Friday Box Office Analysis
By Kim Hollis
November 15, 2008
BoxOfficeProphets.com
James Bond makes his triumphant return to the box office in Quantum of Solace. The 22nd title in a movie franchise that dates back to 1962 will have the series' largest opening weekend by a long shot. The 007 flick earned an awesome $28.4 million on Friday, which gives it a pretty amazing per venue average of $8,219 for just one day. This is almost double the amount Casino Royale made just two years ago on its first Friday. That film did an outstanding job of regenerating interest and excitement about the James Bond character, rebooting the series and putting the thuggish Daniel Craig front and center. It's clear that audiences truly responded to Casino Royale and were ready for more of this darker Bond.
During its opening weekend, Casino Royale had a solid three-day multiplier (weekend box office divided by Friday box office) of 2.77. I do think that Quantum of Solace will have had a bit more of a fanboy rush, but it is a film that tends to skew more adult than your typical franchise tentpole. If we decide to lower the multiplier for Quantum of Solace to 2.6, the film is still looking at an amazing opening weekend of $73.7 million. This absolutely destroys the previous James Bond opening weekend record of $47.1 million.
What that means for November is that it has kicked off with consecutive weekends with the #1 film opening above $60 million. If Harry Potter had hung around in the November 21st spot as originally planned, November would have been a true juggernaut. Even without it, Twilight has an excellent chance to have box office cash registers churning next weekend as an influx of teen girls and female fans of the series turn out for vampire romance.
Notable Holdovers
Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa drops a significant 50% from last Friday; however, these 50% drops from their debut Fridays are starting to become a little bit more common for CGI animated films. They generally recover some over the weekend and in the weeks that follow. The high-spirited sequel should wind up with a final second weekend tally of $37.2 million. It will cross the $100 million mark as early as today.
Role Models falls 41% from last Friday, which is really pretty darned good. The Paul Rudd/Seann William Scott/McLovin starrer is looking to come in with another $12 million this weekend - an amount that is still more than most analysts were forecasting it would make in its first weekend. It's an unqualified success.
Finally, Soul Men drops a rough 55% from last Friday, and it's looking to disappear from theaters pretty quickly to make room for stuff with more potential. A second weekend total of $2.7 million sounds about right.