January 20-22, 2012 Box Office Results

Weekend of January 20-22, 2012

Underworld: Awakening – 21.5 est – My prediction: Over – 25.3 act – Over
Red Tails – 18.0 est – My prediction: Under – 18.8 act – Over
Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close – 12.0 est – My prediction: Over – 10.0 act – Under
Haywire – 8.5 est – My prediction: Over – 8.4 act – Under

Once again, other than Underworld, estimates were fairly close this weekend. None of us got all of the predictions correct.

Underworld 4 proved that there is still a bit of a demand for this franchise. With a $70 million production budget, the film has made short of $40 million worldwide already. Part of the boost in being over estimates probably has to do with Kate Beckinsale’s return who was not in the third film. Also, 3D played a part in the gross, but only 59% of its ticket sales came from that.

Red Tails did better than I thought it would, especially when you compare it to other fighter pilot movies. The marketing for the film was everywhere along with George Lucas’ name. Still, it was only $782,154 above the estimate.

The 9/11 drama Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close expanded to 2,630 theatres and I would say ended up being well under expectations considering that the movie has Tom Hanks and Sandra Bullock, two of Hollywood’s biggest stars. It’s for this reason that I thought it would do well. Box Office Mojo dug up this interesting fact that it’s “the least-attended nationwide opening in two decades for Tom Hanks, and is the least-attended in the last 15 years for Sandra Bullock.” Some say that the depressing nature of the story and the use of the Sept. 11th tragedy to produce an emotional response were reasons that the movie did not do well.

Despite being directed by Steven Soderbergh and having an all-star cast, Haywire underperformed compared to other female-led action films. Even with a more unknown cast, Colombiana did better in its opening weekend. Funny enough, it’s the best reviewed film that came out over the weekend with an 83% on Rotten Tomatoes (Underworld – 32%, Red Tails – 33%, Extremely Loud – 48%). Perhaps with all the action films out, people chose to not make this one a priority.

Iran’s A Separation topped the per theatre average category this weekend after increasing its theatre count to 13. The film recently won the Golden Globe for Best Foreign Film and will likely see an Oscar nomination tomorrow. I saw the film and I thought it was really good. Speaking of the Oscars, The Artist just won at the Producer’s Guild along with a couple Golden Globes, so it is looking more like it’ll win Best Pictures at the Academy Awards. This has not quite impacted its box office totals yet, having earned only $12 million total domestically since November 25th. We’ll see if the Oscars can get it more attention.

This upcoming weekend is looking similar to what we just experienced; three new major releases with a limited release expanding, but only just a little. First up is The Grey, the survival action film starring Liam Neeson and produced by Ridley and Tony Scott. Despite the cheesy trailer with Neeson’s character about to fight wolves with broken mini alcohol bottles, it currently has an 83% on Rotten Tomatoes. Then there’s Man on a Ledge starring Avatar’s Sam Worthington, which has an intriguing premise. The action comedy One for the Money starring Katherine Heigl and based on the 1994 novel written by Janet Evanovich will see about 2,700 theatres this weekend. I can’t expect much from that since I haven’t heard much about it. The film that is expanding is The Descendants, which won some Golden Globes and will almost definitely get an Oscar nomination tomorrow morning. This is purely a move on Fox Searchlight to hopefully make more money off of the buzz by pushing it to 900 theatres.