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MONDAY AM: Saturday’s Fourth Of July box office was even lower across the board than the studios expected. But the 5-day domestic holiday weekend blasted off with something for everyone: families, fanboys, and adults fed up there’s been almost nothing for them in movie theaters. Fox’s Ice Age 3-D: Dawn of the Dinosaurs opened very promisingly with $13.8 million Wednesday, $11.2M Thursday, $17.1M Friday, and $11.3M Saturday, and $13.1 Sunday from 4,099 venues for a $41.6M 3-day weekend – in a photo finish with Transformers 2. The battle was decided by Monday’s actuals. Rival studios claimed Ice Age 3-D wasn’t tracking well with young boys, and that’s why 20th sneaked it at 330 theaters recently. But Fox said it “added an additional marketing layer prior to the onslaught of TF2“. And the studio was right to pursue that strategy. With the public clearly not tiring of 3-D toons, the threequel should come out on top with a $67.5M 5-day holiday even though Saturday grosses were weak.
Internationally, Ice Age 3-D opened with a humongous $148M from 101 markets. Of a total of 11,652 screens, 3D represented 18% or 2,126 screens, contributing an estimated $51M, or 34% of the total opening. This made for the highest grossing animated film opening weekend ever, the highest grossing 3-D film ever, and the 6th highest grossing opening weekend of all time. The threequel still has not opened in China, Japan, Korea and Italy. With the estimated domestic cume of $67.5M, the global opening weekend gross is an estimated $215M.
The toon stayed neck and neck all weekend with the $42.5M July Fourth weekend and $65M five-day holiday for Paramount’s Tranformers 2: Revenge Of The Fallen. The robot sequel took in $10.9 million Wednesday from its still gigantic release into 4,234 dates (-82% from its record-smashing opening day a week ago), and took back the No. 1 title with $11.5M Thursday and $17.9M Friday, only to lose it Saturday with $10.6M but gain it back Sunday with $13.6. So even though the pic has been panned, 
it’s clearly got strong legs. The actioner’s domestic cume is now a huge $300.5M for 12 days and just passed Up and Star Trek to become the highest-grossing pic of 2009. This weekend it scored $55M overseas so that’s over $300.5M from international, and a new worldwide total of a staggering $593.9M.
Despite strong tracking and positive reviews, Universal had been nervous about the debut of Public Enemies because so many adult-oriented pics have failed in recent weeks. (So were exhibitors. According to a report slipped to me by a rival studio, they were disappointed with the story, felt it lacked the promised action, and squirmed when it was too long.) But the well marketed combination of Michael Mann and Johnny Depp is luring adult filmgoers hungry for another original and artistic crime saga which is a rarity in this summer of remakes, reboots and reheated sequels. The expensive gangster pic opened to $8 million Wednesday, $6.7M Thursday, $10.1M Friday, and $6.8M Saturday from 3,334 runs. That’s $26.1M for the July Fourth weekend and $41M for the 5-day holiday (a little more than Uni had projected in order to lower expectations). But you won’t hear audible sighs coming from Black Tower unless Public Enemies shows legs and passes $100M domestic.
Disney’s The Proposal came in #4 with $12.7M this weekend from 3,099 plays and a new cume of $94.2M. In 5th place, Warner Bros’ The Hangover just keeps going on and on and for a $10.4 weekend from 3,070 venues for a new cume of $204.1M. Close for #6, Pixar/Disney’s Up made $6.5M this weekend from 2,656 theaters for a new cume of $264.8M. New Line/Warner Bros’ My Sisters Keeper came in No. 7 and took in $5.2M this weekend from 2,606 runs for a new cume of $25.9M.
Sony’s The Taking Of Pelham 123 was 8th with $2.5M this weekend from 1,908 theaters and cume of $58.4M. Sony’s bomb Year One came in #9 with $2.1M this weekend from 2,240 dates for a $38M cume. And, rounding out the Top 10, Fox’s Night at the Museum 2: Battle Of The Smithsonian earned $2.1M this weekend from 1,419 runs for new cume of $167.7M.
In Week 2 of its llimited release, Summit Entertainment’s well received The Hurt Locker earned received $126,000 this weekend from 9 theaters including NY & LA. It’s cume to date is $365K. The pic expands into 17 more markets on July 10th.
This weekend, total box office looks like $162M, slightly up 1.4% from last year and close to the 2004 record. But, again, the July Fourth drop-off experienced Saturday can’t be exaggerated.
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wtf? According to imdb, ICA AGE 3 sports 2 directors but no writers. At all. Not anywhere. Did they melt away or did the dinos have them for breakfast?
Don’t worry Transformers, you’re still destine to get one of those ten Best Picture Oscar slots.
Fingers crossed for Public Enemies, otherwise there won’t be anything remotely intelligent in the summers to come.
Ice Age 3 is definitely the best of the 3 films. I absolutely loved it, it was hilarious from start to finish. And the 3D was phenomenal too. I’m glad to see it’s doing so well!
The industry really needs to reassess how they measure success. While many adult oriented stories fair poorly these days at the BO, it’s at the secondary revenue stream they rock; DVD, download, rental etc…
If initial DVD and download offerings were factored in, then these movies would be doing more than paying for themselves, they would be considered highly profitable.
C’mon Johnny, you can do it!!!!!!Spray down those robots!
Dear Nikki:
Can I please borrow “Toldja!” for a minute? Thanks.
Regards,
Joe Leydon
Hey: Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs is a monster hit, just like I predicted in my Variety review. Toldja!
There just isn’t enough in Public Enemies to power it to $100 million. The technical execution is solid. No one can criticize it on the basis of the technical merits of lighting, photography, editing, directing, acting, etc.
The problem is there are events occuring in the film, but it has no energy or interest. At my screening, the only times that the audience perked up was when they recognized a trailer moment and sort of congratulated themselves for doing so.
Public Enemies is an ancient gangster story and we already know how it ends. I don’t think it’s really the poster boy for “intelligent” movies. Unless by “intelligent” you mean “there are no talking animals.”
Public Enemies was somewhat of a dreary bore. Not even the shootouts could muster any real excitement. It’s fitting that Michael Mann would drain all of the vitality out of a John Dillinger biopic since he managed to do the same with Muhammed Ali. This guy has got to be the most overrated filmmaker working today. Everybody talks about him like he’s a masterful genius, but he’s got almost a half dozen lousy films under his belt, and there’s always a huge disconnect between the inflated production budgets he somehow commands and what you see on the screen. Also, he hasn’t done himself any favors by switching to ugly low-rent digital video for his last three films; this was especially problematic for PE, where it’s hard to appreciate the detail that went into recreating the period because the cinematography is so lifeless and grainy.
Really rooting for Public. Delightfully surprised at how good it was. Ice Age was solid too.
ICE ICE BABY…
The History Channel did a special on Dillinger that was more appealing than Public Enemies was…way, way TOO long…Johnny Depp was good and the film is nice to look at, but the movie itself just boring.
@Cat
“Unless by “intelligent” you mean “there are no talking animals.””
Actually, by now, “intelligent” means anything with an actual story as opposed to trashing robots for 2+ hours, thank you.
Why Ice Age? Why? We already had bad jokes and lame topical humor with Night at the Museum 2. Why do we need Ice Age? Why?
Apparently, the 3-D version is a completely different film — @ Morgan
None of the many kids giggled “throughout”. None. The laughter stopped once the animals entered JOURNEY TO THE CENTER OF THE EARTH territory and the screen turned kind of ochre.
At least the film held their interest. Parents get a chance to catch up on sleep, especially if they’ve already seen JOURNEY TO THE CENTER OF THE EARTH.
Interesting to see how Public Enemies holds up.
I liked the movie b/c I’m a Depp/Mann whore – but have to admit although I liked the movie I nodded when reading the negative reviews (saw the movie before it opened).
The most frustrating thing was that it could have been a great movie if Mann had tightened it up a bit and added a clearer trajectory.
.but *shrugs* still liked it.
I disagree with the stuff i’ve read that it was released too early – i don’t think it was good enough to be released in, say, late November – i think by then the reviews would have been significantly more unforgiving of the pic.
OMG Public Enemies is bad. Looks like an HD ep of ‘Cops’ without the ‘Hey that’s real’ factor. Visually confusing and thematically incoherent. Awful awful awful. Michael Mann continues his inevitable slide into irrelevance.
Public Enemies has gotten mixed reviews, but I’ll definitely see it this weekend as I’m a huge Mann/Depp fan. (I loved Collateral).
For those who want a smart film amid the summer drivel, go and see The Hurt Locker. It’s doing bang-up biz here in NYC. Saw it last night at the Sunshine Cinemas on Houston St. to a mid-week packed house. It’s an odd mix of the conventional (macho war film, bomb-ticking tension) with the unconventional (no discernible 3-act structure, an almost painterly affection for long, languorous takes at times).
Ten years from now, no one will remember Transformers…but The Hurt Locker will be around to remind us of what we lived through.
It’s feels really nice to have a real movie in the mix to analyze. I’m not saying Mann hit gold but the guy is incapable of making bad movies.
Public Enemies needed:
-better scripting all around.
-better set-pieces and less generic scenes
-less close-ups and more landscape and atmosphere (which Mann perfected in his underrated Miami Vice)
-smelling salts to wake Christian Bale outta his coma. (Granted, the script ripped him off but the next movie I wanna see a Bale-sized ‘rant’ that only he can deliver. Attack it Bale, you bitch.)
-more Mann (urban) angst, his trademark.
Depp did a fine job, especially in the jail scene opposite Bale. Many parts of the film are boring but Mann crafted a hauntingly beautiful final scene (that didn’t even involve Depp), and was one of the purest, most stark portrayals of cinematic slpendor I’ve ever seen. The most important part of any movie is the last five minutes and Mann slayed it folks.
Several nominations coming in the Fall.
@JF – “Actually, by now, “intelligent” means anything with an actual story as opposed to trashing robots for 2+ hours, thank you.”
—————————————
FWIW, a movie about fighting robots sounds just as boring to me as the rehash of an ancient gangster story. I’d rather read a book than see either one of them.
I a fan, that sees every Michael Mann movie on opening day. In the past, I’ve even seen Michael Mann at the Fox Village on opening day (“Heat”). Checking out the picture and sound levels, I guess.
Public Enemies looks awful. Its really bad when compared to the Milius movie “Dillinger”. John Milius’ film just “looks” so much better and it was made in 1973! The digital picture is especially wrong for a period film. What was Michael Mann thinking?
Saw PE yesterday. I wanted this movie to soar, but in the end it just left me cold. There were some moments of energy, but for the most part it just seemed flat. Michael Mann…what happened? His use of HD really bothered the shit out of me. Some scenes just looked like it was shot with an over the counter Sony camcorder. Depp was good, but he can’t save it. Mann fucked up, he got in the way. Damn, what a dissapointment.
Mann’s still the man -
What a great post – wonderful movie just needed a better script, better director, better second lead, better set pieces – geez – yeah other than the acting, the technicals, the script, the pacing and the direction I found it awesome as well.
Terrible movie. Almost to level of being amateurish. Considering Mann shot some of the dreadfully lit, badly shot Little Bohemia set piece it was amateurish. I don’t think the guy could get hired on Cops using that footage as a reel.
Whoa!?! Whats up with the negative reviews. I loved “Public Enemies” and thought it was a great movie. This site must be invaded by “Transformers 2″ apologists.