Friday, April 16, 2010

Dragon's Hold

B.O. Mojo displays and explains the numbers:

Weekly Report: ... How to Train Your Dragon dropped 34 percent to $30.1 million. ... For the second week in a row, How to Train Your Dragon had the best hold of any nationwide release, though its 34 percent week-to-week drop was more severe than its 14 percent weekend dip. This is mainly attributable to the Easter holiday boosting mid-week numbers last week: Dragon's Monday-Thursday grosses were down 68 percent. Through three weeks, Dragons sits at $138.6 million, off $11 million from Monsters Vs. Aliens at the same point last year.

HTTYD has steadily closed on Monsters vs. Aliens domestic numbers since its tepid opening weekend. The feature likely stands a good chance of passing MvA's stateside gross in the next seven to fourteen days.

A few stats: Monsters ended its run with 52% of its worldwide total ($381.5 million) coming from U.S. and Canadian theaters.

Dragon reverses that, with 46% of a $300.5 million take (so far) coming from Canada and the U.S. and Canada.

HTTYD has had strong legs, which can be attributed to a solid story structure and first-rate execution. We can blame its under-powered opening on a publicity and advertising campaign that didn't click until it was rejiggered a week before Dragon's premiere. (Add to that a crowded 3-D field. Monsters, by contrast, had the -- somewhat smaller -- 3-D racetrack to itself*.)

* It's always fun to armchair quarterback after the fact. If DreamWorks Animation's latest had opened with a $70 million haul, I'd be saying how the savvy promotional campaign really kicked the movie into overdrive ...

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

For what it's worth, folks are still telling friends and family about Dragon on Twitter:
http://twitter.com/#search?q=toothless dragon

Anonymous said...

It's such a cute kids cartoon. I dropped the grankids (7 and 8) off to see it and they liked it.

AmyV said...

I thought HTTYD was an incredible film but I think Dreamworks have missed a trick with the advertsing and especially merchandise, at least in the UK. They seem to be putting all their energies in to promoting the next Shrek, which is a shame because I think HTTYD could've been as good a money spinner as Shrek ever was!

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