July 29th, 2006
There were not that many releases from
this week's crop to chart, but it was a newcomer taking top spot as
She's the Man lead both the rental and the sales chart this week. It earned $5.57 million after one week of rentals while the sales figures were not released as usual.
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July 22nd, 2006
For the third weekend in a row,
Failure to Launch topped the rental charts as it added $5.77 million over the week for a total of $25.18 million after three.
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July 10th, 2006
This week is not as slow as last week.
Then again, I don't think it would be possible for it to be as slow.
However, it is still not a strong week in terms of quantity, but at least the quality is there.
Contenders for DVD Pick of the Week include 30 Days - Season 1 and Tristram Shandy: A Cock and Bull Story - Buy from Amazon.
But in the end I went with a double-shot of Masters of Horror - Joe Dante - Homecoming and Our Hero - The Complete Series - Buy Direct.
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May 14th, 2006
With
Mission: Impossible 3 dominating the international charts, most films saw a serious drop-off and those that didn't were able to climb the charts, or at least remain stable. For instance,
Eight Below fell 27% to $3.67 million on 1951 screens in 27 markets, but despite there being two new releases in the top five, it was able to remain in sixth place on the overall charts. The film was not able to crack $1 million in any single market, but did perform well in Spain with $587,000 on 225 screens and that lifted its total box office to $2.15 million in the market, $30.35 million internationally, and $111.42 million worldwide.
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May 7th, 2006
A pair of openings in major markets helped
Eight Below climb a spot to sixth with $5.05 million on 2129 screens in 24 markets for a total of $24.26 million so far. The film opened in France but could only manage sixth place with $1.85 million on 473 screens while in Spain it opened in first place, but only managed $981,000 on 224 screens. In the meantime, the film dipped just 4% during its second weekend in Australia adding $769,000 on 258 screens to its total of $2.29 million there.
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April 30th, 2006
The Wild added a few more markets but still fell out of the top five down 54% to $4.37 million on 2868 screens in 27 markets for a two week total of $17.77 million. Its best market was Spain where the film was down just 43% to $875,000 on 382 screens over the weekend and $3.49 million in total. It had a hard time in family friendly Mexico where it was down 59% to $702,000 on 501 screens over the weekend and $3.60 million in total while in Italy it plummeted an unheard of 84% to just $216,000 on 343 screen for a two-week total of $2.75 million.
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April 23rd, 2006
The latest Asterix & Obelix movie, Asterix and the Vikings, opened in second place in native
France with $3.64 million on 606 screens. The film also made $167,000 during its second weekend in Belgium for a $454,000 two week total. These films are very popular in France and other parts of Europe, but have never made the transition here.
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April 12th, 2006
Ice Age: The Meltdown was even more unstoppable during its second weekend of release scoring $94.7 million on 8,216 screens in 45 markets, which was one of the greatest three-day weekend on the international charts ever. It was another weekend of record openings with the film taking the number one opening for an
animated film in several markets. Including in that list was Germany where the film opened with $14.16 million on 1061 screens over the weekend and $17.15 million including previews and the same can be said for its opening in Switzerland, ($2.76 million on 139 screens, $3.17 million including previews), and Denmark, ($1.27 million / $1.58 million on 92). Other huge openings include the U.K. with $17.02 million at 502 screens including previews, which was nearly 10 times its nearest
competition and France with $12.5 million on 858. It also opened in first place in Australia taking in $3.87 million on 388 screens, which is not as strong as most other markets it has opened in. The best holdover for the film was Mexico where it dropped just 39% to $5.31 million on 1012 screens over the weekend for a two-week total of $18.05 million. The film now has $156 million internationally and should break $300 million worldwide before the weekend. It goes without saying that both those totals are the best 2006 has had to offer so far.
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April 10th, 2006
Only one film mentioned in Friday's preview was able to beat expectations to any real degree, and this pushed this week's box office down 19.5% from last weekend.
However, at $114 million it was still 31.5% higher than last year, which is more important.
Even better news, 2006 has moved ahead of 2005's pace, albeit by a narrow 1% margin, meaning ticket sales are still slower than a year ago.
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April 5th, 2006
Ice Age: The Meltdown was nearly as impressive during its international debut as it was domestically with a weekend haul of $47.37 million on 4605 screens in 29 markets. The film set records in a couple of markets, include Mexico with an outstanding $8.85 million on 1083 screens, which was more than 20 times more than the next highest debuting film in that market. Other record setting openings came in Argentina with $1.2 million on 134 screens, Venezuela with $531,000 on 80, Ecuador with $278,000 on 30. It also has huge openings in Russia with $7.6 million on 460 screens and in Spain with $6.47 million on 449. Probably its most impressive numbers came in the U.K. where the film brought in $4.1 million in previews alone. Look for the film to open huge there next weekend.
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April 3rd, 2006
For the first time in a long, long time we have a bona fides hit topping the charts. Not only did
Ice Age: The Meltdown beat almost all expectations, but it single-handedly brought the 2006 box office out of its slump. The overall box office was $142 million, nearly half of which came from that one movie. This represents a 29.7% increase from last weekend and a 34% increase from last year. Year-to-date, 2006 is still behind 2005, but the deficit was cut in half to just 1%.
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March 31st, 2006
We have the first event movie of the year coming out this weekend. Yes, I realize I said that when V for Vendetta came out, but this time I mean it. In all seriousness, if Ice Age: The Meltdown doesn't have the best opening of the year, then the 2006 box office is pretty much sunk.
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March 30th, 2006
Another week with less sites than I would have liked. (On a side note, it seems every time something weird happens it happens on a Thursday. This time its slight internet connection problems / memory leak. I think. Whatever it is, it's causing my computer to act really slowly.) This shorter list doesn't mean there isn't an award-worthy site and the best of the best is
Over the Hedge -
Official Site.
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March 16th, 2006
Pretty average week with all best sites being previous award winners. The best of the rest was
Silent Hill -
Official Site, and even though this week's update wasn't huge, it was enough to make the overall site award-worthy.
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March 1st, 2006
This is a not as busy a month as it initially looks. Granted, there are 18 movies on this month's list, but there are five weekends, or at least five Fridays. Also, every week there's at least one film that may or may not be getting a truly wide release. Considering the level of competition, I'm leaning against any of five such films opening in more than 2000 theatres. On the plus side, we should see the
first $100 million movie of 2006 open this month, and perhaps even see
two movies reach that milestone.
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February 16th, 2006
During the past week promotional websites for several movies were launched and some older ones added additional content. It's another busy week as the winter slump starts to subside. As for the best site on this week's list, it came down to the interactive feature of
Freedomland -
Official Site and the atmosphere of
Night Watch -
Official Site. After looking over the sites a few times, I still can't decided which one should get the award, so I'm giving it to both.
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February 2nd, 2006
During the past week promotional websites for several movies were launched and some older ones added additional content. It was another slow week with nothing really grabbing my attention and nothing award-winning, (although there are a couple of sites that show promise). Hopefully some of the summer blockbusters will start launching flash sites so this slump can end.
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