What’s good, what’s good. Welcome to this special Tuesday edition of the box-office forecast (I need a good, funny name for this… any suggestions? Suggestive acronyms welcome). Why so special? Because Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen opens tomorrow, which means I need to come up with a forecast for it now. As you know by now, I don't look at jack when it comes to the actual predictions... it's all just in my gut, you know... it's truthiness.
If you’ve ever wondered why so many recent summer-sequel blockbusters have chosen to open on Wednesday’s, you’ve come to the right place. Huge sequels like Transformers 2 tend to experience equally huge declines after their first weekend of release. By opening on a Wednesday, Transformers is giving itself an extra two days (Wed-Sun) to make bank (and to destroy some evil bad guy around which its lack-of-a-plot revolves) before it inevitably runs into at least a 50% decline in its second weekend. Believe it or not, by the time Monday rolls around, Transformers will have already taken in about 45%-55% of its final domestic total (I looked up all of the summer-sequel blockbusters that have opened on a Wednesday in the last 10 years and found that the first five days account for, on average, 45% of the total).
So here’s what we know so far: Transformers’ final domestic total is going to be tremendous (>300M) and it has five days to make about half of whatever that final number is. If I wanted to, I could probably pick a pretty large number and write it down as my prediction, but that would be boring. If you really like movies, you like to see people go to the movies as well, making weekends like this a lot of fun because there are so many elements that will affect Shia’s potential numbers, the first of which is opening day gross.
After looking up all of the summer-sequels from the last decade that have grossed at least 200M domestically and have opened on a Wednesday, I created a little stat that I’m going to call the Opening Weekend Multiplier (OWM). OWM=Opening Weekend Gross (Fri-Sun) / Opening Day Gross (Wed). The average OWM for those films was 2.86 (excluding Shrek 2), meaning you could, on average, multiply a summer-sequel’s Wednesday gross by 2.86 to get a rough picture of what that film’s Fri-Sun take would be (whoever’s sitting there wandering what the intercept is, you’re lame). The tricky part, thus, is trying to accurately predict how much Transformers will bank on Wednesday.
Back in 2007, the first Transformers movie opened on a Tuesday (July 4th weekend) with 36M from 4,000 theaters, including Monday evening screenings. This time around, the opening day gross should be much higher for two reasons: 1)Sequels always have higher opening day grosses then their predecessors 2)IMAX theaters are pricey and they fit more people. The record for biggest opening day gross is held by The Dark Night at 67M, but don’t expect Michael Bay and Spielberg to break it because… 1)The Dark Knight opened on a Friday 2)The Dark Knight had amazing reviews 3) Heath Ledger.
There are a few other factors which point to a massive opening for Transformers. First of all, it has absolutely no competition. Like I said last week, Transformers has three weeks until Harry Potter comes out (also on a Wednesday), meaning it should have more staying power than your ordinary summer-sequel. Second, Meagan Fox is hot (and she’s officially single), giving guys (and girls) more reason to see it. Third, it has no sporting events to compete with either (why do you think it wasn’t released last week during the US Open? Shut up, Wimbledon fans). Fourth, the special effects are simply the best in the business (wait until December for James Cameron’s “Avatar,” in which he will, once again, change the way we make blockbusters). Fifth, the marketing campaign has been rock solid. Starting with the all-important super-bowl spot back in February, the transformers have been all over the place since. Best of all, the marketers don’t even have to do a good job because sequels, great special effects, and good-looking women market themselves.
Finally, the prediction…. The first Transformers made $49,000 on its first weekend at Shortpump, for those of you from Richmond, and it made $115,000 at Lincoln Square 13 in New York (which happens to be one of the busiest theaters in the country). This weekend, simply expect bigger numbers. The biggest Wednesday opening ever belongs to Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix at $44.2M, but it’s soon going to be second on that list. I’d say the ghost of Optimus watches over these transformers and guides them to a Wednesday opening of 50M-55M, grease and spare parts included. Look for a 50% dip on Thursday for around 25M, and expect its opening weekend (Fri-Sun) take to include about 100M-110M portraits of George Washington. Yes, I’m aware that 50M multiplied by 2.86 does not equal 100M-110M, but I think the upfront demand for Transformers is going to be so high that it negatively affects its opening weekend a bit. That said, the Wed-Sun cume could pass the 175M mark, placing it right below The Dark Knight (203.7M) atop the list of biggest 5-day grosses. Then again, you can never be so sure. All we know is the opening is going to be big and that the autobots will certainly follow Optimus Prime’s advice and roll out.
By the way, get ready for “Transformers 3: The guys who fell got back up again” on July 4th weekend 2012. Seriously, that’s the date.
No comments:
Post a Comment