The 12 Days of Box Office - Day 10

By David Mumpower

December 31, 2015

We'll just call her Lady Luke.

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Welcome to the final day of 2015! As we prepare to enter a new year full of hope, promise, and the overwhelming fear of 10 months of political advertising, 2015 ends the same way it started. American Sniper’s stunning box office success shattered not only long-standing records but also perceptions about how well a movie could perform in January. Star Wars: The Force Awakens has achieved the same feat in late December.

The latest Star Wars release and the first ever without George Lucas continued its historic pace on Wednesday. Another $28.1 million yesterday brings its running total to $629 million. That total is important for two reasons. The first is that Star Wars 7 has passed The Avengers to become the fourth most popular domestic performer ever.

The Force Awakens is only $23.2 million behind Jurassic World, also. When it passes that total, it’ll become the most popular film released in 2015 as well as the most successful non-James Cameron film of all-time. $6.6 million after that, it’ll surpass Titanic, a film that enjoyed a re-release that boosted its box office total from $591.8 million to $658.7 million. In the process, it’ll celebrate the new status of being the second largest domestic box office film ever behind only Avatar. Both of those things will happen by close of business tomorrow.

The other reason why the total is important is that The Force Awakens is now the most popular Disney movie ever, a stunning feat for the first Star Wars movie ever released under the Disney umbrella. There’s nowhere to go but down for Rian Johnson’s Star Wars 8. The global take for the film is almost as impressive. It’s already at almost $1.3 billion worldwide, an amount that surpasses Frozen as the eighth best total ever. It’ll jump Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part Two, Avengers: Age of Ultron, Furious 7, and The Avengers by the end of the week to become the fourth best global performer ever.

So, that’s all pretty good.




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There’s obviously no bad news about Star Wars right now, at least not unless you put any stock into the rantings of a bitter, deluded person like George Lucas. The $28.1 million Wednesday earnings represent a five percent decline from Tuesday’s $29.5 million. Bringing Avatar back into the conversation for a moment, that film shared the same holiday calendar configuration as The Force Awakens. On its second Thursday, it gained one percent from $18.3 million to $18.5 million. Given the $11 million disparity in numbers, the Star Wars hold is every bit as impressive since it’s on a larger scale.

Avatar went on to drop 20 percent on New Year’s Eve, the anti-holiday. A similar performance for Star Wars 7 would mean a $22.5 million day. I think that’s a bit ambitious. On top of everything else the film faces on New Year’s Eve, the NCAA semi-finals also start this afternoon, which will bleed a bit of the target audience. Then again, I’ve underestimated The Force Awakens every step of the way, so I’m not the best person to trust on the subject right now.

Most of the top 10 dropped in similar fashion to Star Wars yesterday. Only one film gained any, and that one cheated a bit. Hateful Eight, the latest Quentin Tarantino bloodbath, expanded wide on December 30th. It earned just under a million in 100 theaters on Tuesday then grossed $3.5 million upon platforming into 1,958 locations. That’s a (single day) per-location average of $1,804, the third highest in the top ten behind Star Wars and Daddy’s Home.

For a $44 million production, I would describe that as tolerable but not wonderful. Having said that, there’s a chance it explodes tomorrow if people are waiting until the weekend. That’s not ordinarily how the holiday weekend works, but the release pattern of Hateful Eight is almost historically unprecedented. So, the opening weekend tally depends on whether you tend toward standard box office behavior or Tarantino fanaticism with your expectations. Anything in excess of $15 million switches this one squarely into the winner’s category.

Have a wonderful New Year’s holiday and please use designated drivers, taxis, or Uber if you plan to imbibe.


     


 
 

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