Alert commenters Rosa, Raichu, and Gophers Attack! had it right, Night at the Museum II was victorious. Let’s get into it and see where The Oracle went wrong…
#1 movie predicted correctly: 0 Weeks In A Row
I was actually fine on the cash projection here, it did better than the first one by about 63% (per theater). Well done. Will it have the legs of the first title? No chance.
Result: 53.5 million (My rank: #2, $.5m off)
I was chided for being low, but as it turns out bad reviews or lack of interest simply murdered this one. The budget is listed at $200m too, so if poor word of mouth kicks in they are going to lose a boatload of cash… unless the international market really delivers.
Result: 43.0 million (My rank: #1, $18.8m off)
3. Star Trek
Commenter Chris_sc77 and I split the difference here. He said it would make closer to $17m, while I went with damn near $27m. Of course the answer was somewhere in the middle. Star Trek currently stands at $260m, so yeah, it’s the biggest Winona Ryder film EVER.
Result: 21.9 million (My rank: #3, $4.8m off)
See? It was better than Da Vinci Code. You can tell because it only fell 53.7% while the first one dipped 55.8%.
Result: 21.4 million (My rank: #4, $1m off)
5. Dance Flick
I overrated it a bit. It won’t happen again, I’ve got it getting crushed next weekend.
Result: 11.1 million (My rank: #5, $2.7m off)
If only I’d called Night at the Museum II winning. Curses. I got sucked in by internet hype. I suppose that’s the downside of being on the ‘net 50 hours a week.
Result: 7.8 million (My rank: #6, $0.1m off)
Seriously, you’ve got to like my calls on the bottom feeders. The only prediction I saw on next weekend’s films was Up at $65m and Drag Me to Hell at $15m. Hmmm, that second number looks off to me. Horror fans will boost DMtH to at least $25m.
Result: 3.7 million (My rank: #7, $0.3m off)
8. Obsessed
I hope Beyonce Knowles got back-end on this deal.
Wow. I just left about a dozen punchlines on the table after that set-up.
Result: 2.0 million (My rank: #8, $1.1m off)
It was the best weekend of the year, the top twelve made $168m. The problem was I had it near $200m.
Result: 1.3 million (My rank: #10, $.8m off)
10. 17 Again
A lot of the smaller films really suffered this weekend. Perhaps good weather hurt the box-office?
Result: 1.0 million (My rank: #9, $1.5m off)
For next week, you’ve got to think Up will take it. Wall-E opened at $63m, that sounds about right for Up. It may do even more given it seems more family friendly. I’ll stick with $25m on Drag Me to Hell. Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian will slip to around $30m. Terminator Salvation will be lucky to hit $20m. What do you think? Help me commenters, help me get this losing weekend out of my heart.