Daily Box Office Analysis
By David Mumpower
June 26, 2009
Another day, another $28.6 million. That's the story for Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen as it follows the second biggest box office day ever with the 66th biggest day ever. While the film did fall short of making $100 million in two days as I had predicted and won't be tying The Dark Knight's record, this still is an extraordinary feat. The two day tally of $89.2 million would be the 16th biggest opening weekend ever without even factoring in today, the third day of box office.
Of course, the weekend tally for Transformers 2 will be a bit misleading since it's already had almost $90 million worth of demand met before we even get to the weekend. For perspective, simply consider that Spider-Man 2, the Wednesday opener with the largest five day take, was almost exactly $25 million below this total after its first two days with $64,255,524. That film's weekend take of $88,156,227 reflects that it earned a factor of 1.416 more during the Friday-Sunday period than it had during its Wednesday/Thursday debut. This number is inflated a bit by the fact that July 4th occurred on its fifth day, a Sunday, which is a box office positive, unlike if the holiday occurs on Saturday, a phenomenon we'll experience next weekend. Simply put, the first two days of Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, and weekdays at that, are enough to make it the biggest opening of 2009 to date. It beats Star Trek's first Friday-Sunday period by a full $10 million.
While Transformers 2 is unlikely to reach 1.4 weekend multiplier against its two-day take of $89.2 million, the Spider-Man 2 model would bring a weekend total of $126.3 million and a five-day take of $215.5 million. It's much more likely that we're looking at a Friday-to-Sunday performance of $190 million or so. My calculations show a Friday in the range of $35.2 million, a 30% gain from Thursday, $37 million on Saturday, 5% growth from Friday, and $27.8 million on Sunday, a 25% decline from Saturday. That would be a weekend total of right at $100 million plus the $89 million it already has in the till from domestic receipts. $190 million in five days would absolutely torch Spider-Man 2's $152.4 million and would be a more than respectable run at The Dark Knight's first five days of $203,773,518 to boot.
All of this presumes, of course, that word-of-mouth doesn't wipe out Revenge of the Fallen quicker than normal for action films, a scenario I cannot fully dismiss. Having said that, I am of the opinion that my calculations are, if anything, conservative based on the behavior of the film to date. A drop from $60.6 million on Wednesday to $28.6 million on Thursday seems like a disappointing decline of 53% on the surface. Once we take out the $16 million worth of sneaks, however, Thursday's drop is more accurately described as a much more respectable 36%. That is not a big enough decline to have any concerns about fading demand yet. And I'm not even including the international gates when I say that. By all accounts, Transformers 2 is a juggernaut worldwide with $80 million abroad. While it opened earlier in some locations than it did in North America, we're still talking about $170 million in what amounts to two days in theaters worldwide. Boom goes the dynamite.
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