‘Saw 3D’ #1 For Halloween: Soft $24.2M

COMMENTS (80)

• once again this site wears favoritism/disdain on its sleeve. I don’t like the Saw movies, but how is that a disappointing opening? It’s the 7th in the series and way better than the first.

  And yet you say a 68% drop for Paranormal isn’t bad? granted, it’s typical for a horror flick – but it’s not in any way a strong hold.

  Comment by hank — Saturday October 30, 2010 @ 9:32am PDT  Reply to this post

• Saw 3D cost a mere $17 million dollars to make, up $6 million dollars from Saw VI. Either way, Lionsgate has already made back their budget on the film.

  Comment by RJ — Saturday October 30, 2010 @ 9:51am PDT  Reply to this post

  • They most certainly have not. You forget to subtract the film rental from the exhibitors fees, as well as the marketing costs. They are still in the red, but will definitely make their money back and then some.

    Comment by true figures — Sunday October 31, 2010 @ 3:11pm PDT  Reply to this post

• I saw it Thursday night at 10 PM in a theater with a whole 10 people in it. I really liked the movie though, and I hope Lionsgate has a bad quarter sometime down the road and we end up with a Saw VIII

  Comment by GC — Saturday October 30, 2010 @ 9:56am PDT  Reply to this post

• i hate SAW and i love you Nikki but, objectively speaking, $28MM for any $20MM budgeted film is fantastic, no matter what the expectations were. Whether i agree with the movie or not, the franchise is profitable and has created a lot of jobs for our Hollywood colleagues and THAT is to be appreciated in these lean times. so thank you to all the morons that went to see SAW this weekend!

  Comment by a healthy box office is good for HWood — Saturday October 30, 2010 @ 10:08am PDT  Reply to this post

• How the hell do you track how well a movie is performing among Hispanics and Black People? What does a movie have to have in it to target Hispanics and Black People? What do Hispanics and Black People like? Does it just have to have other Hispanic and Black People actors in it, or is there a certain kind of sense of humor or running-time that is more appealing to Hispanics and Black People? Just curious about Hispanics and Black People.

  Comment by White Person Wanting To Learn — Saturday October 30, 2010 @ 10:09am PDT  Reply to this post

  • it’s called audience demographics and every movie has them, dumbass…marketing people need to know this so they can effectively promote future movies

    Comment by Waiting for the collapse — Sunday October 31, 2010 @ 11:10am PDT  Reply to this post

• So-so? Who cares! Don’t forget how inexpensive these movies are to make compared to the 80M movies that are lucky to have an opening as big as this. Props to Lionsgate for making a killing on this franchise and the incredible amount of ancillary business!

  Comment by Paul — Saturday October 30, 2010 @ 10:16am PDT  Reply to this post

• it only did 9 million friday which means 19 million for the weekend this will be the final saw,until a reboot

  Comment by t-wilk — Saturday October 30, 2010 @ 11:23am PDT  Reply to this post

• Come on Nikki, 28M is way better than so-so. Here comes Saw 8.

  Comment by Anonymous — Saturday October 30, 2010 @ 12:38pm PDT  Reply to this post

• Hmm. I don’t see how those numbers could be interpreted as anything other than impressive given that it’s a seventh film. By all means, hate the movies. I don’t particularly like them. I liked the first one. But calling these figures anaemic and so-so seems to be a case of the heart ruling the head, Nikkmeister.

  Comment by gingerella — Saturday October 30, 2010 @ 3:39pm PDT  Reply to this post

• oh please…PA2 saw a steep drop because it was a warmed over turd, an uninspired prequel/sequel that went absolutely nowhere and was content to redo the cheap bump in the night scares of the original

  Saw should have been put out of its misery years ago, but PA2 is in a way more crass because it is plainly all about squeezing maximum profit from minimum budgets while shuffling the original creatives off to the side…the pros will take it from here, milking the limited premise for every last dime of teenager pocket change

  reality shows have more dignity than PA2

  Comment by Waiting for the collapse — Saturday October 30, 2010 @ 5:23pm PDT  Reply to this post

• talk about a halloweekend: some of these house are super tricked out wow what imaginations people have; or could be crazed set designers unleashed. Pics???
  Well where’s the hot topic of controversy: I’m gonna have to find something to read. Talk radio ? Clean kitchen cabinets, or not the junk room, files, duplicates, I have some homemade linguine Alfredo if yu like.

  Comment by A — Saturday October 30, 2010 @ 5:52pm PDT  Reply to this post

• THE SOCIAL NETWORK opens at 22mil with a 50 mil budget and is praised. SAW 3D with less than half the budget opens at 28 mil and that’s ‘so- so?’

  Comment by ari — Saturday October 30, 2010 @ 7:37pm PDT  Reply to this post

  • How will Saw 3D hold up? I think it’s safe to say it won’t given it’s currently sitting at 8% over at rotten tomatoes. Even people who love the franchise did not love this movie. It was in 3D which is why some feel it should have made more (although I think it’s a solid opening given how tired the franchise is). The Social Network on the other hand was not in 3D (lower ticket prices). It was well received by critics and is an oscar frontrunner. It’s B.O. hasn’t dropped more than 33% every weekend. There is no way in hell that’ll be the case for Saw 3D. So really, the two aren’t even comparable.

    Comment by cookmeyer1970 — Sunday October 31, 2010 @ 8:46am PDT  Reply to this post

    • The posting was about the disparity of the comments about opening numbers, nothing else. The comments about legs, critical response, and the rest are irrelevant. This website is about the BUSINESS of Hollywood so the fact that the film cost less than half as much and equalled the opening gross of a film that was relatively expensive and had a huge marketing campaign is interesting. Despite all the pretensions, films are made to make money and in the end, SAW will be far more profitable than TSN. Nothing more. nothing less.

      Comment by ari — Sunday October 31, 2010 @ 5:09pm PDT  Reply to this post

• Man, the first Saw was actually a pretty cool flick. Kind of a modern giallo, with some heavy Argento influences. Hell of a twist at the end, too.

  But Saw II – VI?? Holy fuckin’ dogshit. Can’t believe how much money they’ve made. Bunch of lifeless, stale, CSI-style horror for teeny boppers, an audience that’d puke up their whoppers if they got a whiff of the films the first one was inspired by.

  By the way, what happened to James Wan and Leigh Whanell? They seemed like some cool kids. I wanted them to go places!

  Comment by Gary Oldman — Saturday October 30, 2010 @ 8:22pm PDT  Reply to this post

• Why is no one addressing the film running over budget…it ballooned to a whopping 22 million and had massive editing issues right up till the end.

  And how much did they spend on p&a? Another 12?

  Saw 3D is a failure every way you slice it. 93% of ticket sales were 3D tickets? Yikes. Without the gimmick, it would have opened to what 7 million? Terrifying.

  Comment by Lol — Sunday October 31, 2010 @ 7:53am PDT  Reply to this post

  • Actually, the film did not go over budget, and it did not have issues in post. Where do you idiots come from who think they have insider information? Go back to your cubicle.

    Comment by Trusty McThrusty — Monday November 1, 2010 @ 2:20pm PDT  Reply to this post

• Re:Ari’s comment.You know Einstein was right about that relativity theory. In Hollywood everything is relative,success, failure,boxoffice,you name a facet of movie making that isn’t massaged, manipulated or overlooked.

  Comment by je pressman — Sunday October 31, 2010 @ 7:55am PDT  Reply to this post

• Poor Matt Damon- dude can’t catch a break. What is this, his 5th bomb in a row? He has been working with great directors lately but the movies are all just so-so. He may have to go back to another Oceans or Bourne pretty soon.

  Comment by chris — Sunday October 31, 2010 @ 8:23am PDT  Reply to this post

  • The problem is he’s been working too much. Every studio wants him for something, which is a problem 98% of other actors WISH they had. Unfortunately it’s taking a toll on the audience – who wants to see him in movies 5 times a year?

    Comment by problem — Sunday October 31, 2010 @ 3:26pm PDT  Reply to this post

• somebody send Finke a copy of “A Serbian Film”. Maybe then she’ll stop calling a mainstream franchise like Saw “torture porn”

  Comment by DeadLanternMat — Sunday October 31, 2010 @ 9:32am PDT  Reply to this post

• Nikki the best phrase ever for you is Haters Gonna Hate!!!

  Comment by mindkilla — Sunday October 31, 2010 @ 10:52am PDT  Reply to this post

• stop calling it torture porn, the term doesn’t even make sense. you never hear people call zombie movies “zombie porn”, or slashers “slasher porn”

  Cannibal Holocaust and Irreversible and more violent than Hostel and Saw, so those are “torture porn” too, right? lol

  Comment by Maverick — Sunday October 31, 2010 @ 10:54am PDT  Reply to this post

• Burg and Koules = two healthy scoops of slime. Please, both of you, do us all a favor and get out of the business. We would all appreciate it. Thanks so much

  Comment by megan w — Sunday October 31, 2010 @ 12:46pm PDT  Reply to this post

• Say what you want about all the films in the top ten – “…not a bad hold” for one film then a “a steep drop” for a film that had the exact same decline a week before. But only ONE film in the TOP TEN has surpassed the 100 million dollar mark – JACKASS 3D. You can say that RED has passed it up in week three – yes. But big deal, RED has made $58 million to Jackass 3D’s $102 million. The closest contender is THE TOWN at $87 million dollars and that film has been out since September. I know it curls the blood of the pretentious Hollywood elite, but facts are facts.

  Comment by Jefferson S. — Sunday October 31, 2010 @ 1:47pm PDT  Reply to this post

• Your hatred for something you haven’t even seen is annoying. “Torture porn” is a myth. They’re really no different from any slasher movie.

  Also, I know you can’t be bothered to care since you don’t like the Saw series, but the previous entry was not expected to be the last one. There was some thought that the third might be the last one, as the creators were leaving, but only this one is being touted as the conclusion to the series. Which it will be, given that it could only muster $22m with the 3D bump.

  To the guy above who said Saw cost $1.2m, James Wan said in an interview with The Onion A/V Club recently that it was actually only $700,000 (cost to make the film itself, not marketing or anything else).

  Comment by Tyler Foster — Sunday October 31, 2010 @ 1:53pm PDT  Reply to this post

• There’s an old joke in Hollywood about sequels, “Only the last one loses money.” This may be billed as the final chapter, like Friday the 13th Part Four was billed that way, but then they came up with a new chapter, or book two, or the new testament or whatever. Perhaps it will be the last of the series, but then three years from now they’ll “reboot” it or hire some video director clown to “re-envision” it or whatever nonsense they talk about all the tired remakes and sequels these days.

  Comment by David Konow — Sunday October 31, 2010 @ 6:03pm PDT  Reply to this post

  • There’s a pretty big door left open at the end of Saw 3D for a potential Saw 8, which can’t be coincidental. I’m not saying they’re likely to *make* another one, but they’ve certainly kept their options open.

    Comment by Grant — Thursday November 4, 2010 @ 7:49pm PDT  Reply to this post

• Maverick, your comments make me laugh. Ignorance surely is bliss in the world you live in… Saw is torture porn. Even Twisted Pics refers to it as exactly that. Get a clue. Go back to Harry Knowles.

  Comment by Captain Awesome — Sunday October 31, 2010 @ 8:59pm PDT  Reply to this post

• It’s amazing that Saw keeps making money. I’ve only seen the first one, which was so-so. But 7 of them? How is it possible to stretch that out? I’m sure we’ll be seeing 7 Paranormal Activities soon enough.

  Question for all…
  If Saw is tracking well for teens, Hispanics and African Americans, do those films have characters of those demos, or is it that teens, Hispanics and African Americans have a special affinity for horror? And if so, any theories? Always fascinated by audiences’ tastes…

  Comment by Mike L. Murphy — Sunday October 31, 2010 @ 11:52pm PDT  Reply to this post