Ghostbusters lands with $46.5 million....

[JediMindTrick]

Netted? No. Remember, studios collect a smaller percentage from overseas. I wouldn't be surprised if Apocalypse has yet to break even.



Tarzan's still No. 3 at the box office, and it's been out for 2.4 weeks. It's grossed 195 million (production budget: 180M, plus marketing), so it's not done. Ghostbusters got a far more gargantuan promotional push and yet it couldn't knock Pets out of first. It faces an uphill battle.

The double budget rule of thumb for profitability accounts for lesser profits overseas which means Apocalypse most likely is well into the profitable range right now. Obviously this is not an exact thing as marketing costs vary from film to film but in general its close. Still disappointing overall but not a flop.

Tarzan meanwhile flopped overseas. Whereas most movies tend to make more internationally now than domestically Tarzan has made more domestically. Part of that certainly has to do with its not going to play in China which has become the 2nd biggest worldwide market for movies (China only allows a limited number of foreign movies per year and Tarzan didn't make the cut). Yes its only in its 3rd week out but you can project its final box office take based on typical movie patterns so it will top out domestically around 120 million especially as it gets forced out of theaters by big name arrivals in the next few weeks like Star Trek and Suicide Squad. Internationally its pretty much done and will likely top around 100 million. It had a 180 million budget so it needed to come in around 360 million total to break even. Its going to come up well over 100 million short.

[Charlie Rock]

I think we need a new rule of thumb for "double budget". It seems production costs have skyrocketed on some movies. But advertising is keeping pace with a slower inflation. not to mention promotion for a $50mm movie is relatively the same as for a $150mm movie. ($150mm used to be the excessive amount but now seems about "average").

[Calighoula]

I doubt they spent $180 million promoting Tarzan. But no, it likely won't profit, either.

OTOH, they spent a lot on Ghostbusters.

[regnak]

The double budget rule of thumb for profitability accounts for lesser profits overseas which means Apocalypse most likely is well into the profitable range right now. Obviously this is not an exact thing as marketing costs vary from film to film but in general its close. Still disappointing overall but not a flop.

Tarzan meanwhile flopped overseas. Whereas most movies tend to make more internationally now than domestically Tarzan has made more domestically. Part of that certainly has to do with its not going to play in China which has become the 2nd biggest worldwide market for movies (China only allows a limited number of foreign movies per year and Tarzan didn't make the cut). Yes its only in its 3rd week out but you can project its final box office take based on typical movie patterns so it will top out domestically around 120 million especially as it gets forced out of theaters by big name arrivals in the next few weeks like Star Trek and Suicide Squad. Internationally its pretty much done and will likely top around 100 million. It had a 180 million budget so it needed to come in around 360 million total to break even. Its going to come up well over 100 million short.

It is too early to say for Tarzan. WB is releasing it very strangely see here:


http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/...tarzan2016.htm

it has yet to be released in a lot of places like all of South America. And about half the places it has released were a week after the US.

[Charlie Rock]

I doubt they spent $180 million promoting Tarzan. But no, it likely won't profit, either.

OTOH, they spent a lot on Ghostbusters.

Yeah, but I think if we were to overlay two graphs with the production and promotion budgets, one (production) would be a more drastic angle. Assuming all points represent averages. So while double-production might be a good rule of thumb closer to the lower end of the graph it would have to be modified to a >2:1 ratio at the other.

[JediMindTrick]

I doubt they spent $180 million promoting Tarzan. But no, it likely won't profit, either.

OTOH, they spent a lot on Ghostbusters.

Its not just marketing. People tend to forget that movie theaters get a cut of the profit. The amount varies depending what week of release the movie is in but it usually comes out to about 30%. So a movie that grosses 100 million domestically is only going to bring back 70 million of that to the movie company. A movie like Titanic that only does moderate business each weekend but keeps doing it for months on end brings even less percentage wise: Titanic's highest weekend was its 4th and its 9th weekend nearly beat its opening weekend.

[Charlie Rock]

Its not just marketing. People tend to forget that movie theaters get a cut of the profit. The amount varies depending what week of release the movie is in but it usually comes out to about 30%. So a movie that grosses 100 million domestically is only going to bring back 70 million of that to the movie company. A movie like Titanic that only does moderate business each weekend but keeps doing it for months on end brings even less percentage wise: Titanic's highest weekend was its 4th and its 9th weekend nearly beat its opening weekend.

I think it's something like studio gets 90% on first week, and every week after that it goes down. S'why popcorn is so expensive, theatres actually aren't making much anything on the tickets. Overseas it is harder for studios to drive that kind of bargain then here stateside so the % favors theatres a bit more (I think rule of thumb was 50%).
http://www.rogerebert.com/letters/ho...ice-is-divided
just fyi link
http://www.themovieblog.com/2007/eco...ts-us-so-much/

Do you see what happens? Look over #3 again. Ultimately, the studios don’t have to learn from their mistakes, theaters don’t have to manage themselves smarter… because as costs and losses and expenditure add up… they just keep passing off the bill to us. We pay for their mismanagement and spiraling costs. Why should they change anything or fix anything when they know that we’ll just get a cash advance in order to pay more to make up for their mistakes.

from 2nd link

[Calighoula]

Its not just marketing. People tend to forget that movie theaters get a cut of the profit. The amount varies depending what week of release the movie is in but it usually comes out to about 30%. So a movie that grosses 100 million domestically is only going to bring back 70 million of that to the movie company. A movie like Titanic that only does moderate business each weekend but keeps doing it for months on end brings even less percentage wise: Titanic's highest weekend was its 4th and its 9th weekend nearly beat its opening weekend.

Hardly. But theaters also don't make as much off the top as people prefer to think, hence the exorbitant concession prices. https://www.yahoo.com/movies/just-ho...128526582.html That's where theaters really make their money. Theaters get a bigger take if movies run longer (think of how long The Force Awakens and The Dark Knight were in theaters). Studios make more off the front end. "Front-loaded" doesn't just pertain to OW grosses.

[trooper_thorn]

I doubt they spent $180 million promoting Tarzan. But no, it likely won't profit, either.

OTOH, they spent a lot on Ghostbusters.

Last I saw the likely marketing budget was about $130M.

[FluffyCyclopsRLZ]

Hardly a bomb, but those aren't particularly encouraging numbers for any 150M-budgeted flick. It's probably going to end up in that unsatisfactory "it didn't make much of a loss/profit, here's hoping folks are stocked for a sequel" category.

[SUPERECWFAN1]

Hardly a bomb, but those aren't particularly encouraging numbers for any 150M-budgeted flick. It's probably going to end up in that unsatisfactory "it didn't make much of a loss/profit, here's hoping folks are stocked for a sequel" category.

Right now the film has opened in a bunch of territories this week and worldwide the film has done : $64+ million thus far. Unless it explodes further outside this country , it won;t do well at all.

[Charlie Rock]

Right now the film has opened in a bunch of territories this week and worldwide the film has done : $64+ million thus far. Unless it explodes further outside this country , it won;t do well at all.

I know you can look this stuff up, but it was actually #1 last weekend in most of the territories it played in. At least the ones that are reporting in now. Heck, we're still waiting on foreign markets to report for Pets and it's a week ahead of GB. But so far for Pets it's opening weekend was like 25% of it's foreign total.

Just saying, you're basing an awful lot of speculation on one weekend's performance. Even if that was all it makes overseas it'll be over $200mm worldwide by the end of it's run.

[FluffyCyclopsRLZ]

Right now the film has opened in a bunch of territories this week and worldwide the film has done : $64+ million thus far. Unless it explodes further outside this country , it won;t do well at all.

Yeah, I know. Given how comedies don't make that much overseas, it's not looking too good. There's just no way in hell Sony is deliriously happy with those numbers. It's just that I'm expecting it to do much better on home entertainment and recoup some of the losses from the theatrical run. I can't help but think the ugly, ugly debate over this movie turned into such a freakshow that the average moviegoer thought "Yeaaahhhh, no. Do not want anything to do with this until these clowns calm the heck down."

That being said, I will concede that the opening weekend figure was kinda... catastrophic relatively to its PG-13 rating and the brand's once popularity. Imagine a Back to the Future/Beverly Hills Cop reboot starring some hot shot comedian opening with that same figure, lol. The thing would instantly be branded a flop.

[SUPERECWFAN1]

I know you can look this stuff up, but it was actually #1 last weekend in most of the territories it played in. At least the ones that are reporting in now. Heck, we're still waiting on foreign markets to report for Pets and it's a week ahead of GB. But so far for Pets it's opening weekend was like 25% of it's foreign total.

Just saying, you're basing an awful lot of speculation on one weekend's performance. Even if that was all it makes overseas it'll be over $200mm worldwide by the end of it's run.

It opened in a number of markets . Coming in at #1 in markets where the revenue isn't high like say New Zealand which was $467,304 isn't good at all. They really need major markets to take this film. Someone has said the UK reception to the film wasn't as good either. With China off the table , unless Japan does SUPER HUGE for the film...its DOA.

Yeah, I know. Given how comedies don't make that much overseas, it's not looking too good. There's just no way in hell Sony is deliriously happy with those numbers. It's just that I'm expecting it to do much better on home entertainment and recoup some of the losses from the theatrical run. I can't help but think the ugly, ugly debate over this movie turned into such a freakshow that the average moviegoer thought "Yeaaahhhh, no. Do not want anything to do with this until these clowns calm the heck down."

That being said, I will concede that the opening weekend figure was kinda... catastrophic relatively to its PG-13 rating and the brand's once popularity. Imagine a Back to the Future/Beverly Hills Cop reboot starring some hot shot comedian opening with that same figure, lol. The thing would instantly be branded a flop.

I think it comes down to respecting the past and giving the future a nice deal. Disney saw that the films will be powered by the new characters of Poe , Finn and Rey. They came into it knowing they also had to respect the past. Disney didn't race out and suddenly approve a film. They went about getting the right script and the right director. They fired Trank from Episode VIII because they saw the warning signs ahead of time.

That is the difference here between both companies. There was no "love" of the property from Sony. It was , we need a movie of this made and we will push the original guys behind it to the side. Sony has ran its movie company into the shitter the past decade with horrible ideas. Like pushing Sam Rami off Spider-Man. Then this deal as we learned. They alienated the core audience from the start with not realizing the script was terrible.

Home video wise , Sony shot itself in the foot there. They have packaged a lot of the home video release into the sales of a shitty video game that wasn't selling either.

[trooper_thorn]

I got a range from $120mm to $190mm. But I can tighten that up once the second week is in and I can use those numbers. Easier to predict when you got two points on a graph instead of one, lol.

Then again, I thought it would open w/ $42mm, so I was off by more than 10% there.

Meh, I figure that if your estimate is within $5M it's fairly accurate. Personally I cheated and used a spread for my final estimate of the opening weekend ($40M-$45M.)

Anyway, unless this has some ridiculous legs I don't see how it makes it above $150M with this type of opening (and even that is somewhat optimistic) but you're right, we need a second weekend to make any real declarations.