2019 At The Box Office (1 Viewer)

[Jake Lipson]

Charting with Dan:

 

[Wayne_j]

It is refreshing that a critic who gave the movie a rotten on rotten tomatoes is so outspoken on Anti Captain Marvel conspiracy theories.

 

[steve jaros]

The March/April box office is going to be ginormous:

Captain Marvel is already massive.

Us is going to be pretty huge.

Shazam is going to be Aqual-level massive for the DCU.

Dumbo might do some decent numbers.

And of course the last Avengers is going to crack the earth open in late April.

Summer now starts in March.

 

[Tino]

Top 20 www.boxofficemojo.com

1 N Us Uni. $70,250,000 - 3,741 - $18,778 $70,250,000 $20 1
2 1 Captain Marvel BV $35,021,000 -48.5% 4,278 -32 $8,186 $321,498,835 - 3
3 2 Wonder Park Par. $9,000,000 -43.2% 3,838 - $2,345 $29,477,304 - 2
4 3 Five Feet Apart LGF $8,750,000 -33.7% 2,866 +63 $3,053 $26,461,064 - 2
5 4 How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World Uni. $6,533,000 -29.6% 3,347 -380 $1,952 $145,752,630 $129 5
6 5 Tyler Perry's A Madea Family Funeral LGF $4,500,000 -42.6% 2,187 -163 $2,058 $65,881,232 - 4
7 18 Gloria Bell A24 $1,802,500 +394.5% 654 +615 $2,756 $2,498,485 - 3
8 6 No Manches Frida 2 PNT $1,780,000 -53.5% 472 - $3,771 $6,626,279 - 2
9 8 The LEGO Movie 2: The Second Part WB $1,125,000 -47.7% 1,389 -657 $810 $103,328,550 - 7
10 9 Alita: Battle Angel Fox $1,015,000 -46.6% 1,439 -257 $705 $83,748,050 $170 6
11 7 Captive State Focus $918,000 -70.7% 2,549 +1 $360 $5,229,660 - 2
12 12 Apollo 11 Neon $800,000 -31.2% 586 -2 $1,365 $6,865,437 - 4
13 11 Isn't It Romantic WB (NL) $630,000 -48.0% 918 -448 $686 $47,507,090 - 6
15 10 Green Book Uni. $600,000 -52.3% 841 -479 $713 $83,879,956 $23 19
14 32 Glass Uni. $600,000 +190.1% 225 -37 $2,667 $110,805,000 $20 10
16 14 The Upside STX $530,000 -34.2% 647 -233 $819 $106,812,456 $37.5 11
17 13 Fighting with My Family MGM $509,274 -53.3% 903 -677 $564 $21,929,250 - 6
18 15 What Men Want Par. $305,000 -57.7% 404 -183 $755 $54,046,163 $20 7
19 23 Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse Sony $250,000 -21.1% 278 -88 $899 $189,868,008 $90 15
20 17 Badla Relbig. $237,547 -49.0% 97 -18 $2,449 $1,712,624 - 3

 

[Colin Jacobson]

Top 20 www.boxofficemojo.com

1 N Us Uni. $70,250,000 - 3,741 - $18,778 $70,250,000 $20 1
2 1 Captain Marvel BV $35,021,000 -48.5% 4,278 -32 $8,186 $321,498,835 - 3
3 2 Wonder Park Par. $9,000,000 -43.2% 3,838 - $2,345 $29,477,304 - 2
4 3 Five Feet Apart LGF $8,750,000 -33.7% 2,866 +63 $3,053 $26,461,064 - 2
5 4 How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World Uni. $6,533,000 -29.6% 3,347 -380 $1,952 $145,752,630 $129 5
6 5 Tyler Perry's A Madea Family Funeral LGF $4,500,000 -42.6% 2,187 -163 $2,058 $65,881,232 - 4
7 18 Gloria Bell A24 $1,802,500 +394.5% 654 +615 $2,756 $2,498,485 - 3
8 6 No Manches Frida 2 PNT $1,780,000 -53.5% 472 - $3,771 $6,626,279 - 2
9 8 The LEGO Movie 2: The Second Part WB $1,125,000 -47.7% 1,389 -657 $810 $103,328,550 - 7
10 9 Alita: Battle Angel Fox $1,015,000 -46.6% 1,439 -257 $705 $83,748,050 $170 6
11 7 Captive State Focus $918,000 -70.7% 2,549 +1 $360 $5,229,660 - 2
12 12 Apollo 11 Neon $800,000 -31.2% 586 -2 $1,365 $6,865,437 - 4
13 11 Isn't It Romantic WB (NL) $630,000 -48.0% 918 -448 $686 $47,507,090 - 6
15 10 Green Book Uni. $600,000 -52.3% 841 -479 $713 $83,879,956 $23 19
14 32 Glass Uni. $600,000 +190.1% 225 -37 $2,667 $110,805,000 $20 10
16 14 The Upside STX $530,000 -34.2% 647 -233 $819 $106,812,456 $37.5 11
17 13 Fighting with My Family MGM $509,274 -53.3% 903 -677 $564 $21,929,250 - 6
18 15 What Men Want Par. $305,000 -57.7% 404 -183 $755 $54,046,163 $20 7
19 23 Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse Sony $250,000 -21.1% 278 -88 $899 $189,868,008 $90 15
20 17 Badla Relbig. $237,547 -49.0% 97 -18 $2,449 $1,712,624 - 3

Kinda amazing that "Us" has already turned a profit based solely on US sales for the weekend!

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

Disney has to be pretty happy with that hold for Captain Marvel. Three weekends in, and it has already surprised the lifetime domestic gross of the original Iron Man. It's just about a lock to surpass Guardians of the Galaxy and Spider-Man: Homecoming. If it can outlast Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 2, that would put it in the top echelon of the MCU box office.

 

[Jake Lipson]

Charting with Dan for this week:

 

[benbess]

Wonder Park
Domestic Total as of Mar. 28, 2019:$32,941,787
Distributor: Paramount Release Date: March 15, 2019
Genre: Animation Runtime: 1 hrs. 26 min.
MPAA Rating: PG Production Budget: N/A
Total Lifetime Grosses
Domestic: $32,941,787 74.4%
+ Foreign: $11,335,544 25.6%
= Worldwide: $44,277,331

Given that this movie probably cost around $100 million, I'd say this is a box office bomb.

 

[Colin Jacobson]

Wonder Park
Domestic Total as of Mar. 28, 2019:$32,941,787
Distributor: Paramount Release Date: March 15, 2019
Genre: Animation Runtime: 1 hrs. 26 min.
MPAA Rating: PG Production Budget: N/A
Total Lifetime Grosses
Domestic: $32,941,787 74.4%
+ Foreign: $11,335,544 25.6%
= Worldwide: $44,277,331

Given that this movie probably cost around $100 million, I'd say this is a box office bomb.

I see that $100m budget on Wiki but have no idea why this movie would've cost so much. It looks cheap and it doesn't boast a cast of really expensive actors - where would that money have gone?

"Despicable Me 3" was $80m - I have no clue how "WP" could cost $20m more!

 

[Malcolm R]

Wonder Park
Domestic Total as of Mar. 28, 2019:$32,941,787
Distributor: Paramount Release Date: March 15, 2019
Genre: Animation Runtime: 1 hrs. 26 min.
MPAA Rating: PG Production Budget: N/A
Total Lifetime Grosses
Domestic: $32,941,787 74.4%
+ Foreign: $11,335,544 25.6%
= Worldwide: $44,277,331

Given that this movie probably cost around $100 million, I'd say this is a box office bomb.

With its troubled production history, I think Paramount is probably happy to see any returns at all, and I think it's actually exceeded expectations domestically. I'm not sure what the plans are for any additional international releases, but to date its foreign distribution has been pretty limited (going by BO Mojo), largely to Asia but still without several of those major markets like South Korea, Japan, or China. It still hasn't played in much of Europe, either.

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

Looks like Disney's strategy of adapting all of its animated classics into live action might be losing a bit of steam at the box office.

 

[benbess]

I thought Mary Poppins Returns was great, but it seems like it will struggle to break even....

Mary Poppins Returns
Domestic Total as of Mar. 28, 2019:$171,862,072
Distributor: Buena Vista Release Date: December 19, 2018
Genre: Musical Runtime: 2 hrs. 10 min.
MPAA Rating: PG Production Budget: $130 millionTotal Lifetime Grosses
Domestic: $171,862,072 49.3%
+ Foreign: $176,945,018 50.7%
= Worldwide: $348,807,090

We can guess that MPR has advertising/overhead costs of at least $70 million, giving a total cost of at least $200m. Since only about half of the box office comes back to the studio, seems like we are looking at tens of millions of dollars in red ink. It's sure to be available on Disney+, which I assume will have to pay the Disney studio something similar to what it would have earned on Netflix/Amazon Prime, etc., but still....

 

[Tino]

I thought Mary Poppins Returns was great, but it seems like it will struggle to break even....

Mary Poppins Returns
Domestic Total as of Mar. 28, 2019:$171,862,072
Distributor: Buena Vista Release Date: December 19, 2018
Genre: Musical Runtime: 2 hrs. 10 min.
MPAA Rating: PG Production Budget: $130 millionTotal Lifetime Grosses
Domestic: $171,862,072 49.3%
+ Foreign: $176,945,018 50.7%
= Worldwide: $348,807,090

We can guess that MPR has advertising/overhead costs of at least $70 million, giving a total cost of at least $200m. Since only about half of the box office comes back to the studio, seems like we are looking at tens of millions of dollars in red ink. It's sure to be available on Disney+, which I assume will have to pay the Disney studio something similar to what it would have earned on Netflix/Amazon Prime, etc., but still....

The best barometer to determine box office success is 2.5-3x production budget. It’s close to break even I would say.

 

[Wayne_j]

I think Disney has been hiding the original Dumbo for so long that it isn't bringing nostalgia to most of the theater goers. It isn't like Beauty and the Beast for example where kids today and their parents have grown up with it.

 

[Wayne_j]

1 N Dumbo (2019) BV $45,000,000 - 4,259 - $10,566 $45,000,000 - 1
2 1 Us Uni. $33,605,000 -52.7% 3,743 +2 $8,978 $128,220,440 $20 2
3 2 Captain Marvel BV $20,500,000 -40.2% 3,985 -293 $5,144 $353,805,815 - 4
4 4 Five Feet Apart LGF $6,250,000 -26.9% 2,845 -21 $2,197 $35,875,601 - 3
5 N Unplanned PFR $6,110,000 - 1,059 - $5,770 $6,110,000 $6 1
6 3 Wonder Park Par. $4,940,000 -43.6% 3,304 -534 $1,495 $37,881,787 - 3
7 5 How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World Uni. $4,232,000 -35.1% 2,785 -562 $1,520 $152,966,010 $129 6
8 39 Hotel Mumbai BST $3,163,660 +3,492.4% 924 +920 $3,424 $3,279,139 - 2
9 6 Tyler Perry's A Madea Family Funeral LGF $2,700,000 -38.7% 1,923 -264 $1,404 $70,039,170 - 5
10 N The Beach Bum Neon $1,800,000 - 1,100 - $1,636 $1,800,000 - 1

 

[Malcolm R]

I wouldn't consider Dumbo as one of Disney's marquee titles. The original film was essentially a quickie, low budget effort to recoup some money spent on other films. It was a modest success at the time, but in adjusted dollars only made the equivalent of about $27m. I was kind of surprised they chose it for the live action treatment.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

Looks like Disney's strategy of adapting all of its animated classics into live action might be losing a bit of steam at the box office.

I'm not surprised.

The same thing happened, more or less, with their line of theatrical 3D conversions of past 2D hits. They re-released The Lion King in 3D first, and it was a massive success. Beauty And The Beast in 3D followed, and did respectable business, but not as well as The Lion King. Monsters Inc did almost nothing, and then the planned Little Mermaid 3D theatrical release was unceremoniously canceled.

These things have the potential to be seen as special treats when they're rolled out in such a way that makes them seem like special events.

But in 2019, we're getting live-action remakes of Dumbo, Aladdin and The Lion King. (Following on the heels of "The Nutcracker and the Four Realms," which was basically a live action adaptation of a Fantasia segment.) It's just too much, too close together. I think there was even going to be fourth animation-to-live action release this year from Disney, but that it has been mercifully postponed to another year.

Honestly, of the group of the three remakes coming out this year, Dumbo seemed the most interesting to me because it seems the least likely to be a beat-by-beat remake of the original. The footage I've seen from Aladdin was uninspiring, and the footage I've seen from The Lion King looks exactly like the earlier version but with CGI replacing hand-drawn animation.

I think Disney is accelerating the decline in demand for these remakes by releasing them so often. I'm surprised they're making that mistake after the "Solo" debacle. "Solo" was probably never going to set a box office world record to begin with, but putting out two Star Wars movies less than six months apart caused the audience to experience franchise fatigue, and I'm concerned that Disney is going to do the same here.

 

[Jake Lipson]

The same thing happened, more or less, with their line of theatrical 3D conversions of past 2D hits. They re-released The Lion King in 3D first, and it was a massive success. Beauty And The Beast in 3D followed, and did respectable business, but not as well as The Lion King. Monsters Inc did almost nothing, and then the planned Little Mermaid 3D theatrical release was unceremoniously canceled.

You forgot Finding Nemo, which was in September 2012 between Beauty and the Beast (January) and Monsters, Inc. (December.) But the fact that you forgot to mention it underlines your point, which I agree with fully. The other thing Disney failed to notice with regard to the 3D reissues, which I know we've talked about before in other threads, is that the Pixar films and Beauty and the Beast were available in circulation on Blu-ray and on TV during the time that the re-release was happening. I remember flipping through channels and seeing Finding Nemo on then-ABC Family in June 2012, less than two months before its re-release was due, and I thought, "It's going to be really hard to sell people on going to the theater for this when it's on TV right now." The Lion King had been out of print and thusly hard to find for several years before they re-released it, and the same would have been the case with The Little Mermaid if they had moved forward with it, so I think that one would have done much closer to Lion King business.

I think there was even going to be fourth animation-to-live action release this year from Disney, but that it has been mercifully postponed to another year.

You're both right and wrong here. The other title you're thinking of is Mulan, which originally had a placeholder date of November 2, 2018 (which ended up being occupied by The Nutcracker and the Four Realms.) It was delayed until March 27, 2020 (this weekend next year.) It was never set for 2019, but its original date was close enough that it absolutely underscores your point. The 2018 target date was never realistic since it hadn't begun production until last year.

However, Disney just recently moved Maleficent 2 (which was expected in May 2020) *up* into October of this year. That one isn't a remake per se because Maleficent dies in the original Sleeping Beauty, so there's no additional story for them to redo, but it is a sequel to a live-action remake, so it still falls in the same general class. They have been done shooting it for some time, which is why they were able to push it up, but I don't think they need it this year, so I'm not really sure why they did that.

Even without Dumbo being a smash hit, Disney has so many big movies this year -- they've already had a smash with Captain Marvel, and Endgame, Toy Story 4, Frozen II, and Star Wars IX are all about as close to sure things as you can get, plus whatever Aladdin and Lion King contribute -- that I think their 2020 slate is going to be comparatively lacking. They're going to have a huge 2019, but come next year they might regret stuffing quite so many enormous films into one fiscal year.

 

[benbess]

I wish the Disney empire would develop/adapt more original stories, rather than just doing remakes and franchises.

Although, as mentioned, the one movie like that I'm thinking of recently, The Nutcracker and the Four Realms, was rather a mess. Two directors were involved in that one, and I couldn't tell if—including the stuff that ended up on the cutting room floor—there was maybe a good movie somewhere in Nutcracker or not? I think Lasse Hallström is a good director, and I just don't know what happened there.

But I really like Mary Poppins Returns and the new Dumbo. To me these are new classics that I will almost certainly be watching again and probably owning at some point.

Yeah, I admit it. I'll likely be joining Disney+ once that gets launched.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

I’m almost certainly in on Disney+ as well.

I like a lot of their existing and reinvigorated franchises.

I’d also like to see some more original material that can become the franchises of tomorrow.

I think they’re about to learn the lesson that if you release an event movie every month, it’s no longer an event, and people will treat it like the routine it is. If they pull back just a little, and space what remakes they do out a little more, they’ll have better results in the long run. But I guess they’re gonna have to learn that the hard way.