Saturday, December 04, 2010

Early December Derby

Now with cinnamon crunch Add Ons.

The Nikkster tells us how animated features are doing:

... [T]he weekend after Thanksgiving is usually slow. ...

1. Tangled (Disney) Week 2 [3,603 Theaters] -- Friday $5.1M (-74%), Estimated Weekend $16.5M, Estimated Cume $90M

2. Harry Potter/Deathly Hallows (Warner Bros) Week 3 [4,125 Theaters] -- Friday $4.8M, Estimated Weekend $16.7M, Estimated Cume $243M ...

8. Megamind (DreamWorks Animation/Paramount) Week 5 [3,173 Theaters] -- Friday $1.1M, Estimated Weekend $4.3M, Estimated Cume $135M ...

I'm looking for Megamind to climb a few notches before the weekend is over. I suppose we'll see ...

Add On: Box Office Mojo tallies the #1 Tangled at $21.5 million for the weekend, with a $96.5 million total.

Meanwhile, Megamind sails on in the sixth position, collecting $5 million on its way to a $136.7 million domestic accumulation.

Compared to the weekend of cranberry sauce and stuffing, both features took sizable hits. (A decline of 56% for the long-haired girl, and a 60% drop for the blue alien.)

Add On Too: The L.A. Times does follow-up analysis of the weekend gone by:

Company Town: 'Tangled' the smoothest box-office performer Disney's 3-D animated feature has estimated ticket sales of $21.5 million to rank No. 1 on a slow weekend at the nation's theaters.

... Coming off very strong word of mouth from opening-weekend audiences, "Tangled" dropped 56% in ticket sales, a relatively modest decline following a busy holiday weekend. The first hit in nearly a decade from Disney's legendary Burbank animation studio, which has been overshadowed by its more successful corporate sibling Pixar, is now just shy of $100 million in gross receipts in the U.S. ...

29 comments:

Anonymous said...

Ooofff! A Friday 74% drop! An estimated weekend drop of 66%? That is a meltdown. According to Finke, this is historically a soft weekend, but those are some huge drops.

Anonymous said...

This doesn't look good. Considering this is the only weekend to make a big push. Hopfully this changes by Sunday. Next week the big holiday films start rolling out.

Anonymous said...

Yeah, looks like Tangled was really front-loaded. I thought the movie was just okay myself, except for the way it looked - the animation was awesome.

Anonymous said...

^Yeah, it looks like Tangled may be the CG version of Sleeping Beauty - looks great, but does not-so-great business at the box office...

Anonymous said...

Last Friday the kids were out of school. Wait for whole weekend numbers before you worry too much.

Anonymous said...

Unfortunately, predicting the weekend box office take from the Friday numbers is a well developed art. Don't expect that $16.5 million estimate to be off by a hell of a lot.

Anonymous said...

uh huh, just like last weekend when the prediction was 35mil and it turned out to be 68mmil?

Anonymous said...

Best it could end up doing will be around $18 million, but yeah, that estimate won't be too far off from the actual number.

So does this mean marketing did all the work for this movie? Don't opening weekends reflect the job the marketing department did, then how the movie holds up on the subsequent weekend viewings reflect how well the movie is actually received?

Anonymous said...

"Yeah, it looks like Tangled may be the CG version of Sleeping Beauty"

No---Tangled has a compelling story.

Anonymous said...

Dont you Dreamworks employees have something better to do?

Anonymous said...

"Yeah, it looks like Tangled may be the CG version of Sleeping Beauty"

No---Tangled has a compelling story.

********

No way. Sleeping Beauty was flawed, but it's still better than Tangled.

Anonymous said...

Oh look at all the chicken littles here. Weekend estimates for Tangled are 21.5m. Toldja. That's a respectable hold for a family film post Thanksgiving.

This thing will play and play all season long.

Anonymous said...

Saturday to Saturday drop of only 46%. Hardly a meltdown.

Anonymous said...

Tangled rised almost 10 million dollars on saturday and an estimate of 21.5 million dollars. (-55%)

Its a respectable hold considering that Harry Potter dropped a (-65%) and Megamind dropped a (-60%).

By next weekend the hold for Tangled will be much stronger and by christmas the numbers will rise just like The Blind Side last year.

Anonymous said...

It's tracking similarly with what Toy Story 2 made it's 2nd weekend after Thanksgiving (27 million, 51% drop)

It ended up making 245 million domestic. Tangled wont make quite that, seeing how its opening weeend was a bit less, but all signs are pointing to a 190-200 million domestic run.

It's entertaining to read hater's comments, trying desperately to invent "melt downs."

Let Disney folks enjoy this success. It helps everyone.

Anonymous said...

"No way. Sleeping Beauty was flawed, but it's still better than Tangled.:

Most of the world would disagree with you. Put both out, and most would pick Tangled.

Sleeping Beauty is beautiful, but dull. VERY dull.

Anonymous said...

^Maybe, but Maleficent kicks Mother Gothel's ass.

Anyhoo, a 56% drop following the Thanksgiving holiday weekend isn't bad, but isn't great. A 50% drop would have been more reassuring. Plus, the Dawn Treader movie could seriously hurt Tangled this weekend. Which would be seriously ironic...

Anonymous said...

Yeah, 6% is makes all the difference.

(rolls eyes)

Anonymous said...

(rolls eyes)

(gives finger) :)

Anonymous said...

56%? Weak.

Anonymous said...

Last year, The Blind Side (the last film to receive the very rare A+ Cinemascore) dropped 50% for the weekend following Thanksgiving. It did 20 million that weekend, its third.

Being a film for adults, its numbers weren't as weekend-loaded. But it still chugged and chugged all the way into March.

I expect Tangled to continue just fine past this weekend, which even took a toll on The Chosen One himself.

Anonymous said...

Hoping it will make enough during its run for the decision makers to be happy.

Anonymous said...

Anything over a 45% drop on a second weekend is considered bad and as for the Blind Side tracking similarly? There were no expectations for that film - there were for Tangled.
What Tangled had going in its favor this weekend is it grabbed the #1 spot. that's a good thing. If it had made the exact same amount (or even more) and failed to grab the #1 spot that would have been a bad omen.
This will not be a home run decision for Disney on what to do next. They will debate this back and forth quite a bit.

Anonymous said...

Copied from IMDB:

How about some historical perspective to put this weekend's gross into context?

Here's a list of every past animated Disney feature that was in release during the Thanksgiving holidays. This list will include how much money it made during the holiday weekend, what its percentage drop was the following weekend, what it had made in total during the 12 days from Thanksgiving Wednesday to the end of the following weekend, and what its final gross would have been if only post-Thanksgiving money was counted. Then hopefully we can use those numbers as a gauge to see how Tangled is really doing so far.


"Oliver & Company"
Holiday Weekend: $6,338,773
Next Weekend: $3,100,641 (51.1% drop)
Total 12-day Gross: $11,500,000
Total Holiday-to-End Gross: $48,680,000

"The Little Mermaid"
Holiday Weekend: $8,384,862
Next Weekend: $4,030,274 (51.9% drop)
Total 12-Day Gross: $15,260,000
Total Holiday-to-End Gross: $77,500,000

"The Rescuers Down Under"
Holiday Weekend: $4,396,208
Next Weekend: $2,004,870 (54.4% drop)
Total 12-Day Gross: $7,844,560
Total Holiday-to-End Gross: $22,700,000

"Beauty and the Beast"
Holiday Weekend: $12,239,650
Next Weekend: $5,969,372 (51.2% drop)
Total 12-Day Gross: $22,755,000
Total Holiday-to-End Gross: $134,500,000

"Aladdin"
Holiday Weekend: $19,289,073
Next Weekend: $10,915,551 (43.4% drop)
Total 12-Day Gross: $39,780,000
Total Holiday-to-End Gross: $216,700,000

"Treasure Planet"
Holiday Weekend: $12,083,248
Next Weekend: $5,547,431 (54.1% drop)
Total 12-Day Gross: $23,650,217
Total Holiday-to-End Gross: $38,176,783

"Brother Bear"
Holiday Weekend: $4,872,344
Next Weekend: $1,259,466 (74.2% drop)
Total 12-Day Gross: $8,184,622
Total Holiday-to-End Gross: $14,045,278

"Chicken Little"
Holiday Weekend: $12,568,113
Next Weekend: $4,406,418 (64.9% drop)
Total 12-Day Gross: $22,615,176
Total Holiday-to-End Gross: $33,883,004

"Bolt"
Holiday Weekend: $26,581,002
Next Weekend: $9,796,149 (63.1% drop)
Total 12-Day Gross: $48,528,104
Total Holiday-to-End Gross: $83,200,261

"Tangled"
Holiday Weekend: $48,767,052
Next Weekend: $21,500,000 (55.9% drop)
Total 12-Day Gross: $96,461,000
Total Holiday-to-End Gross: ?


At the present moment, Tangled is holding its audience at a rate 12% better than 2008's "Bolt." If it were to follow the exact same drop trajectory as Bolt, it would end up at a final total of $165,380,052. If, however, it can continue to maintain its 12% better drop rate, its final total would be $185,542,000. However, if it can maintain the same post-Thanksgiving drop percentages as its current closest percentage-drop Disney animated film comparison, "The Rescuers Down Under," its final total would end up as $279,131,600.


Or perhaps a better comparison would be "The Blind Side," which was released at the exact same time last year, and was the only other movie to get an A+ on Cinemascore. Here are the stats on that one:

"The Blind Side"
Holiday Weekend: $40,111,364
Next Weekend: $20,043,181 (50% drop)
Total 12-Day Gross: $86,147,906
Total Holiday-to-End Gross: $213,239,822

If Tangled follows the exact same drop trajectory, it would end at $238,767,573. If Tangled continues to have a 5.9% worse drop trajectory, it will end at about $224,680,000


Therefore, my new educated guess for what Tangled's final domestic gross will be is somewhere between $185 million and $225 million. Between the comparison of "Bolt" and the comparison of "The Blind Side."

Anonymouse said...

Good analysis, though I think you're leaving out the time when Tangled will eventually get hit a bit more once it gets booted from 3D screens to make room for the newer 3D films... One reason it did so well its first weekend was WB's decision not to release Harry Potter 7 in 3D, so it didn't have to fight for screens.

I think Disney will be happy with anything over $150 million, which this looks like it will be making. And the reception for it has been great.

My hope is they start getting more films in the pipeline now that they have a winner on their hands so that the animators can get more stability over there. Lord knows they deserve it.

Anonymous said...

I think Disney will be happy with anything over $150 million, which this looks like it will be making. And the reception for it has been great.

Again, Thanksgiving/Xmas ISN'T summer--Numbers have to be sports-handicapped and scaled back to half/two-thirds of what a studio would normally estimate for May and June:
The schools aren't out till Christmas vacation; it's retirees and housewives going to the afternoon shows during the weekdays, and all the family business at 7pm but not 9pm.
"Anything over $150M" in mid-November is a big, BIG hit for a word-of-mouth movie not based on an existing book franchise (like HP or Twilight), and that's clearly what Disney's got.

One of the posters on last week's B.O. threads immediately pulled the lever and started the Princess&Frog gears grinding: "Well, it clearly didn't make enough money; what does that say about society and the public's growing lack of faith in the traditional story formula, or did the story not reach them somehow?..."
Hey--Chill. At least Harry Potter didn't crush it like we were all panicking it would. (Now, Pooh, OTOH...)

Anonymous said...

Again, Thanksgiving/Xmas ISN'T summer--Numbers have to be sports-handicapped and scaled back to half/two-thirds of what a studio would normally estimate for May and June:

This is false. Even a cursory check of the box office numbers of major animated releases over the last 10 years will show that the disparity between summer and holiday releases is not nearly so significant as you claim. If it were, DreamWorks and Disney would never have released Megamind and Tangled when they did, nor would Harry Potter have been released in November.

Anonymous said...

There's demographics, and then there's numbers:
Studios know what they're doing when they release the "season opener" first animated/family film during the first week of November, the major family tentpole on Thanksgiving weekend, and the all-out soulless marketing-driven CGI-hype film on Christmas vacation....
BUT, with limited showings to earn from, they don't expect the same overnight $80-90M opening weekend that the big Memorial Day or July 4 blockbuster gets, with audience traffic in and out of the theaters around the clock. If you can do $40-$50M on a November opening, you're doing better than the average hit that opens with $25-35M.
(It's the cold weather, you know, affects everything.)

Anonymous said...

If you can do $40-$50M on a November opening, you're doing better than the average hit that opens with $25-35M.

You're still just pulling numbers out of your ass to justify your opinion, but these are some pretty funny ones. So you're making the Einstein-like discovery that a $40-50 million opening is better than a $25-35 million opening? Gosh, who'd a thunk it?

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