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SUNDAY AM UPDATE: Weekend wonders never cease. Friday the Thirteenth weekend proved lucky for a pair of faded stars. Overall box office looks about $140M (about even with last year’s) and had something for everyone — men/women, old/young, romance/bromance, winners/losers/dropouts. It’s so competitive that The Expendables was marketing itself by pitting Sly Stallone against Pretty Woman: “Guys, don’t let Julia Roberts win”. I love the smell of napalm. North American numbers were refined this AM:
1. The Expendables (Lionsgate) NEW [3,270 Theaters]
Friday $13.3M, Saturday $11.8M, Est Sunday $9.8M, Weekend $35M
Even when The Expendables came on tracking, it looked big. And the timing couldn’t have been better what with Lionsgate getting beaten up by Carl Icahn on a daily basis, and Sylvester Stallone needing a fresh hit in his dotage. Kudos to Sly for coming up with such an irresistible concept directing and starring with today’s and yesteryear’s action heroes like Jason Statham, Jet Li, Randy Couture, Mickey Rourke, Dolph Lundgren, Steve Austin, Terry Crews, and even Bruce Willis and Arnold Schwarzenegger (for nanoseconds in cameos). “Are The Expendables wearing Dependables?” one rival studio exec snarked in an email to me.
Still, it’s the kind of old school camp that the action box office needs — and received a “B+” CinemaScore. The audience was 61% male/39% female, as expected, and 60% over age 25/40% under age 25. Older women were 26%, equal to the percentage of men under 25. Friday’s grosses included a little Thursday midnight money. And Saturday’s fell about 7%. But the weekend fell in line with Hollywood’s big prediction for the pic despite being R-rated and only 2D. But it’s helped by a short running time of only 1 hour, 43 minutes. And maybe that hilarious Comic-Con: ‘The Expendables’ Panel made some difference. The marketing all along was fresh and funny, mostly because Stallone wasn’t afraid to make fun of his image.
2. Eat Pray Love (Sony) NEW [3,082 Theaters]
Friday $8.5M, Saturday $8.1M, Weekend $23.7M
If older males flocked to Sly, then older females embraced Eat Pray Love even with its has-been star Julia Roberts (remember, she couldn’t open Duplicity with co-star Clive Owen) in this music video of a film directed by Glee‘s Ryan Murphy and based on the treacly bestseller by Elizabeth Gilbert. Which is why Paramount was right to pass on what looked like a one-quadrant loser. (Paramount vs Sony On ‘Eat Pray Love’) Really, I hoped women had better taste in movies than this. Exit surveys showed the audience was 72% female with 56% over over 35 and 44% under 35. The pic received a “B” CinemaScore. “At only 37% [positive reviews] on Rotten Tomatoes, they better hurry up and pray that it doesn’t leave their favorite multiplex too fast,’ one rival studio exec emailed me. Make no mistake: the only reason this pic made any opening weekend coin was because of the brilliant job done once again by Sony’s marketing team of Jeff Blake, Marc Weinstock, and this time George Leon and his 72-hour EPL weekend extravaganza on HSN. The studio’s expensive and omnipresent ads and promotions drove box office among women. ”Whether they were in theaters, online, watching television, listening to radio, or shopping in their favorite malls and stores, they saw our campaign,” a Sony exec gushed. Shame on this studio co-run by a female for selling the pic’s self-discovery prattle by pushing women to purchase crap like lotus petal necklaces for Sony royalties.
3. The Other Guys (Sony) Week 2 [3,651 Theaters]
Friday $5.6M, Saturday $6.8M, Weekend $18M (49%), Cume $70.5M
4. Inception (Warner Bros) Week 5 [3,120 Theaters]
Friday $3.4M, Saturday $4.8M, Weekend $11.3M, Cume $248.5M
5. Scott Pilgrim vs The World (Universal) NEW [2,818 Theaters]
Friday $4.5M, Saturday $3.4M, Weekend $10.5M
This odd but innovative movie based on a comic book is yet another greenlight from the fired Mark Shmuger at Universal. He’s the gift that keeps on giving the studio expensive underperformers. Yet the current regime embraced Scott Pilgrim vs The World as a counterprogramming maneuver this weekend even though they knew auteur filmmaker Edgar Wright’s $60M budget (even with location credits) envelope pusher wouldn’t open or earn out. But that’s only because it got great reviews (which younger moviegoers rarely read) and an “A-” CinemaScore. The audience was 64% male/36% female, and 58% under 25 yrs of age/42% 25 yrs and older. Uni tried to hype the genre-bending pic as too cool for the room and claim it didn’t know if Scott Pilgrim would make $5M or $15M this weekend. But the pic will do exactly what Uni execs predicted to me it would: a pittance. “Regardless of the perceived outcome, we are proud of this film. Studios need to continue to offer audiences good and original ideas/films,” Uni said today. ”We do wish a greater number of people went to see the film.”
6. Despicable Me (Universal) Week 6 [2,923 Theaters]
Friday $2.3M, Saturday $2.7M, Weekend $6.7M, Cume $222.9M
7. Step Up 3D (Disney/Summit) Week 2 [2,439 Theaters]
Friday $2.3M, Saturday $2.7M, Weekend $6.6M (-48%), Cume $29.5M
8. Salt (Sony) Week 4 [2,834 Theaters]
Friday $1.9M, Saturday $2.5M, Weekend $6.3M, Cume $103.5M
9. Dinner For Schmucks (DW/Spyglass/Paramount) Week 3 [3,046 Theaters]
Friday $2M, Saturday $2.4M, Weekend $6.3M, Cume $58.8M
10. Cats & Dogs 2: Kitty Galore (Warner Bros) Week 3 [2,728 Theaters]
Friday $1.7M, Saturday $1.6M, Weekend $4M, Cume $35.1M
Editor-in-Chief Nikki Finke - tip her here.
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Does the success of the expendables mean we can finally get a remake of copland?
Paid to see SCOTT PILGRIM tonight. 500 seats, maybe 40 filled, with 15 walkouts during the movie.
It’s a jumbled POS picture. There’s no depth, no life to it. It’s all surface, nothing more. Sorry I wasted my time on it. And wow, Cera needs to find a new line of work. It’s the same performance going on, what, 10 straight pictures?
It deserves to tank.
finally..the truth is revealed
15 walkouts out of 40 people on opening night? Gee, spam much? It was sold out at two theaters I checked and the third (which we went too) was packed with everyone loving it.
they clapped for it at the big ‘plex I went to. And there were other olds like me in the audience.
10.5 mil opening weekend.
It wasn’t sold out anywhere. Nice one, Alex.
Funny, At The Movies just said how terrific it is.
Thank you.
And “At the Movies” was mercifully cancelled just a few days ago. I’m not implying any connection between its cancellation with the poor boxoffice receipts of “SP”, which is a terrific movie I’ve already seen twice!
Michael Cera is NOT a star. Why the heck does he keep getting cast in movies that are going to inevitably bomb?
It’s easy to spit on a movie that’s not performing. I will have to say, though, that I liked Scott Pilgrim a lot — and I’ve never been part of the comic book geek set. I’d much rather that studios stick their necks out and dare to make something innovative than to just stick with box office formula. We’ll see if the advertising budget was worth it, but the film itself gets much applause from me for giving it a shot.
Michael Cera should check in daily with Mitch Hurwitz for the status of Arrested Development- The Movie, he was fantastic as GMB.
Saw “The Expendables”. The audience was surprisingly across the board. It was packed to capacity and people were very enthusiastic with their reaction.
I was very surprised.
I thought the movie was an enjoyable 80′s throwback, BUT I think I prefer the action and chaos of “Rambo 4″. The action in “Rambo 4″ was more intense, and looked realistic. There were a little too many CGI enhanced kills in “The Expendables”.
Also the bad guy in “Rambo 4″ was completely evil. Here we had Eric Roberts, who was finally understated in his delivery and was not in over the top mode. But he posed no real threat.
Again, I liked it, the crowd seemed to love it. I thought the last half hour was the strongest part. If the entire film were like the last 30 mins of the movie, it would have been great.
I think this movie will make more than the projected 34 million. Word of mouth will be good.
I think you are right. I want to see my action heroes of my 20′s out there again… Real explosions (for the most part), real stunts (for the most part) and minimal CGI.
Stallone knows what works in a throwback action movie. And there is an audience for it that doesn’t want CGI mayhem ala Transformers and the Blue People…
So glad to see a real movie being made the old fashioned way.
This movie rocked, and the only problem was that there wasn’t ENOUGH of the dialogue between some characters.
The scenes with Micky Rourke And Sly rocked. They outclassed everyone else, Jason Statham rocked and we didn’t get enough of Charisma Carpenter. Dolf Lundren, who knew. Bruce willis was kinda wooden but it was a small role. Seeing the governator was fun. For the most part there was a world weary humaneness to the characters I could identify with.
Basically you have characters that could fill several movies.
The story reminded me a little of “The dogs of war” I’m going to have to watch it again. But the Expendables was a lot more fun.
would you morons please stop saying “Kick-Ass” bombed?! It made $96M on a $30M budget, and got great reviews for the type of film it was. Lionsgate films usually fair far worse; and in this case, there are plans for a sequel.
Really, they should of made this FOR $12 mill. It’s a kung fu Napoleon Dynamite afterall–or should of been…
after this showing by Universal, they may want to think twice before spending over $200 million for the upcoming Battleship movie. I served aboard the U.S.S. Missouri (BB-63), it wasn’t that fun. They may want to think twice or say THEY SUNK MY BATTLESHIP!!! Despicable Me 2 looks like a better prospect.
Really enjoyed Scott Pilgrim. It has such a good attitude. The teens in the crowd were loving it so I agree, its got a chance for a decent run through the rest of the Summer and then some real video business. But $90m budget — that’s just impossible based on what I saw — maybe half that, which seems like it gives the film a shot to make some money.
Another marketing disaster from Univeral.
The movie might be one quadrant but so is EPL and other films. It never was intended to be a big blockbuster but $12 million is a joke.
This movie has popular source material, Edgar Wright, a cult director everyone idolizes in the target demo, a huge array of stars in the cast from Micheal Cera, which might not be my cup of tea but should be liked from the Scott Pilgrim fans, Captain America, who headlined blockbusters before and should do his fair share of box office lifting especially now with his Marvel gig, Superman, a hot chick all the guys drool over in Winstead, a freshly minted Oscar nominee in Anna Kendrick and a whole lot more actors the fanbase loves.
It had buzz to boot and with 80% at Rotten Tomatoes has fabulous reviews, ie it’s a good movie. Marketing was extensive with an enormous Comic-Con appearance and unlike almost all other Universal movies started many many months ago.
Universal’s marketing sucks. They can’t make general audiences outside the most hardcore fanbases care about their movies. Their marketing doesn’t connect with normal movie goers at all. It has been a problem all year with basically every movie.
They lucked out with Despictable Me but otherwise failures or underperformers throughout. Other studios can turn bad or mediocre movies regularly into medium or good performers but Uni can’t even get a single time a decent BO performance out of GREAT movie.
Universal shouldn’t be looking at the stars when their movies underperform, they should apologize to them for hurting their careers. In today’s competitive movie landscape no movie star can open a film without a halfway decent marketing campaign, not even Will Smith or other A-listers. The incompetence of Uni’s marketing is mindbloggling. I can’t believe that they still haven’t fired at least half the marketing department.
I agree. It is astounding how ineffective Universal’s marketing is. It is unfortunate all the focus for these failures is going to the stars when the true culprit is a group of people who repeatedly demonstrate a near total lack of creativity or intuition.
They won’t get fired. Nobody ever gets fired in Hollywood. 70% of their films lose money but nobody ever gets fired.
Having said that, Scott Pilgrim was terribly marketed. It was a fun, innovative movie and should have been marketed that way. The advertising all but screamed “if you’re not a college student who listens to indie – stay far away”.
I just hope their smart enough to give another big film to Edgar Wright. He’s really amazing.
Scott Pilgram looked like a terrible movie! I’m surprised it’s on track make 12 million.
Eat, Pray, Love. Not, that, good.
SHOCKING…………..not hardly
Empty, soulless, not-even-good-for-the-genre piece of crap “man movie” at #1; empty, soulless, not-even-good-for-the-genre piece of crap “chick flick” at #2.
Meanwhile, “Pilgrim” – a genuinely original, smart, brilliantly-made potential game-changer (in terms of cinematic “language” and demographics) that’s also easily one of the best films of the year? Distant 3rd, maybe 4th.
Way to go, America. Yecch..
#1 #2…studios knew HOW to market the film….Scott pilgrim..not so much.. hence, the numbers that you see.
Canada is part of domestic gross
“Game changer?” “Smart?” “Brilliantly made?” “Easily one of the best films of the year?”
This is a movie about a pedophile slacker fighting seven idiots over a fugly girl. And you talk about it like it’s Citizen Kane.
And you wonder why it never found it’s audience. Because most people know crap from quality. Except the folks who love this flick.
Clearly you haven’t seen it. Reviewers & those that have, have loved it. Uni marketing is to blame here, not the pic itself.
Wow, can’t believe Pilgrim tanked the way it did. Thought it would do at least 18-20 million. These are near Jonah Hex numbers.
dvd market has declined dramatically — a 90 million dollar movie with at least 35-40 million in p&a… and considering the exhibitors take 50% of the weekend take… cannot recoup investment let alone get them into the black on Pilgrim.
Scott Pilgram was actually surprisingly pretty good, although I admit I saw it mainly because it was at the right time. I bet this does better than you think, although $90 million does seem like an awful lot of money. Twitter response seems pretty positive, fwiw.
While I think opening Pilgrim against The Expendables was a mistake, I can guarantee that the flick will have legs. It’s getting good word of mouth and it is a film that practically demands repeat viewings. (My teenage brother has already seen it twice) I think it could be a sleeper.
saw expendables, was really average for me. these guys should be embarrassed, i could not help but laugh as stallone tried to be cool, way too old and weird looking now. for what it is worth, expendables is better than a-team, but i liked salt more than both, and i did not expect that to be the case. my mother and sister saw epl, mom was lukewarm and sister said it stunk. oh, there were some old dudes stuck in their high school years, one was wearing parachute pants, and they seemed to really enjoy expendables…will do well among certain demographics, that seems to be a given.
Don’t like Michael Cera, always plays the same character, like a younger male version of Jennifer Aniston.
Pilgrim is the most fun movie I’ve seen in a long time. Shame.
then you don’t get out much, do you..Shame
I hope these numbers aren’t official, Scott Pilgrim vs. The World was freaking awesome. I just got back from seeing it with a bunch of friends and the theater was packed. My friends and I were talking about the movie the whole time on our way back.
Whats even more surprising is none of us read the comics and we still ended up talking about the movie. I enjoyed this movie so much and will definitely be seeing it again. People flocking over to The Expendables or Eat Pray Love obviously have no taste in good movies.
Michael Cera is not a star. The public is sick of seeing him in movies. He’s made one money-loser after another. I really hope the studios stop casting him. He plays the same character in every film, and lately all those films have flopped. The problem with SCOTT PILGRIM is Michael Cera. The public has rejected him yet again.
I’m a comic book fan, but never read Scott Pilgram, soooo the preview was all I had to judge whether I should see this movie or not..guess what? I’m not going to see this crap..That’s what went thru my head as I watched each and every commercial daily..hourly..it just comes off as a white hot mess and judging by the early numbers, many people feel the same way.. it may be good , it may be fun, but money is too damn tight to experiment.
If you’re a comic book fan you will enjoy it.
You know, they have these things called “movie reviews” nowadays that help you get a better idea about a film. There’s more to go off of than just the trailer. SP got great reviews!
I especially don’t understand your continual attack on the film throughout the comments here, especially since you haven’t seen it.
I don’t want tot see it because, I’m like the rest of America that thinks the premise and star actor is dumb as hell.. thats why
Holy Toledo.
The Other Guys whups Scott Pilgrim v The World ??? HUGE UPSET !!!!
That is an epic fail for Scott Pilgrim given how HYPED and PUMPED it was in geek-world. So, to put it bluntly the nerds lose…. again !!!! And, yes, Comic-Con is a piss-poor indicator of success for mainstream Hollywood movies, though I doff my hat to the convention organizers who manage to corral more free press and pub than RuPaul sashaying naked down Sunset Blvd. …..
I wonder if heads will roll after this Michael Cerna implosion?
(I wish someone would make a truly resonant teen/young adult film like “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” or “American Pie” instead of all of these lame-o geekboy fantasies writ large.)
The problem is that Hollywood, much like yourself, group all the geeks together into one demographic. Plenty of comic book fans hate Scott Pilgrim. Some hate it because it is for hipsters, and others hate it because of the manga style art. There were some that were making fun of the Scott Pilgrim fans by calling it “Twilight for boys”.
As for the comic-con failures, I love them. This is a problem that Hollywood created for itself, and now they have to live with it until they realize that comic-con hype doesn’t mean anything.
That’s actually a really good point about how Hollywood only sees comic book audiences as one unit right now. Oddly I hadn’t thought about it, but it makes total sense give how much disagreement I see there even about Superman vs. Batman. Though those characters are iconic enough that divisions of fandom mean less to box office.
I think if marketers start take it into account, they can probably cross some of those lines to build their audiences for these smaller niche films but will they wake up to that problem?