THB #354: Box Office, Summer's Almost Here

I’ve been covering box office weekly for more than 25 years. I have more time in the saddle than any box office analyst currently working in public. There are some younger writers who have great passion and deliver insights that are fresh and interesting. Some do not.

The last 3 years of trying to compare every film, every genre, every sniffle, has been fascinating… and at the same time, super boring. In having to say something every weekend, inundated with analytics companies that are all elbowing one another to make claims about what they can deliver, with the all or nothing mindset of industry journalists and the new domination of gossip columnists whose strings are pulled and who don’t smartly challenge their “sources,” covering box office becomes like a marketing event itself, more about finding a quick, sticky narrative than really working the numbers.

Look at this weekend. We know that The Super Mario Bros Movie, reviled by critics, had an extraordinarily good hold for any movie that opened to over $100 million domestic. There are only 6 examples of equal or better holds in all of movie history. 1 Christmastime (Star Wars VII), 1 Thanksgiving time (Frozen II), 3 in May (Spider-Man, Shrek 2, Top Gun: Maverick), and almost identically the 2016 The Jungle Book, which also opened in April (though not against Easter), and also dropped just over 40%.

Even among films that opened to between $50 million and $100 million, there are only 25 examples of a second-weekend dropping under 41%… and only 7 of those are not in summer or the holiday window (Gravity, The Lego Movie, The Lego Batman Movie, The Martian, The Passion of the Christ, A Quiet Place, Zootopia).

But, why?

I will indulge pretty much any theory of “why?” as long as the theorizer is willing to admit they are really guessing. I mean, the broad guesses all make sense. Great worldwide IP, a lack of films made and released for families, great marketing. Yes, yes, yes, yes.

I personally think this amazing hold may be 5% better because the film opened on Easter weekend and there are families who were just not going to the movies on Good Friday or Easter Sunday. But a 46% drop on a $146 million 3-day is still amazing and not objectively explicable.

This is one of the great lessons of box office coverage. It often makes no objective sense. And bless Anthony at Deadline… he didn’t even try to explain it. He just reported it.

Likewise, M3GAN to Knock At The Cabin to Cocaine Bear to Renfield… $30m to $14m to $23m to $8 million. Kinda makes sense. Maybe Universal releasing one of those kissing cousins every 3 months would make more sense. They don’t have one scheduled over the summer. As always, keep in mind, opening weekend is never about the movie itself… so stop checking RT scores.

What about The Big Movies, that were supposed to be all we needed in theaters? Shouldn’t Shazam 2 and Dungeons & Dragons 1 be causing executives to change their undergarments? And yeah, I think “Marvel is Over” is a bit much right now, but Ant-Man’s Family Acid Trip got beat by last spring’s The Batman - an R-minded Batman film rated PG-13 - by 73%.

Even John Wick, Chapter 4 is underperforming the hysteria. Wick 1, $43m. Wick 2, $92m. Wick 3, $171m. Wick 4, likely just under or just over $200 million.

Now, $200 milion domestic and better growth internationally - likely $225 million or better - is terrific for everyone connected to John Wick. Top 15, maybe Top 10 for the year worldwide. Don’t mean to diminish. But $500 million is the bottom of the top for The Biggies. Lots of people are making lots of money on the series and a quarter point would make most of us very, very happy. But the growth has been steady, not spectacular.

But we need to stay as objective as possible about the new norms and what they should be if we are going to call the industry healthy.

LOOKING AT THE SUMMER

Here are all the movies expected to do over $100 million domestic this summer, in order of release, and my guess at how much they might gross.