WEEKEND ESTIMATES: 'The Dark Knight' Faster than Speeding 'Express;' Caped Crusader Banks $26.5M for 3-Day; 'Pineapple' Good for $22.95M Friday-Sunday; 'Pants 2' Fits $10.58M Into 3-Day Frame But Doesn't Beat Fraser Despite 'Mummy' Dive!
by Steve Mason
FRIDAY 10:00 p.m. (Pacific): The Dark Knight (Warner Bros.) has battled back from a tough Wednesday and Thursday to score a photo-finish win over Sony's Pineapple Express on Friday. My sources are projecting $7.8 million for the Caped Crusader vs. $7.65 million for the Judd Apatow-produced cannabis comedy. The big news from this is that Christopher Nolan's Batman Begins sequel will score a staggering fourth consecutive weekend win, with something in the range of $26.52 million, compared to $22.95 million or so for Express.
This has been an exceedingly tough week to make accurate projections. A megahit in its third week, a weed-whacked comedy with a strong R-rating opening on a Wednesday, a midweek opening for a "girl power" sequel and the added dynamic of the start of the Beijing Olympics have all conspired to make forecasting difficult. There is no question, however, that TDK has "come from behind" for the weekend win.
No one needs to shed any tears for Sony. Pineapple Express is a great big hit with an expected five-day take of $41 million against a reported budget of $28 million. The fact that the Seth Rogen/James Franco comedy opened on Wednesday, instead of Friday, however, likely allowed Dark Knight the win in the traditional three-day box-office race. Still, Express will certainly top $80 million domestic, and it has a shot at $100 million.
For The Dark Knight, Friday matinee business was exceedingly strong, and the film continues to perform extraordinarily well with kids and families. Saturday afternoon will be the key in defeating Pineapple Express, as another big matinee bounce is anticipated. TDK will drop only about 38 percent this weekend, which is another extraordinary hold. This weekend should guaranteea push to $500 million, with several of my industry sources now pegging the film to hit $510 million-$515 million domestic.
The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor (Universal) finished No. 3 on Friday with an estimated $5 million, which should translate to a $16.1 million three-day. That represents a 60 percent drop for Rob Cohen's resurrection of Steven Sommers's Mummy franchise, and, with a 10-day cume of just over $70 million, reaching $100 million in total domestic is probably a "pipe dream."
After a strong Wednesday of $5.7 million or so and a decent $3.23 million Thursday, The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2 (Warner Bros.) failed to build on its success Friday. The decently-reviewed sequel managed just $3.85 million on Friday for a probable three-day of $10.58 million. That will give this young-female-skewing feel-good movie a five-day take of $19.52 million. (That's a far cry from the $25 million I was projecting after Thursday, but again, this has been a tough week to figure out.) Still, Pants 2 is up 31 percent from the $13.57 million five-day opening of the 2005 original.
In fifth place, for both Friday and the weekend, is the Will Ferrell/John C. Reilly comedy Step Brothers (Sony), with an estimated $2.73 million Friday and about $9 million for the weekend. The modestly-budgeted picture will probably have a new cume north of $81 million by Monday morning.
One other development of note is that Mamma Mia! (Universal) will top $100 million sometime this weekend. The ABBA-inspired Meryl Streep musical added about $2.68 million on Friday, and is headed for about $8.87 million over the three-day. That will give the Female 25-Plus geared picture a new cume of about $104.8 million.
EXCLUSIVE FANTASY MOGULS EARLY FRIDAY ESTIMATES
1. The Dark Knight (Warner Bros.) — $7.8 million, $1,938 PTA, $423.31 million cume
2. NEW Pineapple Express (Sony) — $7.65 million, $2,490 PTA, $25.72 million cume
3. The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor (Universal) — $5 million, $1,323 PTA, $59.55 million cume
4. NEW The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2 (Warner Bros.) — $3.85 million, $1,422 PTA, $12.79 million cume
5. Step Brothers (Sony) — $2.73 million, $858 PTA, $74.73 million cume
6. Mamma Mia! (Universal) — $2.68M,$842 PTA, $98.62 million cume
7. Journey to the Center of the Earth (Warner Bros.) — $1.22 million, $622 PTA, $78.12 million cume
8. WALL-E (Disney) — $932,000, $435 PTA, $207.99 million cume
9. Swing Vote (Disney) — $786,000, $355 PTA, $9.68 million cume
10. Hancock (Sony) — $892,000, $395 PTA, $219.3 million cume
EXCLUSIVE FANTASY MOGULS EARLY 3-DAY ESTIMATES
1. The Dark Knight (Warner Bros.) — $26.52 million, $6,589 PTA, $442.03 million cume
2. NEW Pineapple Express (Sony) — $22.95 million, $7,471 PTA, $41 million cume
3. The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor (Universal) — $16.1 million, $4,259 PTA, $70.65 million cume
4. NEW The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2 (Warner Bros.) — $10.58 million, $3,911 PTA, $19.52 million cume
5. Step Brothers (Sony) — $9 million, $2,831 PTA, $81 million cume
6. Mamma Mia! (Universal) — $8.87M,$2,779 PTA, $104.81 million cume
7. Journey to the Center of the Earth (Warner Bros.) — $4.41 million, $2,240 PTA, $81.31 million cume
8. WALL-E (Disney) — $3.35 million, $1,566 PTA, $210.42 million cume
9. Hancock (Sony) — $2.97 million, $1,317 PTA, $221.38 million cume
10. Swing Vote (Disney) — $2.16 million, $977 PTA, $11.05 million cume
Woah!, PE only pulled in 7mill. I expected way more than that atleast 9 to 10mill. I guess that huge Wednesday opening really took a toll on it's weekend numbers, but I still thought word of mouth would have carried it better. Hopefuly, it will last in Theatres a bit longer and not get completely destroyed when TT comes out next week.
Posted by: wrongturn687 | August 08, 2008 at 10:42 PM
Mason - I told you you were high on your Pineapple prediction for Friday.
John Ireland sucks! You are the man. Talk about box-office on the radio show. I still owe you a lunch from last summer
Posted by: Lester Hayes | August 08, 2008 at 10:56 PM
That's a sigh of relief. On to next weekend! I hope your tracking is HUGE!
Posted by: JackO | August 08, 2008 at 11:58 PM
Mason you are a moron. Can't you pick anything correctly? I don't think you've ever been right. Shut down this website now because you're a [Expletive Deleted] disgrace.
Posted by: Jeff | August 09, 2008 at 09:35 AM
Jeff, box office tracking is a hard job to do. Its not as easy as it seems because you don't have a clue what every person in America wants to see. So show some respect to Steve Mason and don't swear you ignorant jerk
Posted by: Bob | August 09, 2008 at 11:09 AM
at this point, i don't really care if TDK is #1. it'll be in the top 5 for a long time, so if it gets kicked out of the top spot, it won't be THAT tragic.
but hey, if it DOES make #1 this week, that'll be awesome. it should be called 'superman' at this point; the film is invincible.
Posted by: RIPsquishy | August 09, 2008 at 11:58 AM
Haha, I said DK will be number 1 all along this weekend.
However, I disagree with you on Mummy. I think it will skim $100M. It will be close though.
Posted by: Ryan | August 09, 2008 at 04:21 PM
Mummy will pass 100 million! If not, it's doing so well internationally, they just need to bring back the original director.
Pineapple Express was so much better than I ever expected it to be -- very hilarious!
Posted by: Jake | August 09, 2008 at 10:19 PM
i think it was a great move that Pineapple and the pants opened on wed. I think in the end it will help with their final grosses.
Posted by: seth | August 09, 2008 at 10:20 PM
Thanks as always for all of the comments. I am always happy to hear from people who disagree, have different opinions and point out my under and over projections. I do regularly quote William Goldman's famous show business adage "Nobody knows anything." I don't however appreciate the lack of class on the part of poster Jeff.
I'm cool with "Mason you're a moron." (I'm a sports talk show host on radio, so I get criticized all the time.) But, I do not want expletives on the site. Frankly, they're not necessary, and I have to assume poster Jeff is smarter than he sounds. I generally don't edit comments, but I have removed the expletive from Jeff's post.
FYI - The point of the website is not to project box office, although I definitely write on the subject. People all over the world are playing a fantasy movie game here. That's really the purpose of the site.
Thanks all,
Mase
Posted by: Steve Mason | August 09, 2008 at 11:36 PM
Steve, please don't take comments like Jeff's to heart. Even those of us who may post disagreements with your estimates at times, still greatly enjoy reading your input. Your columns are my favorite part of FM. Please keep it up.
Posted by: MB | August 10, 2008 at 02:14 AM
Now that's class. Willing to take criticism but taking a stand against expletives at the same time. I applaud you Mase.
On to other business. It seems to me that with all the Wednesday releases throughout the month of August, Hollywood is catering to TDK and Warner Bros. This week PE and Sisterhood, next week Tropic Thunder, and the following 2 weeks have The Rocker, which could be the summer sleeper (there hasn't been one yet) and Traitor. TDK's home Warner Bros. is opening Star Wars on Friday which might actually play to the studios advantage in regards to top 5. I guess time will tell. HEY ALL YOU STUDIO EXECUTIVES, "WEDNESDAY IS NOT THE NEW FRIDAY!"
Posted by: Synestro | August 10, 2008 at 02:30 AM
Maybe you should also mention that The Dark Knight played at 1,000 more theaters than Pineapple Express, which is the reason it won the weekend.
Posted by: jse33 | August 10, 2008 at 08:41 AM
Couldn't disagree more, JSE33. The PTA estimates tell a different tale. PE got $7,291 and TDK got $6,467. So if PE was in as much as theatres as TDK it would actually lose it's negligible lead since it met it's demand in it's allocated theatres. There were no sell out reports for PE. Sorry to burst your Apatow bubble.
Posted by: JackO | August 10, 2008 at 12:07 PM
If PE had came out on Friday I'm sure it would have won the weekend. I mean if it could pull in $12 mil on Wednesday, it would have brought in at least maybe $15 mil on a Friday. And even with the drop on Saturday, it should have edged out TDK. I'm trying to figure why the studio decided to release PE on a Wednesday. I could understand if it had a huge budget and they're were trying to maximize the amount of money they could make up front. But since PE's budget is only $28 million, you gotta scratch your head. They would have easily notched $30-35 million over the weekend. Most films don't open mid-week unless it's a holiday weekend or it's a big film/sequel type. And I see Tropic Thunder is doing the same next week. But TDK is still rolling. And I don't think it even has to be no 1 to continue to pile up the grosses. Next weekend should bring maybe 18-19 million bringing it ever closing to that $500 million mark. So it's been a wild ride so far.
Posted by: poohtiger | August 10, 2008 at 12:24 PM
I was thinking about TDK prospects of hitting the Titanic milestone. One tracker states it may come close to hitting 540m. Now as much as I think the sickly hysteria of the hype and all of this film I will admit it would suck if TDK came so close but didn't quite get there. The numbers are coming down on the weekdays some and school is ready to begin again so it will be tough. But now the Conservative Talk Shows are picking up on TDK as IT being and or representing the Bush Administration war on terrorists and playing it up as a positive for the Bush Presidency. This could give it another hefty lift as maybe now Cons may get out to see it if they haven't already, maybe. On the other hand maybe now the Libs who taught it was great won't be thinking as much of a film Cons relate to Bush and the war on terror. And there could go its chances for BEST PICTURE as well if it ever had any to begin with. OUCH.
Posted by: jdls08 | August 10, 2008 at 03:40 PM
Have you guys noticed that none of the judd apatow movies have opened at no. 1 this year
Posted by: salva | August 10, 2008 at 05:23 PM
Steve - I seriously love your website and your predictions, it's why I like many others keep coming back because we want to see the tracking and I hope that you don't let a few negative people upset you.
Again, I disagree with the other post about opening Pineapple on Friday instead of Wed. It made an extra 18 million by opening on wed, something with the olympics and tropic thunder opening next wed -- that I don't think it could make up. Even thought it is one hilarious movie. I would rather have 18 million more than bragging rights that I got to be number 1.
Posted by: jake | August 10, 2008 at 07:41 PM
I made a comment on your page discussing opening weekend for TDK and I stated that nothing would knock TDK off the top spot until Tropic Thunder. Now I predict that Tropic Thunder stays on top for three or four weeks as well.
Posted by: Brett | August 11, 2008 at 08:26 AM
Do you really think that tropic thunder is gonna open that big? I just don't see the mass appeal of the movie, although with the disability protestors maybe it will create more publicity. A comedy war movie about moviemaking? I dunno.
Posted by: seth | August 11, 2008 at 12:23 PM
Mase, any predictions or tracking for Tropic Thunder? Lee's Movie Info has the film pegged at grossing $77 million for the five-day, which sounds like a pipe dream and a half to me.
Anyway, the above comment from Jeff was completely inappropriate. There were two different ways the weekend could have gone, both of which were heavily supported by data, and Mason just happened to pick the wrong card. The fun of this site is in the writing and articles, not in knowing exactly how the weekend will play out.
Posted by: Squirrel | August 12, 2008 at 01:57 PM
I wrote a rough draft for BATMAN III back in 1992. So I have a love affair with The Bat. When I heard Heath Ledger was going to be The Joker I winced. But I was floored when I saw the promo. Now I have seen THE DARK KNIGHT twice. I would love to see it get nominated for Best Picture and win for Best Actor. Then with $120 Milion more in its gross it would blow the faggotty TITANIC out of the water. Let's just wait and see...I predicted it would beat Star Wars and as we all know Batman made Vader his bitch! LOL!
Posted by: Anthony A. | August 29, 2008 at 07:49 PM