One Month Out: Part One
By BOP Staff
November 3, 2009
BoxOfficeProphets.com
Kim Hollis: James Cameron's last film was relatively successful at the box office. Perhaps you've heard of it. It involved a boat and a love story. Avatar has been promising immersive storytelling for awhile now. What are your expectations for it in terms of box office and quality?
Josh Spiegel: Depending on how heavily Avatar is marketed on TV and in theaters for the next six weeks, I can imagine the film coming close (close, mind you) to the opening-weekend performance that The Dark Knight had. Now, whether or not that prediction is wildly off-base is one thing; I'd be shocked if Avatar, though, comes anywhere close to Titanic's box-office stats, for a large number of reasons. Yes, both films have a romance; yes, both films have lots of action. However, not a lot of people in the States are as ga-ga over Sam Worthington as they were over Leonardo DiCaprio. In general, if Avatar gets the right amount of marketing and hype, and gets good word-of-mouth, it might end up as one of the 300 million-plus grossers of 2009. But that's a big if.
Max Braden: The two films face a completely different demographic. Titanic was a date movie across the board, and was friendly fare for adults as well as love-angst obsessed teenage girls, while Avatar is going to appeal to a much more narrow male age range. Keeping that in mind I doubt it will be able to open bigger than December's historical leaders: I Am Legend, Lord of the Rings series, Narnia, and King Kong. That would mean an upper range of $65-75 million for the three day weekend. And while Titanic opened moderately and just kept raking in the money, I expect Avatar to behave more like a summer movie. I don't think it will earn much more than $200 million over its run.
Jim Van Nest: I'm with Max on this one. The trailer has me whelmed. Maybe I'm not the target audience here, I'm not sure. I think a lot of the success of this film will depend on how it's marketed. If they run a series of TV spots that focus on different aspects...to open it up to a broader audience, it could do better. But if they play the "from the director of Titanic" card as their main selling point, not so much, in my opinion.
Kim Hollis: While I'm intrigued enough to be there opening day, I do agree that there's an odd quality to the trailer that I think will be perplexing for potential audience members. I'm counting on Cameron to deliver, but it's been an awfully long time since his last movie and I'm not sure if people are going to be saying, "Hey, it's a James Cameron movie!" in the same way they might say, "Hey, it's a Steven Spielberg movie!" I have a real fear that this thing could crash and burn a la King Kong (which admittedly did okay, but not up to expectations).
Sean Collier: It's hard to imagine Avatar living up to the hype. "Whelmed" is right - my reaction to the trailer was pretty much, "Oh, so that's what Avatar is." I'm sure it will be very, very good, but I don't see why it will perform much better than any tentpole action/sci-fi film; the Titanic bump will inflate it to a very good opening, above $70 million, but I'd be surprised if it hit $250 million total.
Reagen Sulewski: The strange thing about Avatar is that movie goers are being asked to take things pretty much on faith. "This 3-D technology is really, really awesome! Even better than the animated stuff we've shown you! Only there's no way we can show you how awesome it is, you have to buy a ticket! More expensive than regular tickets, even!" It could live up to that, but there's got to be that initial hook of the plot to bring them in and I'm not sure these ads have done it. If it can leverage the 3-D tech correctly it can more or less call its own end point, but if the plot turns out to be The Abyss II, well, that's not going to save it.
Brett Beach: Avatar. I imagine that between now and December 18th, there will be any number of ridiculous print and web articles with some variation of the "straw man" question: Will Avatar beat Titanic's domestic and/or worldwide figures? I will be more than happy (as I am sure James Cameron will) when we all move past that line of thinking. I am surprised that there is no counter-programming going on that weekend. What I have seen so far of the creatures in Avatar distresses me as they appear to be more of the "so lifelike you'll think they're almost totally truly real" world of CGI that drives me batty. At a conference earlier this year, both Cameron and Peter Jackson expressed a desire not to sublimate the importance of telling a great story to the spectacle provided by continuing advances of technology. Great sentiment, but since I consider them both far better conjurer of worlds than writer of words, this may be a moot point. Avatar needs to make around $250 million to stand on its own. I have a feeling it will perform much like King Kong did in 2005, with a not ginormous but respectable opening and long play through January and February.
Michael Lynderey: People seem to have been buzzing about this one for eons now, but I never saw the appeal. And I hate to sound like a sourpuss, but the trailer makes this look fairly routine, and lacking that ubernatural "oomph" Cameron is known for in his sci-fi. I think it's going to get a fairly positive if unexceptional critical reception, and the box office will follow suit - something like a total number just on the edge of $200 million. Avatar just seems like too much of internet hype over something that will look very out of place in the middle of the holiday movie season.
George Rose: I don't think it will come remotely close to setting the box office on fire. Beowulf couldn't break $100 million using the same technology and a classic story. I don't know why anyone is getting overly excited about Avatar. Is Cameron's name really that powerful? Titanic had a lot going for it beyond the Cameron name. I'm sure Avatar will be a high quality product and will make tons of money, but it will fail expectations in every single way. That's what happens when an audience makes a mountain out of a mole hill, it's simply doomed to failure because of how high the bar has been set. I think it'll be lucky to see $250 million. $300 million tops. That sounds good, but put that next to Titanics 10+ year inflated $600 million. How's that Cameron name sound now?
David Mumpower: I disagree with one thing Brett said. We have moved into an era where December blockbusters generally don't play into February. January 2009 box office exemplified this as new products dominated the marketplace after the New Year began. Avatar is going to make 70-80% of its money by January 2nd, barring something unforeseen. Of course, Cameron does have some precedence in having a December release overwhelm the first quarter of the following box office year, but I don't expect a duplication of that once-a-generation feat here.
What we do know is that Avatar has the most awareness of any remaining film on the 2009 schedule. It also has the name recognition of James Cameron, one of the few directors whose name above the title means something. When we consider his track record of action films, True Lies inflation-adjusts to $260 million, Aliens inflation-adjusts to $167 million and Terminator 2: Judgment Day inflation-adjusts to $353 million. Independent of what happened with Titanic (which oh by the way inflation-adjusts to $950 million), we're still talking about a direct whose action films excel at the box office. I have to believe that Avatar earns north of $250 million during its domestic run, and I consider that number upwardly mobile if it turns out that Cameron has once again delivered breathtaking, unprecedented tech.
One billion dollars?
Kim Hollis: Generally speaking, what type of box office does Avatar need to be considered a successful follow-up to the #1 film of all-time.
Josh Spiegel: It's hard to say; some people in the media may simply call Avatar a disappointment if it doesn't have the same ridiculous legs Titanic had. Of course, it's almost guaranteed that Avatar won't perform that way; however, there's an equally pretty good chance that Avatar's opening weekend will look a lot better than Titanic's, which, for all its box office records, wasn't as impressive as some people might think. Avatar is going to have to make at least 300 million (or get close to it) domestically for it to look like a return to form for James Cameron.
Max Braden: Even taking Titanic out of the equation for a moment, after all the hype of Cameron + delay + super technology + epic holiday film, Avatar needs to open over $40 million. That's not an easy feat for most movies; there have only been nine December opening movies to accomplish it. To compare anything to Titanic is a tall order. Its $600 million take nearly tripled the gross of Cameron's own previous best effort. I don't think any of the criticism of Transformers 2 or The Dark Knight were that they failed to take down the box office champion, and if there are criticisms of Avatar, I don't think they'll be that it should have been a shoe-in for the top 5 of all time...
Jim Van Nest: I don't know that people will use box office as a measuring stick for how successful of a follow up it is. It will all come down to whether or not the film is any good. If it's a good film, the box office will follow. If Avatar cracks $250 million I don't think anyone could argue that it was a financial success. But, with the quality bar set so high, it may be damn near impossible for it to end up being a critical success.
Sean Collier: It could make $275 million, and mainstream news would still report that it was no Titanic. The box office will not measure up to Cameron's previous success - the determinant of Avatar's legacy will be how well received it is and how much audiences enjoy it.
Kim Hollis: I agree that it's very unfair to be comparing it to Titanic, even if I'm the person who framed the question. That was truly a lightning in a bottle situation, one that is probably never going to be replicated. Avatar is going to do well. I actually think our first question needs to be whether Avatar does well enough to make its budget back. The responses I'm seeing from the "man on the street" are concerning to me to say the least.
George Rose: It needs no less than $400 million to be a truly successful follow up, which would allow it to beat Transformers 2 and become the top grossing movie of the year. If it can't be biggest movie ever, like Titanic, it better at least be the biggest of the year. People were disappointed with King Kong's $218 million back in 2005, especially considering the high quality of the director, effects and overall spectacle. By comparison, anything less than $250 million for Avatar should be seen as a travesty (don't forget the higher ticket price for seeing it in IMAX, too), even if it ends up being the biggest movie of the winter. Let's be honest, a $250 million follow-up to a 10 year-old $600 million film is hardly a step up. Hell, Alvin and the Chipmunks 2 will probably make that much.
Reagen Sulewski: If it ends up as the #1 film of 2009, it'll be hard to criticize it in any respect. I don't think anyone who claims that Titanic is the benchmark for its success or failure should be taken seriously. But more realistically and practically, if a tentpole film makes $250 million domestically, it's hard to view that as anything but a success.
Michael Lynderey: I don't think anyone is seriously thinking that Avatar is going to play out like a Titanic copycat. But a strong opening - $80 million weekend, or so - and then a long, leggy total of something like $300 million seems like the best scenario here. If anyone's disappointed by that, they're just being picky. Avatar's not a love story, it's not based on anything, and it's a sci-fi movie in a month not particularly known for its space affinity.
David Mumpower: What Reagen says is accurate. Even a dozen years later, there is still enough hatred (well, resentment disguised as hatred) of James Cameron to have people eagerly anticipating the moment they can start slamming Avatar as a failure. Amusingly, the same thing happened with Titanic, which had some of the worst buzz of any film in the 1990s. After it was delayed from summer to December, several entertainment publications berated Cameron for making an inferior clone of Waterworld. No one mentions that now for...various reasons. The point is that even this close to the release of the film, there is still too llittle known to have a good read on the downside of Avatar. To a certain segment of the population, maybe even most of the people who care, anything less than $200 million is going to be considered a failure, which is what got King Kong and Armageddon into so much trouble. Any time a film is *expected* to be in the top 100 releases ever, there are unreasonable expectations. I agree with Reagen in that if this film makes $250 million domestically, something only 53 releases in the history of cinema have managed, it's a blockbuster as well as a successful project. Unlike most of the people responding here, I believe Avatar will accomplish that feat.