Box-Office Oracle: ‘Hunger Games’ Looks to Repeat over ‘Wrath of the Titans’ and ‘Mirror Mirror’
By
Laremy Legel
It’s looking like repeat city at the top of the charts. The weekend was shaping up as a legitimate competition … right up until they started showing Wrath of the Titans to people. Regardless, let’s break this thing down!
Laremy predicted the #1 movie correctly 4 Weeks In A Row
Technically, it should be front-loaded with an over-reliance on the teen dollar, but I don’t see that here. If anything it’s somehow transcended the “young adult adaptation” curse, sneaking instead into the “pop culture phenomenon” trend line. So a 50 percent bleed here looks reasonable.
A look at the overall numbers shows $232 million worldwide on a $78 million production budget, very efficiently done. The one warning flag is the international dollar, right now they are achieving an odd 3:1 domestic/international multiplier, a far cry from Twilight‘s international reach. Could Hunger Games be a uniquely American phenomenon? If the film ended up at $400 million / $150 million, would that signal overseas audiences not digging it? Kick-Ass managed to pull a 1:1 ratio, but Hanna never got there.
Clearly, the franchise and film are on solid ground given the massive domestic haul, but the international box office will determine home run vs. grand slam status.
The 2010 version opened at $61 million in early April, so what gives here? What gives is that the film is a mess, and it’s going to lose steam as the weekend progresses. Audiences might end up giving it a decent enough Cinemascore … but I can’t see that translating to actual recommendations a la “You’ve gotta see Wrath of the Titans!”
The radio spots are mercilessly bad, and it’s rated PG (which means adios to teen dollars). Still, I think they can convince three million people to see Julia Roberts this weekend.
$90 million worldwide on a production budget that’s only half of that, this one put up a nice holdover number last weekend. It’s solid counter-programming against the top titles again this week as well.
The exit velocity of John Carter is accelerating. Disney has already hit the panic button, but they may want to hit it a few more times just to make sure.
The last three titles won’t make much. The budget here is listed at $6 million, which means it’s under-performing, given it hasn’t made $5 million yet.
