Despicable Me had an excellent opening weekend leading a very strong top five, while Predators had a better than expected debut to post a strong opening weekend gross. My predictions were not strong in terms of grosses, but I correctly placed all five films of the top five in order. Here’s how the weekend broke down:
Despicable Me debuted in 1st place with a gross $60.1 million (I predicted a 1st place finish and a gross of $51 million). Despicable Me had a very strong per theatre average of $17,295, which was the highest per theatre average in the top ten. Despicable Me had a very strong debut, which you can attribute to quite a few things: 1) Strong Reviews 2) Good Marketing and 3) 3-D screenings which increased ticket prices. When I made my prediction for Despicable Me’s opening weekend, I picked a variety of films, but the highest grossing film that I used was Monsters vs. Aliens which grossed $59.3 million on its opening weekend and Despicable Me surpassed that. The film will face some competition next weekend when The Sorcerer’s Apprentice opens, but it should have a strong run. The budget for Despicable Me is rumoured to be around $69 million, so Universal has to be extremely happy with the debut of Despicable Me this weekend.
Dropping from 1st place to 2nd place is The Twilight Saga: Eclipse with a gross of $33.4 million (I predicted a 2nd place finish and a gross of $20.7 million). The Twilight Saga: Eclipse had a per theatre average of $7,475 and was only down 48.5% from last weekend. The hold is impressive, because as I pointed out on Friday, The Twilight Saga films have usually had a large second weekend drop. See below:
Twilight – 62.2% second weekend drop
The Twilight Saga: New Moon – 70% second weekend drop
The Twilight Saga: Eclipse – 45% second weekend drop
The film is the best reviewed of the three and despite their being more competition in the summer, The Twilight Saga: Eclipse is showing that it can play with the big boys. The Twilight Saga: Eclipse is now the second highest grossing film in the franchise and has a very legitimate chance to become the highest grossing film of the franchise if it continues to post these strong holds.
1) The Twilight Saga: New Moon – $296.6 million
2) The Twilight Saga: Eclipse – $237 million
3) Twilight – $192.7 million
The budget on The Twilight Saga: Eclipse is rumoured to be around $68 million, so Summit Entertainment has to be extremely happy with how the film has performed.
Debuting in 3rd place is Predators with a gross of $25.3 million (I predicted a 3rd place finish and a gross of $18 million). Predators had a per theatre average of $9,479 which was the second highest in the top ten. The film has breathed new life into the franchise as it is a definite improvement from the $10 million opening weekend that Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem had back in 2007, which was the last time the Predator character appeared on film. The strong reviews definitely sparked some interest with audiences. The fact that there were not strong expectations for the film, this opening weekend gross is considered to be a success. It’s funny how we interpret numbers. Predators opened with $25.3 million, which is considered a success, while The A-Team opened with a gross of $25.6 million, which was considered to be a disappointment. It’s all about meeting expectations. We’ll see how the film holds next weekend, when both Inception and The Sorcerer’s Apprentice will battle for some of its audience. Still, a good start of Predators especially since the budget on the film is rumoured to be around $40 million.
Dropping from 3rd place to 4th place was Toy Story 3 with a gross of $22 million (I predicted a 4th place finish and a gross of $16.6 million). Toy Story 3 had a per theatre average of $5,862 and was down 27.3% from last weekend. The hold was excellent, and with the strong hold, Toy Story 3 is now the highest grossing Pixar film of all time:
1) Toy Story 3 – $340.2 million
2) Finding Nemo – $339.7 million
3) Up – $293 million
What’s amazing is that Toy Story 3 has accomplished that achievement in only its 4th weekend. What’s also noteworthy is that Toy Story 3 is now the highest grossing film released in 2010, surpassing the $334 million of Alice in Wonderland, which means Disney has to be very thrilled to have the top two films of 2010 so far. The rumoured budget for Toy Story 3 is $200 million, so the film is just printing money for Disney/Pixar.
Dropping from 2nd place to 5th place is The Last Airbender with a gross of $17.1 million (I predicted a 5th place finish and a gross of $14.1 million). The Last Airbender had a per theatre average of $5,354 and was down 57.5% from its opening weekend. The drop was decent compared to the drops of Shyamalan’s more recent films. Here’s the list:
2010 – The Last Airbender – 57.5% second weekend drop
2008 – The Happening – 65.7% second weekend drop
2006 – Lady in the Water – 60.4% second weekend drop
2004 – The Village – 67.5% second weekend drop
The Last Airbender had the highest drop of any film in the top ten this weekend, so that is not a good sign for the long term health of the film, and when final numbers come in on Monday, there is the possibility that the film could drop to 6th place. The reported budget on the film is $150 million, and so far The Last Airbender has grossed $100.2 million, which gives M. Night Shyamalan his first $100 million grossing film since 2004’s The Village.
Dropping from 4th place to 6th place is Grown Ups with a gross of $16.4 million (I predicted a 6th place finish and a gross of $10.5 million). The per theatre average for Grown Ups was $4,736 and the film was down only 13.9% from last weekend. The drop was not the smallest in the top ten, as Cyrus was the number 10 film seeing its numbers rise 77.5% from its previous weekend. Still, Adam Sandler has to be very happy with the gross, and it gives Sandler his 11th $100 million grossing film. The rumoured budget on Grown Ups is $80 million, so Sony Pictures is happy with the film’s performance. After three weekend, Grown Ups has taken in $111.3 million, and has a shot at being the number 5 film when final numbers come out on Monday.
7th place belonged to Knight and Day with a gross of $7.8 million, giving it a total of $61.9 million. The budget is reported to be $117 million.
8th place belonged to The Karate Kid with a gross of $5.7 million, giving it a total of $164.6 million. The budget is reported to be $40 million.
9th place belonged to The A-Team with a gross of $1.8 million, giving it a total of $73.9 million. The budget is reported to be $110 million.
As mentioned earlier, 10th place belonged to Cyrus with a gross of $1.375 million, giving it a total of $3.5 million. The budget is reported to be $7 million.
In limited release:
The Girl Who Played With Fire – The second film in “The Millennium Trilogy” that follows the continuing adventures of Lisbeth Salander and Mikael Blomkvist opened in 11th place with a gross of $965,000 from 110 theatres, giving it a per theatre average of $8,773.
Grease (Sing-A-Long Re-Issue) – The classic musical starring John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John grossed $78,000 from 12 theatres for a per theatre average of $6,500. Tomatoes
The Kids Are All Right – The film that stars Annette Bening, Julianne Moore and Mark Ruffalo and is about a lesbian couple dealing with the sperm donor of their kids appearing and wanting to be a part of their life grossed $505,000 from 7 theatres giving it a scorching per theatre average of $72,143, which is the highest of any film in release.
Winnebago Man, [REC] 2 and Around a Small Mountain have not reported their opening weekend grosses as of this writing.
So to recap, here were my predictions:
Despicable Me – $51 million
The Twilight Saga: Eclipse – $20.7 million
Predators – $18 million
Toy Story 3 – $16.6 million
The Last Airbender – $14.1 million
And here are the actual numbers:
Despicable Me – $60.1 million
The Twilight Saga: Eclipse – $33.4 million
Predators – $25.3 million
Toy Story 3 – $22 million
The Last Airbender – $17.1 million
My predictions compared to the actual top five films were off by $38.7 million.
Next weekend, Leonardo DiCaprio and director Christopher Nolan team up for the highly anticipated Inception, while Nicolas Cage looks to have a box office hit with The Sorcerer’s Apprentice. Check out Biff Bam Pop next Friday to read my predictions!
