Monday Morning Quarterback Part I
By BOP Staff
July 23, 2013
BoxOfficeProphets.com
Matthew Huntley: There are a few factors for why I believe The Conjuring succeeded (and over-performed) this weekend: 1) It's a genre picture, particularly a horror movie, and horror movies tend to be more front-loaded than others (for some reason, they seem to carry more urgency than and fans like to rush out and see them opening weekend); 2) The reviews are very strong; in fact, at 85% positive, they are some of the best of the year; 3) The reviews are very strong...for a horror movie! This genre tends to get beaten up by critics, but apparently The Conjuring merits praise instead of abuse, and I can't help but think this caught people's eyes, especially those who don't typically give the genre a chance, thus adding to the audience numbers and intrigue; 4) The cast has a good reputation. I'm a fan of Vera Farmiga, who tends to choose interesting, thoughtful projects; and many may remember Patrick Wilson from Insidious, another horror movie that beat expectations on a small budget.
Essentially, everything was working in this movie's favor, including the weak competition, and the numbers are evidence to that.
Jay Barney: It would not have been surprising for The Conjuring to have won the weekend, but it is shocking for it to have done so well. An opening north of $40 million, on a weekend where there was so much competition at the box office, is pretty amazing. I think a lot of it had to do with the marketing and trailer, which did attract some buzz.
While this opening is larger than The Purge, I’d still say the Purge will be the more successful movie. The opening for that one was $36 million, while the budget was a scant $3 million. The Conjuring is a breakout success, though, giving us our second major horror flick to impress this summer. If I recall last year, the only major horror film even attempted during the summer was Chernobyl Diaries and that did not do so well. What The Purge and the Conjuring have accomplished is very impressive.
Felix Quinonez: I think there will always be an audience for horror movies, people just like to be scared. And when you add the fact that The Conjuring had some genuinely scary trailers and great reviews, things lined up just right for this to break out. I will say that I am surprised, not with the fact that it did well, but with the fact that it put up such high numbers. But I think that could be do to the fact that the last few weeks have been dominated by family movies, maybe audiences were ready for some R-rated scares.
Max Braden: It's remarkable that in just a few days this movie will have earned more than Patrick Wilson's other most recent horror film, Insidious, earned in its entire run two years ago. (And Insidious 2 is expected to be released in just a couple months from now). I don't think there's a lot different between the two horror films conceptually, but I think the tone is the key: The Conjuring looks like the type of horror that makes audiences laugh about how scared they were after they've heard themselves screaming. That's the basis for the appeal of going to "haunted" houses at Halloween - it's fun to be scared. The key seller here had to be the clapping hands in the trailer. What kind of non-spoof horror movie does that and still manages to take itself seriously? So where in Insidious you're supposed to care about the characters and the plot, and maybe who the cast is, I think in The Conjuring it's all about the challenge: "okay, let's see how well you can scare me." When you get that right, you get the money.
David Mumpower: For months now, friends of mine who are not generally fans of the horror genre have been raving about the trailer for The Conjuring. During this time frame, I started to contemplate something. If a lot of low budget titles such as this open well anyway, what is the bump for the rare horror movie that looks especially good? It is similar to the aforementioned The Purge in this regard, albeit with the caveat that The Purge is not a true horror movie per se. What we learned this weekend is that there is a respectable box office boost when a horror title appeals to people outside the normal viewing demographic. Now, that is not an Earth-shattering revelation by any stretch but it should entice studios into finding better concepts in addition to the slasher garbage that drives horror genre box office revenue.
I also believe we should laud James Wan for once again delivering a quality product against a frugal budget outlay. Insidious earned $100 million globally against a production budget of $1.5 million. With The Conjuring, he was given a much larger budget of $20 million, which is still dirt cheap. The opening weekend box office scaled along with the budget; ergo, Wan has already recovered production costs after a weekend in theaters. Suffice to say that he deserves a raise and is positioned to be the next Wes Craven/Sam Raimi if he continues to deliver like this.
Kim Hollis: Turbo, a DreamWorks Animation film distributed by Fox, earned $21.3 million from Friday-to-Sunday and $31 million since its debut on Wednesday. What do you think of this result?
Matthew Huntley: Although this figure is below expectations, I'm not terribly surprised by it. The concept and trailer for Turbo didn't make it seem like anything special, and with trusted franchises like Monsters University and Despicable Me 2 occupying the family demographic, there just wasn't room for the little snail that could. Everything about this movie appeared vanilla, and gave off a sort of "been there, done that" impression, and with what's likely a very predictable story line, parents probably chose other ways to keep their kids cool and busy this past weekend.
Jay Barney: Turbo coming in at $30 million for the first five days of release is just fine. It will have a weekend to work with before it slows down because of Smurfs 2, but I’d expect its drop isn’t going to be too big. Monsters University is entering the final stages of its run, and while Despicable Me 2 is still the reigning champ for families with children, that picture is pretty much beating up on every other film right now. Turbo will have to rely on foreign receipts to make any money, but that was probably part of the plan all along.
Felix Quinonez: I think given the budget it's definitely disappointing but I am not surprised. I think a big problem with this was just its release date. Between Monsters University and Despicable Me 2, the last four weekends saw an animated movie at the top and Despicable Me 2 is still killing it at the box office, so maybe just waiting even a month wouldn't have been such a bad idea. Aside from that, Turbo never really seemed like a real summer contender. It looked like a lower level animated movie that should have been released during the off season, not in the midst of blockbuster season.
Tim Briody: It's fine, if still in the shadow of Despicable Me 2. It's going to be one of those movies that a few years from now we'll have forgotten about and go "it made WHAT?"
Max Braden: I think that's a terrible showing. In another era this should have been a $60 million opening. It's basically a mashup of Cars and A Bug's Life, which were both very successful. I suppose there's the animation glut factor at the moment, but it still surprises me. I refuse to believe this is any curse of Ryan Reynolds.
Okay, fine, I like cars and racing and I think the idea of a really fast snail is ridiculously funny and I'm annoyed that other people didn't like what I like. Hrumph.
David Mumpower; More than anything, what we learned with Turbo this weekend is that DreamWorks Animation is not invulnerable to flops like Flushed Away and Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas. Even after all the box office blockbusters they have experienced over the past decade, a bad concept is still an impossible marketing task. In hindsight, we also owe Rise of the Guardians an apology. The holiday title is going to look like Star Wars compared to Turbo's domestic total. Turbo is already out of the top three at the box office, meaning that on top of everything else, it's front-loaded.
Max actually touches upon the core flaw with the movie. It IS a mashup of Cars and A Bug's Life. That is the problem with it. Vaunted animation director Henry Selick made headlines yesterday when he lamented the lack of imagination in today's mega-budget animated movies. All of them are intended to be blockbusters so they are tested for mass appeal. Obviously, the director of smaller fare such as James and the Giant Peach and Coraline would be frustrated by such populist productions. In order to reach the lowest common denominator, a movie must target them and the perception in the industry, right or wrong, is that rehashed ideas are the safest play.
Also, there is a bit of DreamWorks Animation jealousy over the sheer volume of toy sales the Cars franchise has garnered for Disney/Pixar. I understand the attempt to create their own merchandising juggernaut, something the animation house has lacked since they ran Shrek into the ground. How to Train Your Dragon may yet evolve into that type of lucrative rainmaker, but Madagascar never did. Turbo seemed like a safe bet because it follows the same path as previously popular family films. And that is exactly the problem. The story lacks any originality whatsoever, relegating it into the derivative heap of cash grab animated movies. Audiences have developed a solid ability to sniff those out and ignore them.
Furthermore, I believe this is another example of the dreaded movie modeling system en vogue in Hollywood right now. These numbers look great on computer if there is no thought put into them. In fact, the practice is eerily similar to the "Similar Films" charts BOP posted with movie write-ups in our early days. Just because there are surface similarities between projects does not mean both will do well. Computer models fail to grasp this obvious fact as easily as human minds do. What happens is that decision makers defend choices by hiding behind their algorithms. That style of leadership blew up on DreamWorks Animation with Turbo, a project that never passed the laugh test...even when it was in theaters and people were theoretically encouraged to laugh with/at it.