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| Pirates 4 crossed $1b on Saturday! |
But there’s really two films that stood head and shoulders above the rest when it comes to record breaking; Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides and Transformers: Dark Of The Moon. No it wasn’t the longest titles record, Pirates 4 became the eighth film to pass one Billion Dollars in worldwide box office, settling in at number seven. It’s also the third Johnny Depp film to pass $1b (he’s becoming the 21st century Harrison Ford; with the Pirates movies as his Star Wars, and Tim Burton collaborations as his Indiana Jones).
TF3 broke so many records on its way to a 6 day gross of $372,165,000 that it could take all morning to type them all! Its 3 day (Fri – Sun) bow in North America passed Spider-Man 2’s $88.2 to become the biggest Independence Day weekend opener ever; it also passed Pirates 4 to claim biggest weekend of the year so far. With $210m it became Paramount’s biggest ever international opener, flying past Indiana Jones & The Kingdom of The Crystal Skull’s $147m opening. Records tumbled in several markets; $28m opening in South Korea is the biggest of all time; Hong Kong’s $5.2m is the biggest there; Panama, Peru, The Philippines, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore and the United Arab Emirates ALL scored the highest ever openings as well. Given that the film didn’t even open in Japan & China, two of the biggest international markets (Perhaps even more so here given how well his film is playing in that region), the opening could have been even more spectacular. Other records that may not have been broken but remain impressive are the third biggest global opening of all time ($372,165,000) and the second biggest global bow of the year (behind Pirates 4).
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| Remember the Wing suit jumps were all real, just add carnage! |
TF3 made $22m in Russia, $16.5m in The UK & Ireland, $16.1m in Australia, $14.3m in Germany, $11m in Mexico ($11 million) $10.9 in France and another $10.2m in Taiwan. All of that amounts to a staggering 51% increase on the comparable opening of TF2; so, even with the Spectre of Harry Potter’s finale looming on the 15th, it seems all but certain that the film will pass TF2’s impressive international gross of $434m. In fact the film surely has a chance of approaching $600m internationally. A massive 70% of the money taken internationally was from 3D screenings.
Depending on how far the film can go against 2011’s trend for North American box office to underperform / meet but not pass expectations the film may, MAY, have a chance to emulate Pirates 4’s $1b takings. There are indications that the film may do better than expected domestically. (The second film was viewed a lot more negatively there than abroad and whilst sequels to even ‘poorly’ received films benefit from increased recognition factor etc in the international market, the recent trend in North American market is for people to save their cash on a sequel to a film they didn’t like; even sequels to films they did like as Cars 2 and Kung Fu Panda 2 demonstrate). Whilst the 6 day take for TF3 is $38m behind the $200m that TF2 had taken in the same time period, the film has had smaller daily drops (TF3’s Wednesday to Thursdays drop was 43% compared to TF2’s 53%) and bigger daily increases (TF3 went up 53% Thursday to Friday while TF2’s increase was 23%) This suggests that the third film, which is taking 60% of its domestic cash from 3D showings, is benefiting from superior word of mouth. Regardless this film looks likely to massively increase the domestic / international split, which slightly favoured international for both previous films. (A very spurious hypothetical would be that if the domestic gross ended up 20% behind TF2, TF3 would close around $320m. If it dropped from 51% ahead to 30% everywhere else it would make about $565m. So $885m is a fair guesstimate at this point, although it could of course make a little less or a fair bit more, it all depends on how strong it’s second, and final Potter free, weakened plays out.)
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| Thor will return in The Avengers (2012) & Thor 2 (2013) |
Transformers: Dark Of The Moon jumps straight in at number 6 on the summer chart after just 6 days. A new cycle of Transformers films, perhaps taking an entirely different path Sans Director Michael Bay & the Witwicky characters, is inevitable. It would join Fast 6 (24/5/2013) and Thor 2 (26/7/2013) as a summer 2011 film with a sequel. Of course we could realistically expect sequels to every film in that chart bar Super 8, and perhaps Cars (although the box office for that film is almost nugatory compared to the $10b in licensing money it is expected to generate)
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| Fast 6 reunites cast and director summer 2013 |
Kung Fu Panda may have disappointed domestically but it will pass the first film’s international take and most likely has done enough to earn a third movie. The Hangover Pt II seems to be guaranteed and Pressure will be mounting for some kind of return to the world of Bridesmaids as well.
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| Critical favourite |
The most interesting one is X-Men: First Class; it’s another film that has had a perplexing, relative, lack of success at the North American Box office. It is likely to finish closer to $140m than $150m and $150m really has to be seen as the minimum expectation for the film, even with its handicaps (a new cast, characters that were less popular or ‘unknown’ to fans of the movies rather than the comics / cartoons, no Wolverine or Hugh Jackman, no stars, no actors who added gravitas (Sirs Ian McKellen & Patrick Stewart) and a hard core fan (fanboy) backlash / boycott surrounding misuse of the title and theme ‘First Class’ & a perceived, cynical, attempt to rush out an X-Men film just to keep the movie rights from reverting back to Marvel.) There are significant numbers of Marvel fans who expressed intent not to go and see the film, even if it was good, and many claim to have stuck to their word. The irony here is that the film has received mostly excellent reviews (it ranks higher than Batman Begins in many critic and public reviews) and the quality of those reviews makes its domestic performance all the more disappointing. ( For example a Moviefone poll has the film listed as the 2nd best of 2011 so far) Once again in 2011 it is the international box office to the rescue. The film is on the verge of passing the $200m mark, only X-Men: The Last stand has done so (without adjustments) and that mark was surely at the higher end of Fox’s hopes for the film.
So the questions are:
1. Will Fox (who had been saying that matching the original X-Men’s $297m gross was the target) consider the reviews and global take sufficient to green light a sequel to X-Men: FC?
2. Will the favourable critical and public reaction be enough to persuade Fox to green light X4 as well? The treatment for which has been sitting on their desk screaming “make me make me & X5” for several months now.
3. Will the box office for X-Men: FC instead lead Fox to decide that only one of those film series should be pursued, either the First Class or the original series?
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| The Wolverine is based on a legendary comic story |
Whatever the answers to those questions are we’ll be having at least two more Fox produce films featuring Marvel’s popular mutants. Hugh Jackman returns in 2012 (or 2013) in ‘The Wolverine’ (which if rapturous reaction to his First Class cameo is anything to go by cannot come quickly enough) and Ryan Reynolds will reprise his role as Deadpool in ‘Deadpool’, which is due in 2014, but may come forward to 2013.
Please check back later to answer two short polls on whether you’d rather see a 4th film in the original X-Men series or a sequel to First Class; AND which of the top 10 Summer movies you’d most like a sequel to.
Happy 4th of July Americans!
Summer chart!
Film
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North American Gross*
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International Gross
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Total Worldwide Gross
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Budget
| |||||
1
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Pirates of The Caribbean 4
|
|
$774,000,000
|
$1,007,703,000
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$250m
| ||||
2
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Fast Five**
|
|
$389,000,000
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$597,309,000
|
$125
| ||||
3
|
The Hangover Pt. II
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$248,118,000
|
$300,000,000
|
$548,118,000
|
$80m
| ||||
4
|
Kung Fu Panda
|
|
$374,000,000
|
$530,704,000
|
$150m
| ||||
5
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Thor
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$177,931,000
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$261,700,000
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$439,631,000
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$150m
| ||||
6
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Transformers: Dark Of The Moon
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$162,165,000
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$210,000,000
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$372,165,000
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$185m
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7
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X-Men: First Class
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$138,612,000
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|
$334,312,000
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$160m
| ||||
8
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Cars 2
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$116,043,000
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$82,200,000
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$198,243,000
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$200m
| ||||
9
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Bridesmaids
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$152,895,000
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$34,800,000
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$187,695,000
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$32.5m
| ||||
10
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Super 8
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$7,500,000
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$108,036,000
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$45,000,000
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$50m
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*North America includes The US & Canada. **Fast 5 opened 1 week before the official summer movie season, but to all intents & purposes it’s a ‘Summer Movie’. Besides 11 Years ago Summer season didn’t kick off until US Memorial day at the end of May, maybe another change is coming.
Worldwide
Film
|
Weekend Gross
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Total Gross
|
Budget
| |
1
|
Transformers: Dark Of The Moon
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$307,400,000*
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$372,165,000
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$185m
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2
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Cars 2
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$47,212,000
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$198,243,000
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$200m
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3
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Kung Fu Panda
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$20,525,000
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$530,704,000
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$150m
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4
|
Bad Teacher
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$20,800,000
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$88,146,000
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$20M
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5
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Larry Crowne
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$16,007,000
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$16,007,000
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$30m
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*Weekend gross includes international total Tuesday – Sunday.
International
Film
|
Weekend Gross
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Total Gross
|
Budget
| |
1
|
Transformers: Dark Of The Moon
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$210,000,000*
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$210,000,000
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$185m
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2
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Cars 2
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$22,100,000
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$82,200,000
|
$200m
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3
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Kung Fu Panda 2
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$19,000,000
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$374,000,000
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$150m
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4
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The Hangover Pt. II
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$8,900,000
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$300,000,000
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$80m
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5
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Bridesmaids
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$7,200,000
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$34,800,000
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$32.5m
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6
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Pirates of The Caribbean 4
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$6,900,000
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$774,300,000
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$250m
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7
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Bad Teacher
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$6,700,000
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$28,600,000
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$20M
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8
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Mr. Popper’s Penguins
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$5, 700,000
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$11,100,000
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$55m
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9
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X-Men: First Class
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$4,900,000
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$195,700,000
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$160m
|
10
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Super 8
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$3,600,000
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$45,000,000
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$50m
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*Weekend gross unknown so total Tuesday – Sunday shown..
North America
Film
|
Weekend Gross
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Total Gross
|
Budget
| |
1
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Transformers: Dark Of The Moon
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$97,400,000
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$162,165,000
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$185m
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2
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Cars 2
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$25,112,000
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$116,043,000
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$200m
|
3
|
Bad Teacher
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$14,100,000
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$59,546,000
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$20m
|
4
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Larry Crowne
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$13,007,000
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$13,007,000
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$30m
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5
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Monte Carlo
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$7,600,000
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$7,600,000
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$20m
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6
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Super 8
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$7,500,000
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$108,036,000
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$50m
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7
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Green Lantern
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$6,270,000
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$101,962,000
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$200m
|
8
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Mr. Popper’s Penguins
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$5,100,000
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$50,125,000
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$55m
|
9
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Bridesmaids
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$3,521,000
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$152,895,000
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$32.5m
|
10
|
Midnight In Paris
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$3,438,000
|
$33,638,000
|
$30m
|
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