Monday Morning Quarterback Part I
By BOP Staff
September 30, 2008
BoxOfficeProphets.com
Kim Hollis: Eagle Eye, the latest from the Shia LaBeouf/D.J. Caruso tandem, outperformed their previous film Disturbia by earning $29.2 million. Are you pleased, unhappy with, or indifferent to this result?
David Mumpower: I was expecting this title to make slightly over $30 million, meaning this total is actually a bit lower than I had projected. Midway through August, I reviewed the remaining releases over the next two months. This was the only true heavyweight I saw on the schedule in that period, and it has become the best weekend performance of any release since the first weekend of August (The Dark Knight's third frame). Paramount has to be pleased with such a result.
Scott Lumley: $29.2 million is pretty good considering that the recent box office kings have all been in the $12-$13 million range. I actually think this has a good chance to hang onto the top spot for a week or two.
Tim Briody: That's certainly waking up the box office after a rather weary month and a half. If anyone's disappointed in this performance, I would like to smack them around a bit.
Shane Jenkins: I must like getting smacked around, because I am going to agree with David here. It's a perfectly fine number, but I was anticipating a $35 million plus weekend when I saw the ads over the summer. I figured this would be the first big thing to get teenage butts back in the theater, and it is, but just not quite to the degree I was expecting.
Kim Hollis: I think it's pretty much right on target and meeting expectations. I'm sure the studio was probably hoping for a little bit more, but if this can have legs like Disturbia, it will be fine in the end. I'm not sure it can have that kind of staying power, though, as it's a different time of year and we're seeing some epic drops from week-to-week even in movies that you wouldn't expect.
Reagen Sulewski: I think it's clear that this generation has chosen its acting idol. To which I will say: I am so disappointed in you.
Jason Lee: I agree with Tim. Let's consider that this is the biggest BO performance since The Dark Knight brought in $42 mil back on the August 1st - 3rd weekend. I'll even go out on a limb and say that no film that will open above $30 million until High School Musical 3 and Saw V come out four weeks from now. Paramount has to be very pleased with this total.
Daron Aldridge: This one is pretty much where I expected it to be, especially given the September history that Max pointed out. I couldn't be happier because the box office has been downright depressing the few weeks. The film's accurately ubiquitous tagline of "We are everywhere" seemed to be the goal of the marketing push because it seems like every show on my DVR had at least one Eagle Eye commercial that I, of course, skipped over.
Sean Collier: The "biggest weekend winner in a while" point is both alliterative and noteworthy, but Shane is right - where are all the teenagers? School's been back in for six weeks now. Shouldn't every 14-year-old boy in the world have asked the cute girl in Spanish class out by now? Eagle Eye totally should've seen a $10 million awkward first date bump. I was expecting more in the $35-$40 million range as well.
Max Braden: I don't know why Shane and Sean would have expected it to open above $35 million. A September release opening above $30 million is a rare thing - Eagle Eye ranks #4 on the historical unadjusted list for the month. I'd be pleased with that result except that I saw it and the screenplay is entirely undeserving of that kind of money. The marketing people should be pleased they avoided revealing the premise.
If you don't see his movies, he'll run you over. Or smoke in your bathroom.
Kim Hollis: Do you think Shia LaBeouf is a box office draw, or do you believe he's been lucky with his projects?
David Mumpower: I suspect the truth lies somewhere in the middle, but his resume is adding up to a fine early career. He's got Transformers in his back pocket, there is a lot of noise about another Indiana Jones film, and now he's got Eagle Eye to add to Disturbia. He seems to be the primary casting choice for the current genre of "misanthropic nerd saves the day".
Scott Lumley: He's definitely turning into some sort of draw, but I think David's right in that he's been very lucky with some of these projects. What he's doing now reminds me of Orlando Bloom's early career arc. Let's hope his career a couple of years from now spans out a little better than Bloom's has.
Tim Briody: Even without the Transformers and Indy movies, he was certainly not a guy I expected to develop into a solid draw at all. Clearly he's picking a lot of smart projects. If he can avoid any more...unfortunate run-ins with the law, watch out.
Shane Jenkins: I feel like he happens to have been at the center of movies people would have seen anyway. As icky as it sounds, I would be curious to see how he would fare in a romantic comedy, or at least something outside of the action genre. He's got the talent for it, but I wonder if fans would follow.
Kim Hollis: I think it's a combination of having a certain segment of teen audience follow him from the Disney Channel and also having his career guided and molded by people like Spielberg. He really does need to quit trying to be a bad dude, though. (I say try because I just can't buy him as a dick. He's working too hard for some of this attention. Smoking in the bathroom? That's just ludicrous.)
Jason Lee: I don't know who had to sleep with who in order to make it happen, but I definitely agree with Kim in that Shia has been the beneficiary of some influential, guiding hands (like Spielberg) helping his career along. I think Eagle Eye and Disturbia clearly place Shia in an Adam Sandler-ish category: he's a box-office draw, but only in the right type of film.
P.S. Can you believe that this is Shia's fourth straight live-action film to open at #1? Not that he's been personally responsible for all of them, but still.
Sean Collier: I can't help but think the bubble is going to burst, here. He's far too much of a babyface to be a serious leading man - he looks 16 with his first goatee, nothing more. I feel like he'll find a niche, but god knows what it is.
Max Braden: I agree with everything said so far: draw when the production is right. But I think his bubble is going to last a lot longer than Colin Farrell's did. I don't have a problem with Shia being this generation's action star. He's got the same intense energy and good looks that made Tom Cruise a star.
Daron Aldridge: I guess I will have to join almost everyone on the road most traveled by agreeing with Shia's good fortune at the box office being a byproduct of appealing films. Shane's comment in particular rings truest to me that these movies likely would have been hits regardless of the lead actor unless the lead was a disastrous choice, i.e. Dane Cook (who I still blame for hindering the box office potential for the underrated Mr. Brooks.).
It's marginally better than the Kathy Bates nude scene...
Kim Hollis: Nights in Rodanthe, quite possibly the oldest-skewing romantic comedy ever released, earned $13.4 million. Is this a good result?
David Mumpower: I think that the strangest marketing move I have seen in calendar 2008 is the frequent marketing of this film during shows on The CW. Matlock and The Golden Girls re-runs were a much better call for this. I do think a total that effectively matches The Notebook's $13.5 million is a solid result for a title with romantic leads who have a combined age of 102.
Scott Lumley: Nights in what? Seriously?
Considering that I did not see one commercial for this film on TV or in a theatre, I think that this has to be a pretty spectacular result. Eagle Eye has been advertised since early June and I knew it was coming. Nights in Rodanthe did almost 50% of Eagle Eye's total with no marketing at all.
Tim Briody: If the ads on the CW went "remember Rachel McAdams and Ryan Gosling in The Notebook? Now picture them a lot older!" then it would...no, wait, it still wouldn't have made sense.
Shane Jenkins: This is currently my go-to movie punchline, but I guess it's good that there are $13.6 million worth of people who aren't cold-hearted cynical bastards like me. But really, Diane Lane in soft focus running with horses on the beach? Am I really the monster here?
Kim Hollis: Like David, I was perplexed by the marketing strategy to target shows on the CW. Sure, you're probably looking at a cheaper buy, but it's not coming anywhere close to giving you the reach you need in your target demographic. They should have been all over CBS and even cable nets like Food Network and HGTV. With that said, I think the weekend result is fine and it should limp along to a decent total overall. It's probably going to be a bigger DVD hit, actually.
Reagen Sulewski: This is a fantastic result for a film with one of the worst titles in recent memory. If you say it out loud and don't see it, you'd expect there to be a bunch of elves and ogres running around.
Jason Lee: I can't argue with your point about the studio's questionable ad buys, David, but I still thought this total would edge a little closer to $20 mil given the strong performance of The Notebook in its theatrical run and subsequent success on DVD.
Sean Collier: How many actual romances show up a year? One? Two? Not romantic comedies, mind you, but actual romances. (Wall-E doesn't count, even if it was the BEST romance in years.) Romances are almost as rare as westerns, and yet, there's still a large built-in audience - the aforementioned Golden Girls crowd. If it had been marketed better, it could've done a much higher number, I think. Incidentally, I was working on a joke about a monster-movie porno named "One Night in Rodan," but I couldn't pull it together.
Max Braden: There's no comedy in this movie; if that was implied by the marketing then the marketing was bad. It's a straight up romantic tragedy just like Nicholas Sparks' previous works. Had this not had his name behind it, I would have expected a sub-$10 million opening. But he's got intensely loyal fans. I think the relative box office to The Notebook would probably relate directly to book sales. The Notebook had a stronger response because it was better material.
Daron Aldridge: Since Lakeview Terrace was so lovingly called out for being the template for generic action/thriller or as Reagan dubbed in the wrap-up, Crisis in Generictown, Rodanthe equally fits bill for the nondescript romance film about two people who learn to love again after...blah blah blah. So, if we justifiably give an "acceptable" to Sam Jackson's forgettable film, then I will extend the same judgment to Gere and Lane and say that this is a decent result.