Twelve Days of Box Office
By David Mumpower
December 31, 2008
BoxOfficeProphets.com
No, I wasn't kidding about any of the above. The number one film yesterday was again Marley & Me. The Jennifer Aniston/Owen Wilson/puppy dog love triangle (I may have the details fuzzy on this) spent its sixth consecutive day in first place. Another $7.3 million on Tuesday is a negligible decline of 3% from Monday's $7.5 million, giving the Benji knock-off a running total of $65.6 million. Like all the other films in release this week, Marley & Me will experience a temporary bump in the road with New Year's Eve box office before relishing in the huge boon of Thursday-Sunday box office this week. Marley & Me should be over $100 million by Sunday, giving it bragging rights over Beverly Hills Chihuahua as the pooch of choice in 2008. It's a dog eat dog world (although you may thought it's a doggie dog world).
The rest of the top four films are all new releases from last weekend and all of them not named The Spirit are doing quite well. Bedtime Stories had the second best Monday-Tuesday bump within the top ten, adding 3% to Monday's $6.4 million total to wind up with $6.6 million yesterday. It's crossed the $50 million barrier in six days and should be north of $80 million by Sunday. Meanwhile, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button has the "worst" drop within the top ten, falling a modest 7% from $5.0 million Monday to $4.7 million yesterday. When 7% is the biggest drop within the top ten, it's readily apparent that all the titles are performing uniformly. Valkyrie is no different. After $4.0 million on Monday, it drops 6% to $3.8 million on Tuesday, giving the Tom Cruise starrer $37.3 million after six days. The title is poised to wind up with domestic receipts in the range of $75 million, which has to feel like a win for the actor at this point.
The rest of the top ten is straightforward. Yes Man fell 5% to $3.6 million while Seven Pounds fell only 3% to $2.4 million. Conversely, Monday's only film out of the three to drop, The Tale of Despereaux, is now the only one to improve on Tuesday. It had the best percentage improvement within the top ten, increasing 6% from just under $2.3 million on Monday to just over $2.4 million on Tuesday. Yes Man is the best overall performer of the three with a current total of $57.3 million while Seven Pounds is the biggest disappointment at $43.7 million. I see The Tale of Despereaux as easily the best performer relative to expectations, however, as it is now at $32.1 million. An animated mouse being within shouting distance of a Will Smith Christmas release has to feel like a win for Universal, no matter the situation.
With The Spirit dropping 13% from Monday to a total of only $1.0 million on Tuesday, it fell out of the top ten for the first time. It may sneak back in for another day or two, but its box office run is already almost over after less than a week in theaters. Its running tally of $12.5 million is grim. What have we learned from this? Casting then advertising all the hot women in the world won't help if the movie's plot looks Uwe Boll-esque. The Spirit is an unmitigated disaster for Lionsgate.
Rounding out the top ten are two $100 million blockbusters. Twilight virtually matches Monday's $1.3 million while Bolt creeps up 11% from just under a million on Monday to $1.1 million on Tuesday. Twilight has current box office of $170 million, which still makes me do a double take each and every time I type it. Bolt recently passed the previous Disney 3-D animation release, Meet the Robinsons, and has current domestic receipts of $104.5 million. I don't expect Bolt to get there, but it is starting to creep up on Chicken Little's final box office of $135.4 million. Bolt should be at $110 million or so by the end of the week, making it one of the leggiest films of the year after a $26.2 million debut.