Week of 6/19/09

What’s good, what’s good… a new box-office forecast for a record second week in a row? Crazy, right? Good news, by the way: I’ve kept my promise and have recently learned to read so there shouldn’t be any theater count errors on my part. Once again, these are all my predictions based off of info on rentrak box office essentials. Alright then, why don’t we get at it?

I’m gonna be honest with you… there’s not much happening in the box-office this weekend at all. We’ve got two wide releases, and they’re both comedies that shouldn’t rock the charts too dramatically. For those of you who are new to box-office analyzing, there is a simple explanation for this frustrating dearth of any potential blockbuster release, and it’s called Meagan Fox. That’s right, Transformers 2, arriving this Wednesday, would, undoubtedly, smother any major action/fantasy release scheduled for this weekend, and, as a result, Warner Bros. is waiting three full weeks to release Harry Potter. If you start counting from last weekend (June 12th), Paramount has managed to clear five weeks (two before, three after) of the SUMMER box-office around Transformers’ release, paving an autobahn for the auto-bots to push the record books with no limits. And, surely, they will.

What we’re left with, this weekend, is one… “Year One,” that is. Starring Jack Black and the ever-awkward Michael Cera, “Year One” follows the two social outcasts as they embark on the first road trip ever. From online ads to tv commercials to NBA finals outtakes, the marketing push for One has been pretty solid, but I don’t think this film will do as well as expected for a few reasons. First and foremost, The Hangover is still hanging on to the box office crown, and it doesn’t seem to be going away any time soon. Declines for the soon-to-be champ of R-rated comedies have been slim during the week, hovering around the low-twenty percent levels (these refer to the declines experienced from Monday-to-Monday, Tuesday-to-Tuesday, etc.), which is pretty remarkable given the genre. Second, Michael Cera, contrary to popular belief, is not a huge box-office draw. Adam Sandler, Will Ferrel, and the Apatow boys are in a separate league when it comes to hit comedies. Don’t believe me? Let’s take a look at his resume, which includes Juno, Super Bad, and Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist. Juno was a box-office sensation, but Michael Cera had little to do with its success. We can credit most of Juno’s glory to its smart distribution plan (it started off in 7 theaters and gradually went to wide in the coming weeks), it’s great word-of-mouth/reviews, the time of year (winter holidays), the oscar buzz surrounding it and Ellen Page’s performance, and certainly its provocative story line. Sure, Cera’s name helped it a little, but not enough for me to think of him as a leading man. Now, look at Super Bad, another extremely successful film starring Cera. Yet, nobody had ever heard of Michael Cera before Super Bad, meaning his name wasn’t what drew in the audiences. Three things were responsible for the success of Super Bad—1) It was advertised as an Apatow movie 2) It was actually pretty good/funny 3) Most importantly, it had a fantastically cut trailer, which people were talking about months in advance of the film. If I can stress anything, it’s the power of a good movie trailer, regardless of genre Slumdog Millionaire, Pineapple Express, Titanic, 300, etc. That leaves us with Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist, a film in which Cera certainly was the leading man and anchor for its potential success. Opening in a 2,400+ theaters, Nick and Norah only grossed $11M in its first weekend, averaging a tepid $4,600 per site. Michael Cera: NOT a safe box-office bet, regardless of his "adorable" awkwardness and attire.

Jack Black, on the other hand, is a legite A-Lister, at least on occasion. Although he has certainly missed the mark with “Margot at the Wedding,” “Tenacious D,” and “Be Kind Rewind,” he has done well with “School of Rock” and “Nacho Libre.” Yet, if you look at his comedies, none of them have come close to the numbers put up by Sandler, Ferrel, Rogen, Rudd, Stiller, etc. Opening in 3,022 locations, Year One will probably collect 22M.

The only other movie opening in wide release is “The Proposal.” Starring Ryan Reynolds and Sandra Bullock, this romantic comedy offers nothing new to the table, whatsoever, although I’m glad to see that Reynolds, following his last performance, in which his mouth was sewn shut as Mutant X in “Wolverine,” has taken a greater artistic challenge by actually having to speak in this film. (He did have a few lines in Wolverine, but not important enough to merit any credit.) Reynolds has been in so many films and so many different genres (horror, comedy, action, romantic comedy, shit), but none of them have grossed more than 65M except for Wolverine. Same goes for Bullock. Her only real “blockbusters” have been “Miss Congeniality” and “Speed,” both of which opened at least more than nine years ago. Suffice it to say, Sandra Bullock has no box-office pull either. What happens if you stick two “stars” with little past success in starring roles of a bland film? Yeah, you get my point. Expect “The Proposal” to get on both knees without putting up much of a fight towards the rest of the box-office with a 15M weekend gross.

We’ve got three holdovers that should continue to bring in audiences this weekend. “Up,” coming off a 30M take from last weekend, should see another small decline of about 35%, which would give it around 20M for a total of close to 230M. I’d expect it to cross the 300M mark eventually, although it may not beat Finding Nemo’s 340M domestic total. Believe it or not, “The Hangover” could put up a pretty good fight against Year One. It only experienced a 27% decline in its second week, but Cera and Black should be able to increase that stat just a little. I’d say Hangover drops 40% and makes about 19M for the frame. Finally, “Pelham 123” had a solid opening last week at 23M and should drop about 45% to around 14M.

Alright, that’s it. Sorry it was a little long. I’ll be back next week when we finally get some real excitement at the box-office with Transformers. Peace. Oh yeah, and I'll post the results later.