June 9th, 2010
There were a handful of new releases that reached the top 30 on this week's sales chart, including the new number one. However, none of them were particularly strong. Valentine's Day led the way with 498,000 units sold, generating $8.46 million in opening week sales. Given its box office performance, this is a disappointing start.
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May 17th, 2010
It's an amazingly slow week. In fact, there is only one Featured Review on this week's list that is for a DVD coming out this week. (The other four are for screeners that arrived late.) Additionally, there's not a single first-run release on this week's list that managed to be a hit both at the box office and with critics. The film that came closest was Invictus, but for Pick of the Week I'm going with The Messenger on DVD or Blu-ray. Both are worth picking up, and High Definition is the better deal.
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March 21st, 2010
The Round Up opened in sixth place with $6.32 million on 632 screens in 3 markets. Of that, $5.67 million was earned on 602 screens in France, which was easily enough for first place in that market.
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March 14th, 2010
The Princess and the Frog remained in sixth place with $5.18 million on 3019 screens in 35 markets for a total of $149.82 million internationally and $253.53 million worldwide. This past week it opened in Japan, struggling into fifth place with $1.02 million on 363 screens. Even with that disappointing result, it should do well enough on the home market to show a profit relatively soon.
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March 7th, 2010
The Princess and the Frog may have slipped out of the top five internationally, but it still added $8.32 million on 3053 screens in 28 markets for a total of $143.18 million. It had no major market openings again this week, but it added $2.84 million on 689 screens over the weekend in France for a total of $27.30 million after a month of release there. This weekend the film debuted in Japan, which could help it return to the top five. Regardless, it has made enough money that it should show a profit, eventually.
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March 5th, 2010
With our annual Oscar Prediction contest underway, now is the best time to look at the nominees and try and figure out who the favorites are and which films should just feel honored to be nominated. Today we look at Best Actor in a Lead Role, which is yet another category with a runaway favorite.
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March 5th, 2010
With our annual Oscar Prediction contest underway, now is the best time to look at the nominees and try and figure out who the favorites are and which films should just feel honored to be nominated. Today we look at Best Supporting Actor, which might be even less competitive than the Best Supporting Actress.
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February 28th, 2010
Shutter Island started its international run with a sixth place finish this past weekend, earning $9.28 million on 1229 screens in 9 markets. The film opened in first place in Spain with $3.25 million on 406 screens. It had to settle for second place in Australia, in a virtual tie with Valentine's Day at $2.50 million on 250 screens. It's way too early to tell where the film will end up, but matching its domestic run internationally is a solid goal.
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February 21st, 2010
As expected, The Princess and the Frog reached $100 million internationally just before the weekend started, ultimately overtaking its domestic total. It had no major market openings over the past weekend, but it managed to rise to first place in France with $4.09 million on 697 screens for a total of $17.31 million after three. It also remained solid in the U.K., adding $2.36 million on 501 screens for a total of $6.58 million. Overall, it pulled in $11.29 million on 3349 screens in 34 markets for a total of $111.94 million internationally and $213.69 million worldwide.
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February 10th, 2010
Avatar's legs on the international scene are as strong as they come.
It remained in first place for the eighth weekend in a row, this time down just 17% to $79.44 million on 10,298 screens in 94 markets for a total of $1.59 billion internationally and $2.21 billion worldwide.
Japan was added to the list of markets where the film has hit the century mark with $108.04 million, including $6.41 million on 650 screens this weekend.
Other results of note came in the U.K, where it became the biggest hit of all time, at least in terms of British Pounds.
In American Dollars, the film has $112.19 million after making $6.77 million on 417 screens this weekend.
Additionally, we can now report that China has overtaken France as the film's most lucrative market, leading now by $144.4 million to $141.4 million.
This is not only big new for this film, but huge news for the industry as a whole.
China is now a major player at the international box office, both as a consumer and also as a producer.
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February 8th, 2010
Oceans opened in its native France and that helped it climb into sixth place with $9.52 million on 888 screens in 4 markets for a total of $16.98 million. It earned third place in its native market with $5.39 million on 542 screens while it was down just 7% during its sophomore stint in Japan with $3.48 million on 303 screens over the weekend for a total of $10.81 million after two.
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February 2nd, 2010
Oscar nominations were announced at 5:38 this morning, continuing a tradition that have never been adequately explained to me. (Why so early in the morning? Does earning an Oscar nomination become sweeter if people have to wake you up to congratulate you?) Leading the way in nominations were Avatar and The Hurt Locker, both of which pick up nine nods each, many of them in the same categories.
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January 31st, 2010
It's Complicated saw its weekend haul climb 16%, but it still fell out of the top five.
It added $10.37 million over the weekend on 2,665 screens in 32 markets for a total of $50.92 million after a month of release.
The film opened in third place in Germany with $2.40 million on 552 screens over the weekend and $2.74 million in total.
Meanwhile in the U.K. it added $1.84 million on 431 screens over the weekend for a total of $8.72 million after three weeks of release.
With debuts in Japan, South Korea, and Italy still ahead of it, it could reach $100 million internationally to go with its $100 million domestic total.
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January 21st, 2010
For only the second time in box office history a film has reached $1 billion internationally.
That film is of course Avatar, which again led the way at the international box office over the weekend.
It added $128.87 million on 14,575 screens in 95 markets for a total of $1.12 billion internationally and $1.61 billion worldwide, as of Sunday.
Avatar's only major opening of the weekend was in Italy, which is also the last territory to get the movie.
In that market, it set a record for biggest box office debut with $13.88 million on 848 screens.
Other markets of note include China where it added $17.9 million on 2,509 screens over the weekend for a total of $75.6 million, which is the best ever for that market.
It also broke the all-time record in South Korea with $71.91 million after a month of release, including $6.11 million on 579 screens this past weekend.
Meanwhile France remains its most lucrative market with a running tally of $115.3 million after $11.6 million this weekend.
There are a number of other markets where the film looks poised to cross the century mark (Russia at $86.15 million so far, Germany at $82.74 million, U.K. at $80.76 million, etc.) and the film continues to set records in numerous markets, as it is domestically.
At this pace, the film could top Titanic on the international stage as early as this weekend, while worldwide it is just a matter of time.
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January 6th, 2010
The Producers Guild of America announced their nominations this week, and while there are only three categories for theatrical releases, they tend to be quite accurate predictors for the Oscar nominations.
This is great news for Up, which picked up nominations in two of the three categories.
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December 22nd, 2009
It was a fantastic weekend at the box office as the top film topped expectations and broke records, admittedly by narrow margins, but records nonetheless.
Overall the box office pulled in $138 million, which was 42% higher than last weekend and an outstanding 56% higher than the same weekend last year.
Year-to-date, 2009 has earned $9.96 billion, extending its record and moving closer to the $10 billion milestone.
This time last year the cumulative box office was $9.15 billion, meaning 2009 has an 8.8% lead.
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December 17th, 2009
The SAG nominations were announced this week, and the trend of the year continues with Up in the Air leading the way, but no one film dominating. This time around Up in the Air was in a three-way tie with Inglourious Basterds and Precious, which makes the race even more interesting.
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December 17th, 2009
There are two wide releases this weekend, but mostly everyone is just talking about Avatar, its box office potential, and its obvious comparisons to Titanic.
It should have no trouble beating the combined $43 million made by all three wide releases this weekend last year, and will almost certainly make more during its opening weekend than the $53 million that Titanic made during its opening week.
And that's the low end of expectations.
On the high end, it has a number of records in its sights.
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December 16th, 2009
The Hollywood Foreign Press Association announced their nominations this week, but looking over the list of films chosen, it is hard to declare any one film as the big winner. Up in the Air did pick up six Golden Globe nominations, including several of the most prestigious nominations, but it is far from the only major player.
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December 14th, 2009
The box office was a little mixed this weekend with good news balancing the bad news. For instance, the two new releases in the top five both disappointed, but all three holdovers topped expectations.
Overall business was down 2.3% from last weekend, but up 6.0% from the same weekend last year, which is always the more important number.
Year-to-date, 2009 has now pulled in $9.79 billion, which is 8.6% higher than the same pace last year and more than $100 million more than the previous record.
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December 13th, 2009
Disney claimed top spot at the box office this weekend as The Princess and the Frog expanded nationwide.
But with a weekend box office estimated at $25 million, the movie will need to have great legs over the holidays if Disney's going to recoup its investment.
The movie has good reviews and is ideal family fare, so its chances are good, but the studio is looking at the same nail biting exercise as they're going through with A Christmas Carol, which opened with $30 million and reached an estimated $124 million this weekend.
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December 10th, 2009
It's official: 2009 has broken the record for the highest total box office, surpassing the total earnings for 2007 this week.
And the box office should only get hotter as we near Christmas.
This weekend, Disney releases its first "hand animated" film in more than five years, which should help it top the charts with ease.
In fact, I think it will top last year's number one film, The Day the Earth Stood Still, although I appear to be in the minority in that opinion.
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December 1st, 2009
November turned out to be a good month with more films meeting or exceeding expectations that missing.
We also saw records broken as 2009 marches closer to the all-time record, and the possibility of becoming the first year to hit $10 billion in total ticket sales growing.
It won't need that much to get there, and even if just one or two of the predicted $100 million hits this month get to that milestone, we will still finish the year by breaking records.
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June 19th, 2008
This week's round of new casting information contains updates for 2012, Public Enemies, Transformers 2, and more!
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June 17th, 2008
The last couple of weeks another number of upcoming movies, new stars and directors have been added to our archive!
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