Friday Box Office Analysis
By Tim Briody
February 14, 2015
BoxOfficeProphets.com
Fifty Shades of Grey
The erotic thriller based on the wildly successful novel starts with $30.2 million on Friday, with $8.6 million of that coming from Thursday night showings. That’s the second best opening day of the year so far, falling just short of American Sniper’s $30.3 million first day of wide release last month.
With that opening, it appears we can dial back expectations that Fifty Shades of Grey will break the $83.8 million February opening weekend record of The Passion of the Christ, set in 2004. But there is a tremendous wild card at play: Valentine’s Day. Romantic films always see a bump on this day, regardless of the day of the week it is, and Fifty Shades of Grey might be a huge beneficiary of Saturday being the 14th. For reference, the appropriately named Valentine’s Day saw its best day of box office come on the 14th, which happened to be a Sunday, sending it to a $56.2 million weekend back in 2010. Meanwhile, 2012’s five-hanky weeper The Vow, released when Valentine’s Day fell on a Tuesday, spiked from $3.3 million on its first Monday to a massive $11.5 million on Valentine’s Day proper. So yeah, it’s a good box office day.
The other strange aspect to this weekend is that it’s a holiday weekend, though the President’s Day box office effect tends to be minimal compared to other holidays, it’s something to keep an eye on. I expect Fifty Shades of Grey to have a strong Saturday (it will easily crush the $23.3 million earned by Valentine’s Day to take the February 14th record) that duplicates Friday’s take, which places it at $79.4 million for the weekend and a four day total of about $90 million.
Kingsman: The Secret Service
The comic property adaptation comes in with a pretty strong $10.4 million on Friday, buoyed by being a well-received alternative to Fifty Shades of Grey. The action comedy starring [bp:762_]Colin Firth[/bp] and [bp:17_]Samuel L. Jackson[/bp] has its eyes on becoming a franchise, and a weekend of $29 million with a four day total of $35 million means those plans might come to fruition.
The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water
Last weekend’s champion, the SpongeBob movie sequel falls 56% from last Friday to $6.5 million, which is a bit higher than expected. This is definitely a film that benefits from the long weekend, so it will end up racing Kingsman for second place on the weekend. Last weekend it turned a strong Saturday into a 3.71 weekend multiplier and $55.3 million weekend, and this weekend it looks to earn $25.7 million for the weekend and about $31 million over four days.