a fan of Boyle, if I was a Fox exec I would have been pulling it then, as it had obviously lost its momentum and Black Swan was gaining much more recognition (and nothing to do with the sex scene - I first remember hearing about that a year ago, but the reason it gained so much attention was because of the great performances and expert direction).

Fox played a very smart move, if they'd carried on pushing 127 Hours what could it have possibly made? $25-30m max? While letting Black Swan drown in limited locations despite it's huge acclaim? No, they did the right thing, pulled 127 Hours and allowed the momentum of Black Swan to carry it to possible blockbuster status. If any aspiring company wants to learn how to push the right limited movies at the right time, they could do much worse than look at Fox.

[Buscemi]

But when it was dropping, Fox also had Love and Other Drugs out. Instead of pushing 127 Hours, Fox was pushing Love and Other Drugs (opening in 2,500 theatres the same week 127 Hours expanded into 300). And when it turned out to be a dud, Fox kept pushing it over 127 Hours. You've ever heard of finding an audience? Fox wouldn't do it with 127 Hours, either chickening out over the content or being incredibly quiet with expansion. Meanwhile, they continued to push Black Swan and Love and Other Drugs because of the sex appeal.

In the process, Warner Bros. got the UK rights and managed to open it at Number 2 there. So you can clearly see that Warner Bros. is actually trying to push the film and not trying to bury it due to a lack of sex scenes.

[silversurfer19]

Well, maybe Fox thought, y'know, as an actual distributor of more than one movie, that they needed to advertise other movies. 127 Hours had a full 3 weekends to generate the amount of buzz necessary to push it wide, but in it's second weekend it was already no longer the leading limited release. The fact of the matter is there just was not enough buzz to warrant a wide release. Every time it went wider it's PTA more than halved, and that was before it had even reached any sort of wide status. There was just wasn't the demand. Maybe most of the US were not interested in seeing a guy sit on a rock for two hours before cutting his arm off?

And you continue to believe the sole reason Fox pushed Black Swan was for its sex appeal? Really? Man that's just lazy. The amount of buzz the movie has generated from the performances is the reason. In fact, I've seen nothing for months regarding the sex scene on any review, advertisement or anything. It's all been about Portman's great performance.

And it did ok in the UK because it's a UK director, and one of their most famous, so it's hardly surprising. And even then The King's Speech almost doubled it's OW take. I have no doubt when Black Swan is released there it will beat 127 Hours numbers. So maybe WB isn't that much of a hot shot when coming to distributing in the UK?

[BanksIsDaFuture]

Sex scenes has nothing to with it. 127 Hours has/had an extremely limited audience, while obviously Black Swan has become a huge hit.

That's the whole point of releasing something limited: if it does well, it expands and if it flops, it'll be quickly shuffled out of theaters.

If all Black Swan had going for it was lesbian sex scenes, it would've performed just like Jennifer's Body. Or like Love & Other Drugs. But not approaching $70M and counting...

[Shrykespeare]

Friday Estimates:

The Green Hornet, $11.1M
The Dilemma, $6.1M
True Grit, $3.24M
The King's Speech, $2.43M
Black Swan, $2.41M
Little Fockers, $2.0M
The Fighter, $1.48M
Tron Legacy, $1.39M
Season of the Witch, $1.27M
Country Strong, $1.1M


It'll be close, but it looks like the third Narnia movie may crawl over the $100 million mark before its done.

[Shrykespeare]

Sunday Estimates

Top 5:
5 points - The Green Hornet, $34M
4 points - The Dilemma, $17.4M
3 points - True Grit, $11.2M
2 points - The King's Speech, $9.1M
1 points - Black Swan, $8.1M

So King's Speech cracks the Top 5 for the first time. And True Grit now has 16 Top 5 points, more than any December release.


PTA (Nov, Dec leagues)
5 points - Barney's Version, $17,925
4 points - Another Year, $9,769
3 points - The Green Hornet, $9,487
2 points - The Illusionist, $9,300
1 point - Blue Valentine, $5,974

PTA (Jan leagues)
5 points - Barney's Version, $17,925
4 points - The Green Hornet, $9,487
? points - The Dilemma, 5,925
? points - Season of the Witch, $1,592
? points - Phil Ochs: There But For Fortune, $?

Nov/Dec: That gives both Another Year and Blue Valentine 10 PTA overall. Illusionist now has 9 PTA overall.

Jan: Since I won't know how Phil Ochs did in its second week until tomorrow, it could be anywhere from 3rd to 5th place. 2 points is probably the safest bet.


User Ratings:

The Green Hornet - 6.8
The Dilemma - 5.1
Barney's Version - 7.2

[Shrykespeare]

Sunday Actuals

Top 5:
5 points - The Green Hornet, $33.5M
4 points - The Dilemma, $17.8M
3 points - True Grit, $11.0M
2 points - The King's Speech, $9.2M
1 points - Black Swan, $8.3M



PTA (Nov, Dec leagues)
5 points - Barney's Version, $16,310
4 points - Phil Ochs: There But For Fortune, $12,377
3 points - The Green Hornet, $9,355
2 points - The Illusionist, $8,639
1 point - Another Year, $8,600

PTA (Jan leagues)
5 points - Barney's Version, $17,925
4 points - Phil Ochs: There But For Fortune, $12,377
3 points - The Green Hornet, $9,487
2 points - The Dilemma, 6,060
1 point - Season of the Witch, $1,629