Friday Box Office Analysis
By Tim Briody
February 25, 2012
BoxOfficeProphets.com
The war/action movie starring real Navy SEALs is tops on Friday with $9 million. Act of Valor is unique among recent war-on-terrorism movies. Something BOP has stated on a regular basis is that movies are a form of escapism, a way to forget about what's actually going on out there for a while. We don't buy our movie tickets to watch a war that's actually happening be recreated on a soundstage and that's why many films about recent conflicts have suffered at the box office. But with Act of Valor using non-actors and the popularity of SEAL Team Six after the capture and death of Osama bin Laden, things are a little different. Reviewers were generally unkind but audiences are eating it up, and as Kim Hollis and David Mumpower hinted yesterday, it's likely playing well in red states.
The Academy Awards are Sunday and those are always a factor in weekend box office to a varying degree. I think the weekend's top two openers will not be affected by the Oscars too much, so Act of Valor has a clear path to a solid and extremely profitable weekend.
Good Deeds
[tm:5181_]Tyler Perry's Good Deeds[/tm] (starring Tyler Perry) is not only among the shortest titles in Perry's oeuvre but it's also among his lowest opening day box office takes, earning $5.4 million on Friday. This is only ahead of 2007's Daddy's Little Girls, which inexplicably opened on a Wednesday with $4.5 million. His lowest Friday proper is 2008's The Family That Preys, which opened to $6.2 million. Either Perry's schtick is starting to wear thin or people only like Perry in a starring role when he's dressed as Madea. His films follow pretty standard patterns over opening weekends and any Oscar effect will be minimal. Good Deeds should have a weekend of $14.9 million.
[tm:5249_]Wanderlust[/tm]
The [bp:4264_]Paul Rudd[/bp]/[bp:1156_]Jennifer Aniston[/bp] comedy Wanderlust flops with $2.2 million, disappointing given the pedigree involved and the popularity of Aniston. The studio probably smelled a bomb and put it in just 2,000 theaters, where it will vanish quickly. Let's call it $6.1 million.
Gone
Amanda Seyfried's Gone is in ninth place with $1.7 million. It'll have a weekend of $4.7 million. And just like that it was...well, you know.