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I've already discussed The Dark Knight's $130 million prospects. But Universal's Mamma Mia! also opens domestically on July 18th, so expect one of the biggest 3-day weekends ever at the box office. The studio thinks this counter-programming from Playtone's Tom Hanks and his producing partner Gary Goetzman will open strong at $25+ million. 
(I agree since keep seeing those ubiquitous ads and then can't get that damn ABBA song out of my head.) After all, the pic is based on the musical that's a global sensation that's been seen by 30 million people since it debuted in London in 1999. But this is one of those rare times when it doesn't matter what a pic makes stateside. Because Mamma Mia! has already blown the doors off overseas box office and looks to make $200M internationally. It opened gangbusters in Greece and the United Kingdom already and debuted in 11 more international markets this weekend, for an estimated $24M overseas weekend with a per screen average of $17,544. The U.K. opened the film at No. 1 with 34% market share for an estimated $13.2M, which makes it the biggest opening ever for a musical in the U.K. It is also Universal's 4th biggest opening ever in the market, behind only Bridget Jones 2, Mr. Bean's Holiday and King Kong. Australia opened No. 1 with $5.2M and 28% market share and also is the biggest debut ever for a musical. Scandinavia, the Middle East, and parts of Asia all had great numbers. In Greece, where the pic was filmed, Mamma Mia! opened last week to huge numbers for that country. Expectedly, as home to Abba, Sweden had an outstanding No. 1 opening. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to know that the pic is doing so well because ABBA is still huge around the world even if it was never that big in this country. (Although the Abba music in those Aussie films popular here, Muriel's Wedding and Priscilla Queen Of The Desert, made the pics...) The Swedish pop group burst on the European scene by winning the Eurovision Song Contest and has sold over 400 million records. Even though ABBA last performed together in 1982, the group still sells 2M to 3M records each year. I'm really curious to see all of next weekend's box office numbers roll in...
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Mama Mia looks like fun. I love love Abba, however, I’m not convinced that the singing is all that good. Judging by Meryl singing “I’m checking out” in that movie who’s name I forgot, She’s “okay” as a singer. Not as great as people make her out to be. And the other actors in the movie aren’t singers at all from what I know.(one day hollywood will cast musicals with actual singers) So, ehh, I’ll wait for this on one of the file-sharing sites next Saturday night. Dark Knight will stomp the hell out of it. Although it will get many of the people (over 25 women) who don’t want to see DK or who couldn’t get tickets. So I guess about 30 million.
Yeah, Hanks and his wife seem to have cornered the market on the 2008 equivalent of the “Beach Blanket Bingo” type films. Innocuous, musical type movies. No ruffling of feathers or sensibilities. Good for them.
The movie will do OK, not huge business. For a movie to do huge weekend business, it has to be both a date-night movie and one that lots of young men with disposable income will go see, without any good substitutes.
It’s also a recession, now. So while movies are a good date-night activity, for young men, there’s a lot of competition for women. Not the least of which is Blockbuster night.
The foreign market is a poor predictor of the US market. If the US were like the foreign market, TROY would have been a huge hit here and Brad Pitt would be opening big movies every year (men can’t stand him for obvious reasons).
ABBA was not huge in the US, but they did have a respectable, solid string of hits here that most people know from the radio – especially “Dancing Queen,” “Take A Chance On Me,” “Knowing Me, Knowing You,” “Fernando” and “The Winner Takes It All”… not to forget “Waterloo,” “SOS” and “The Name Of The Game” – all received substantial airplay and the biggest are now played on oldies stations which ignored them for several years. The success of the musical was the third wave of their popularity in the US. The first wave, of course, in the 70s, the second wave in the early 90s when their hit collection “ABBA Gold” was released – which has sold millions more than any of their earlier albums in the US (the often quoted number was 20 million alone in the 90s) and when the Aussie movies played here.
To add to interest, the recent rare appearance of all four original members at the Stockholm premiere has longtime fans chattering on the Internet. Agnetha Faltskog (the blonde soprano in the group – their reluctant sex symbol) is usually the hold out but was there smiling and in good spirits.
“Mamma Mia” should have a strong box office here this weekend, probably a good number two to Batman and Joker and it IS solid female counter-programming to super hero fare.
The dark knight will be record breaking and Mamma Mia will do 40-50 million — so yes it will be a record breaking weekend. You all underestimate Mamma Mia.
I’m mildly curious about this and I get the impression that’s how a lot of people feel. (There’s a certain novelty factor in having Pierce Brosnan singing.) Definitely not a must-see though. I would imagine there will be more interest in the DVD. But as Nikki said, it’s already big everywhere else so it’s a big hit, right? Nice to know not EVERY film has to be huge in the US to attain that status.
Dear Peggy:
Are you fucking kidding me? You come here and post a message on a website that is predominantly by, for and about the Entertainment Industry, an industry which is still recovering from a crippling writers strike and is bracing itself for a possible damaging actors strike (the topic du jour here practically every single jour, in case you’re just visiting), and talk about your big Saturday night in front of your computer watching a first run theatrical release on a file sharing site?! That’s some nerve.
And by the way, the movie you can’t seem to remember is called Postcards from the Edge, and I recall having quite enjoyed Meryl Streep’s big closing number, not that my opinion matters. The point being is that you could have easily used your computer for something that it’s actually for, like looking it up on IMDB, rather than a) coming off lazy and ignorant, and b) declaring your intention to rob the creators and talent of Mamma Mia blind. Take your keyboard and go beat yourself over the head with it.
I think this movie will surprise a lot of the box office obsessed who can’t wait to prognosticate……….and are usually wrong.
Don’t forget Space Chimps.
I bet Hanks wish he had shot this under an Aftra contract. Well, going forward I am sure all of his films will go that route. More money in his pocket. No wonder he lobbied hard to get it approved!!!!
“keep seeing those ubiquitous ads and then can’t get that damn ABBA song out of my head”
You too, huh, Nikki? Someone pass the brain bleach, pronto!
I think Meryl Streep and Pierce Brosnan are very talented actors, but I don’t want to see them in a musical. I’m glad Europe loves it, but I just can’t see young men racing with their dates into a movie version of “Mamma Mia!”… No, this is an old ladies movie… I should know. I am one!
i saw it here in the uk on saturday. so i can only speak for myself, but i’m a 19yo male (and gay) and i loved it. the demographic of the audience was wide. there seemed to be people of all ages loving it which was great to see. there was an applause at the end and clapping during the end performances which is very unbritish. i have never seen any audience at the cinema applause at the end in the uk. i believe the budget for mamma mia is $60m-$70m so this will be a nice earner for universal.
A recession is exactly why Mamma Mia will have staying power at the BO. It’s one of those delightful happy movies that makes you smile and want to dance. True excapism, in the Hollywood tradition and that will lead to a slow but steady accumulation of BO numbers.
Some may even go several times. This movie is going to be around a long time and the numbers will be there at the end.
It screams: Take A Chance On Me…. and the audience will.
I see a dark future looming ahead.
I like ABBA (well OK, *some*), but only ABBA should — and can — do ABBA.
That dark future? This bit of froth becomes the 21st Century’s “Rocky Horror Picture Show” with midnight showings and audiences dressing up in 70s garb and badly badly badly singing along. In. The. Aisles.
See it before you can’t!
Every woman I know wants to see this, all ages. I see Hairspray/Sex & the City numbers. It looks like great fun. Over $100M for sure.
I think the reason they chose good charismatic actors over super singers is that they can inhabit roles emotionally so that they, despite their antics, become credible to people – that people start caring about them. When the BBC talked to people having seen it, many admitted that Pierce Brosnan was perhaps not the greatest singer in the world, but that it didn’t matter – because it was so funny, and the music was great etc etc, most leaving the theatre seemed quite bubbly. However it has been said that it is a bit ‘european’ in tone, having apparently rejected the big money in favor of autonomy. (ie, yep, we want a bunch of overweight old greek women dancing around here thank you
As for younger men rushing to see this, who knows – certainly some of them seem to take every chance to post on the imdb that this movie is only for old woman and gay men – apparently the macho thing to do is to go see a guy in tight leather pretend to be a bat
I have no doubt that this film will find an audience here in the U.S and eventualy gross over a 100 mil.
The same audience that made last years Hairspray a big hit will show up for this one!
Yeah lets hope that this doesnt become a trend. And by that I mean making songs into movies…. all I need is nelly making a movie…
Just not movie material.
Here in THE NETHERLANDS we are TRILLED about
the MAMA MIA movie!!!!!!
it is possible that this movie will be very populair this weekend because of the bad weather this weekend.
with rain people do go more to the cinema here..
this movie should have a lot of oscars next year
best SUMMER MOVIE!!!!!!