Bruno coming in at $30.4 means the mysteriously named “BR” came in closest with a call of $29.3m. Only one other commenter was under my prediction of $33.1m, a fellow named Athar. So what happened? After a massive $14m Friday night Bruno fell quickly. Was it word of mouth? Too sexual? Let’s break it down.
#1 movie predicted correctly: 1 Week In A Row
1. Bruno
My take is that while Borat was silly, Bruno was overtly sexual. Which had to have hurt it. Most of the commenter predictions were in the $30s and $40s, heck there was even a call for $50m on the board. So we can definitely say it didn’t live up to box-office expectations. However, the studio has still got to be pretty happy as you can make a film like Bruno very cheaply, spending most of the dollars on marketing. It has a decent shot at $100m domestically, provided word of mouth isn’t the problem. But I’m slightly dubious. I think $80m is a more realistic call.
Result: 30.4 million (My rank: #1, $2.7m off)
Of all the Ice Age films, this one fell the least. Has to be due to competition, right? Fox has already topped $300m worldwide cume here, so this is certainly a big win for them.
Result: 28.5 million (My rank: #2, $5.6m off)
No, it didn’t tank this weekend, falling a respectable 42.8 percent. But nothing really fell this weekend, as competition was light, and only one film fell more than Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. Wanna take a guess?
Result: 24.2 million (My rank: #3, $2.2m off)
Yep, Public Enemies. It was probably too slowly paced to garner much crossover appeal. At a budget of $100m Public Enemies is looking slightly doomed financially.
Result: 14.1 million (My rank: #4, $1.6m off)
5. The Proposal
“Raichu” nailed this number. Good on him. Sidenote: Does anyone see a reason Universal is sandbagging on Bruno at all? That Friday night was so big, $16m on Sat/Sun seems really light.
Result: 10.5 million (My rank: #5, $0.7m off)
6. The Hangover
It was the worst weekend in a month, and the third worst weekend of the summer, but it still wasn’t as dire as I predicted. The top 12 made nearly $136m.
Result: 9.9 million (My rank: #6, $1.9m off)
We basically knew it would get crushed… and it did. I read a bit of the Hayden P. dust-up, so I’ll throw my two cents in. I don’t think she’s overtly sexual, I think she just chooses bad roles for herself. Which means she won’t be around in a decade if the trend continues.
Result: 5.0 million (My rank: #7, $0.3m off)
8. Up
Up vs. Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs at the box office. Who you got? Ice Age is ahead worldwide ($312m to $309m) and has done a ton of work internationally. Will Up end up coming from behind?
Result: 4.6 million (My rank: #8, $1.6m off)
Even My Sister’s Keeper only dropped 27 percent. See, Hollywood? If you give people nothing new to choose from everything will make a little cash.
Result: 4.1 million (My rank: #9, $1.2m off)
Another $100m budgeted film that seems to be in trouble. Probably too late to save it, eh?
Result: 1.6 million (My rank: #10, $0.7m off)
Allright, get your Wednesday-Friday Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince predictions in. We’ll break it down on Wednesday morning, right here, in living color.
