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2008-06-03
This was a bad week for big movies, with not a single first run release is even worth rating a solid purchase, never mind being a contender for DVD Pick of the Week. There were a few other contenders for the title, including Dirty Harry Collection on DVD or Blu-ray. However, I found it impossible to decide which format was the better deal. Had the Blu-ray provided anything more than High Definition, or been a more reasonable price compared to the DVD, it would have been an easier choice. One of them is the DVD Pick of the Week, I just don't know which one. On a side note, there is an immense flood of Blu-ray releases, including a few I thought were coming out previously.
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2006-12-03
There was a new number one this week as Ice Age: The Meltdown led both the sales and the rental charts. In the latter it took in $10.26 million for the week, less than $1 million above The Da Vinci Code's $9.35 million haul.
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2006-11-25
The Da Vinci Code led a large group of new releases, taking top spot on the charts with $11.05 million in rentals while it also topped the sales chart with ease.
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2006-11-19
Cars led a group of new releases that dominated the sales charts this week, however, it had to settle for a very close second place on the rental charts. Leading the way was Mission: Impossible: III with $9.31 million while Cars took in $9.24 million.
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2006-11-11
New releases were nearly shut out of the charts this week, however, one new release that did make the charts was Mission: Impossible: III, which earned top spot with $9.08 million.
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2006-10-31
Halloween falls on a Tuesday this year, and that is playing havoc with this week's DVD releases.
The only single day that messes with the movie industry more than Halloween is Christmas Eve.
That doesn't mean there are no DVDs worth picking up -- there are -- but they are few and far between.
There were only two real contenders for DVD Pick of the Week, Ghost Whisperer - The Complete First Season and Kids in the Hall - Complete Season 5, and if I were forced to choose just one I'd go with Ghost Whisperer - The Complete First Season.
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2006-09-03
A first place opening in the U.K. helped You, Me & Dupree shoot up the charts nearly reaching the top five. While it did have to settle for sixth place, its $4.32 million on 914 screens in 8 markets was enough to push its still early international total to $13.01 million. Over in the U.K., the film picked up $3.10 million on 409 screens and that was more than double its nearest competitor. The film opened in Iceland over the weekend earning second place to Garfield's A Tail of Two Kitties with $42,000 in three theatres.
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2006-08-28
Monster House climbed one spot to sixth with $4.48 million on 1498 screens in 14 markets for total of $20.33 million at the international box office. The film added two more midlevel markets but bombed in both. In the Netherlands the film missed the top ten with $89,000 on 65 screens over the weekend and $100,000 in total while it was only slightly better in Poland earning sixth place with $71,000 on 48 screens. Holdovers, on the other hand, were better than expected with the film down a mere 16% during its second weekend in the U.K. with $1.61 million on 425 screens for a total of $5.83 million.
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2006-08-06
Over the Hedge may have slipped out of the top five landing in sixth place this week, but it is still bringing in plenty at the box office. After earning $7.12 million on 3877 screens in 33 markets the film now has $121.76 million internationally and is closing in on its domestic total with several more markets left to open in. Its biggest market was again Germany with $1.49 million on 743 screens over the weekend for a four-week total of $14.26 million. Should it perform well in Japan and Italy, it will have no trouble reaching $300 million worldwide. And while that is low compared to the historical averages for digitally animated films, but is still a great result.
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2006-07-30
A first place debut in China lifted Mission: Impossible 3 into sixth place overall with $5.74 million on 838 screens in 21 markets for a total of $239.82 million. In China it earned $2.8 million on 394 screens while in Japan it managed $2.50 million on 540 for a total of $29.92 million after three weeks of release.
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2006-07-23
A South Korean film, Hanbando, a.k.a. The Korean Peninsula, topped its native market with a huge $6.14 million on 520 screens over the weekend and a total of $9.85 million overall. That was good enough for sixth place on the international charts.
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2006-07-12
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest started its international run with day-and-date releases in seven markets and on 1552 screens earning an astounding $46.64 million. Over half of that total came from the U.K. where it debuted in first place with $21.21 million on 514 screens over the weekend and $25.41 million in total. That was the film's only 8-figure opening, but it also did well in Australia with $8.33 million on 489 screens and New Zealand with $1.17 million on 95 screens. The film set a record for top opening for a Hollywood film in South Korea with $8.4 million on 450 screens while topping the market in Taiwan with $1.9 million on 18, Thailand with $1.4 million on 110, and an estimated $100,000 in Uruguay. In most markets the film earned double what its predecessor made. However, if one were to look for a downside, you'd quickly notice that the film didn't break nearly as many records internationally as it did domestically. It was a top ten all-time opening in many markets, but not the colossal it was here.
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2006-07-02
Scary Movie 4 opened in first place in both France and Spain, helping the film into sixth place overall with $4.89 million on 1512 screens in 22 markets for a total of $74.72 million internationally. In Spain the film made $1.76 million on 400 screens over the weekend and $1.83 million in total, while in France it brought in $3.47 million on 571 screens, but that was for the full week.
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2006-06-25
The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift started its international run last weekend but missed the top five with $7.93 million on 810 screens in 8 markets. The film took first place in five markets, including the U.K. with $3.35 million on 415 screens, in Australia with $2.28 million on 221 screens, and New Zealand with $444,000 on 53 screens. This is inline with what the original opened with in those markets, but with shorter legs due to Sequelitis it won't have as high a final box office.
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2006-06-18
Trick 2 opened in its native Japan finishing in a close second with $3.83 million on 282 screens. That was enough for sixth place on the overall charts and the best per screen average in the top 30.
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2006-06-07
The Da Vinci Code completed its three-peat, earning $51.61 million on 11,676 screens in 66 markets for a total of $408.86 million on the international scene.
The film became only the 21st film to top $400 million internationally, and it should become the 12th to reach $500 million before too long.
Worldwide the film has $580.82 million, placing it in 32nd spot on the All Time Charts and should have no trouble reaching $700 million and might even place in the top twenty before its run is over.
As for individual markets, the film is still leading in many major markets including Germany ($6.19 million on 902 screens for a total of $38.79 million), Japan ($6.06 million on 822 screens and $45.95 million in total), Italy ($5.39 million on 747 screens for a $30.68 million total), as well as Spain ($2.69 million on 752 screens for a total of $25.77 million).
The Da Vinci Code could top the charts next week as well, but with the World Cup starting, it will likely see huge declines in most major markets, especially those with teams participating in the two-week football tournament.
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2006-06-05
The post-holiday weekend hit the box office hard as the total fell to $135.8 million, down a massive 30.5% from last weekend.
But more importantly it was up by 3.3% from the same weekend last year, which is in line with the year-to-date gains.
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2006-06-04
The one major change from the studio estimates was in fourth place as the Spanish film, Volver, grew by 15% to $4.55 million on 835 screens in 5 markets for a total of $21.33 million. The big surprise came in France where the film was up a massive 41% from its opened taking in $2.64 million on 333 screens for a two-week total of $5.53 million. Meanwhile, in Italy is was down a mere 16% to $1.11 million on 309 screens for a total of $3.30 million.
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2006-06-01
For the second weekend in a row there's only one wide release to deal with.
However, unlike last weekend, there is no chance records will be broken, at least not the good kind.
The weekend should keep pace with 2005, which saw the all three wide releases struggle.
In fact, the one wide release this week could make more than all three did last year.
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2006-05-31
Despite the worldwide opening of X-Men: The Last Stand, The Da Vinci Code was able to remain on top with a relatively comfortable lead. Over the weekend it added $92.8 million on 12,038 screens in 82 markets for an international total of $320 million while its worldwide total has reached $465.25 million. The film is now 34th on the all-time international charts and 56th on the worldwide charts. As for individual markets, the results were mixed. In the U.K. is was down a hefty 48% to $9.15 million on 522 screens for a $35.38 million total but it had a better time in Germany down just 17% to $11.16 million on 887 screens for a $29.62 million two-week total. Its best holdover was Holland where it grew by 5% to $2.19 million on 143 screens for a total of $5.06 million, however, that result was aided by holidays and four of the six holdovers in the top ten saw triple-digit growth. Where does it go from here? The film has already made enough to cover its production and P&A budgets, so the only goals left involve climbing the charts. How far up the charts it reaches is still in doubt, but if I ware a betting man, I'd predict that in the end it should reach the top ten internationally and the top twenty worldwide.
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2006-05-30
Records fell this weekend as X-Men: The Last Stand beat all expectations, so there's little surprise that the overall box office was also much stronger than expected.
For the 3-day weekend it was up 20.3% from last weekend at $197 million, which was 6.9% higher than the same weekend last year.
The total box office for the 4-day weekend was $242 million or 4.2% higher than last year.
Year-to-date, 2006 is ahead of 2005 by a 3% margin, which is in line with ticket price inflation.
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2006-05-28
Mission: Impossible 3 was knocked out of first place by The Da Vinci Code, but that was not a surprise to anyone. What was a surprise is the lack of staying power Mission: Impossible 3 has exhibited so far; this week the film fell a further 43% o $23.22 million on 6392 screens in 57 markets for a total of $164.32 million. Its best market of the weekend was the U.K. where it added $3.44 million on 445 screens to its total of $23.70 million. However, South Korea is close behind with $3.19 million on 330 screens for a total of $23.22 million. The film only as a few openings left and Japan is the only major player out there so unless a minor miracle happens Mission: Impossible 3 won't reach the heights that its predecessors did.
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2006-05-25
Memorial Day long weekend is the busiest weekend of the year. Many times it has been compared to the Superbowl, and for good reason. Over the next four days more than 25 million people will go to see a movie, each of them will be inundated with ads for upcoming releases. Trailers, posters, stands, ads on their popcorn boxes, ads on their drinks, ads, ads, ads.
If the films fail to bring in moviegoers this weekend, the effects will be felt for months.
All this pressure falls on just one wide release and last week's superstar.
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2006-05-24
To call The Da Vinci Code's worldwide start impressive is an understatement of incredible proportions. The film pulled in a record breaking $152.45 million on 12,182 screens in 57 markets for a total of $155.00 million including previews, which tops Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith's record of $144.7 million on 10,000 screens in 114 markets. (On a side note, that latter film did earn a better per screen average by a significant margin.) The film already has $232.07 million on the worldwide scene and will enter the top 200 by the beginning of the weekend. This is even more impressive as industry tracking had it struggling to make $100 million internationally and predictions were for just over $150 million worldwide.
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2006-05-22
It was a good news, bad news weekend. Good news, The Da Vinci Code had one of the biggest opening weekends of all time and that helped the overall box office climb 63.8% from last weekend to $163 million. Bad news, every other film in the top five missed expectations, leaving the box office of flat with the same weekend last year.
Not all of the smaller, independent releases have reported yet, but when they do, this weekend should see just a tiny increase, one that would round to 0.0%, but that's compared to microscopic decline of 0.001% it is showing right now.
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2006-05-18
One of the most hotly anticipated movies of the year opens this weekend, as does the latest digitally animated movie.
Neither film looks likely to break any opening weekend box office records on its own, but we could have the biggest one-two opening punch ever, and with their respective target audiences, both movies should have strong legs.
Whatever happens, one record will be broken this weekend, although it's a mark that no-one will be proud of achieving.
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2006-05-17
Mission: Impossible 3 was again able to top the international charts this time down 42% to $40.5 million on 7,390 screens in 57 markets. It showed amazing legs in some unusual markets including Germany where it was down 19% to $2.25 million on 881 screens for a total of $5.91 million while in South Korea it was down 24% to $5.54 million on 390 screens for a total of $17.73 million. On the other hand, in France the film tumbled 53% to $2.79 million on 850 screens for a two-week total of $10.4 million. So far the film has amassed $129.2 million internationally with openings in Japan and other smaller markets yet to go. On a side note, the film looks like it will be banned in China even though several parts of the movie were filmed there. Surprisingly the film is not being banned due to TomKat overexposure but because the movie shows the Chinese police and government officials as corrupt and / or incompetent.
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2006-05-15
It was a bad week for new releases with no newcomer able to beat expectations.
Even though the holdovers held up well the overall weekend box office numbers sank.
In total, theatrical releases earned $100 million, which was down 9.7% from last week and more importantly 2.7% from last year.
This was the first year-to-year drop-off in eight weeks, although it was relatively small.
In fact, had either Poseidon or Just My Luck matched expectations, the total box office would have seen a small growth.
The small decline wasn't enough to put a dent in 2006's lead over 2005, which remains at 6%.
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2006-05-11
The second weekend of summer is looking soft this year with Mission: Impossible 3 getting off to a slower than expected start last weekend and buzz surrounding Poseidon being rather weak.
The good news is that both those films should top last year's winner and that should lead to another week of year-to-year growth.
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2006-05-10
Mission: Impossible 3 started its international run this weekend in first place with $70.03 million on 6997 screens on 56 markets. With a per screen average just the tiniest margin over $10,000, it is no man's land between hit and miss; it made a very healthy amount of money, but still not as much as many expected. Its international debut very similar domestic opening in that way.
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2006-05-09
Army of Shadows remained in first place on the per theatre charts this week.
In fact, the film's average grew by more than 9% to $13,775. Next up was the overall box office leader, Mission: Impossible III with $11,777 while fellow newcomer Art School Confidential was very close behind with $11,311.
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2006-05-08
The unofficial start of summer was a disappointment, with the number one film missing expectations by nearly $20 million. However, the overall numbers were still very positive with the box office bringing in a total of $110 million.
That's 7.8% higher than last weekend and 26.5% higher than the same weekend last year.
Even better are the year-to-date numbers, which now stand 6% higher than last year.
There is some bad news ahead as next week looks weaker and Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith and its $100 million weekend will hurt year-to-year comparisons the week after that.
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2006-05-05
It was not a great week when it comes to new websites with most of the really interesting updates coming in the form of new trailers. However, it was one of those sites, Casino Royale - Official Site, that was awarded the Weekly Website Award. I just hope when the site goes live in two weeks by Fanboy enthusiasm is rewarded.
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2006-05-04
This weekend is the unofficial start of the summer box office season with what should be the biggest movie of the year, at least so far.
There's little doubt that Mission: Impossible 3 will be the biggest movie of the weekend, the only question is how well will it compare with other blockbusters, both this year and years past.
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2006-05-01
This week we have another multi-prize contest, but again just the one movie to predict. And if you can't tell what movie that is from the improperly spelled title, it's Mission: Impossible III. Whoever comes closest to predicting the opening 3-day weekend (Friday to Sunday), without going over, will win Nanny McPhee - DVD. On the other hand, whoever comes closest to predicting the opening 3-day weekend (Friday to Sunday), without going under, will win The Barbie Diaries on DVD. Entries must be received by 10am, Pacific Time on Friday to be eligible, so don't delay!
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2006-04-30
There are quite a few sure-fire, monster hits coming out this month, although none looks likely to come close to the box office performance of last year's May champ, Revenge of the Sith.
On the other hand, this time last year, the Summer Box Office season got off to a really, really bad start so we should at see some strong year-to-year gains, at least for the first two weeks. This should help 2006 extend its lead over 2005 and push ticket sales into the black.
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2006-04-28
The first of the new Friday edition Weekly Website Review column is here, but not without a hitch. We had a bit of a power outage early in the day so I did what any modern man would do when faced with the prospects of going without the Internet for an undetermined amount of time, I took a nap. Fortunately, I was mostly done before the power went out so there was no real affect on this week's list, but I am starting to this that this column is cursed. As for the list, its pretty average with the best of the bunch being A Scanner Darkly - Official Site.
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2006-04-20
Another slow week and either I've lost my mojo for finding new and updated sites, or this is the calm before the storm that is the summer box office season. And speaking of Storm, the best of the bunch this week is X-Men: The Last Stand - Official Site.
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2006-04-13
Back to normal levels of traffic on this list, but like last week there's not an over abundance of huge sites on this week's list. I hope that changes soon as the summer box office season is just around the corner. The best of the bunch this week is Hard Candy - Official Site, which has been slowly growing for months.
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2006-04-06
It's a much busier week this week including several sites that I found through e-mails. Thanks for the tips. (On a side note, if you sent me an e-mail regarding a movie site and I forgot it, please send it again. It was a big list this week and I'm almost positive one or two sites slipped between the cracks.) Unfortunately, while there are plenty of sites on this week's list, there's not a lot of top notch ones. The movie on this list that made me the most excited was The Simpsons Movie, and that one doesn't even have an official movie site, just the teaser trailer.
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2006-03-30
Another week with less sites than I would have liked. (On a side note, it seems every time something weird happens it happens on a Thursday. This time its slight internet connection problems / memory leak. I think. Whatever it is, it's causing my computer to act really slowly.) This shorter list doesn't mean there isn't an award-worthy site and the best of the best is Over the Hedge - Official Site.
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2006-02-16
During the past week promotional websites for several movies were launched and some older ones added additional content. It's another busy week as the winter slump starts to subside. As for the best site on this week's list, it came down to the interactive feature of Freedomland - Official Site and the atmosphere of Night Watch - Official Site. After looking over the sites a few times, I still can't decided which one should get the award, so I'm giving it to both.
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2006-02-09
During the past week promotional websites for several movies were launched and some older ones added additional content. It was the busiest week in more than a month, but there weren't many big launches or massive updates, so it is the slow-growing V For Vendetta - Official Site that earns the Weekly Website Award.
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2005-12-15
During the past week promotional websites for several movies were launched and some older ones added additional content. We've hit another slow patch for movie websites, which is not unexpected since the most of the new site on this list are for films that open months from now so there's hardly any content, or open during the dead zone that is January. I would say the best of the rest would be King Kong - Official Site, but it is not strong enough to win the Weekly Website Award.
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2005-09-01
During the past week promotional websites for several movies were launched and some older ones added additional content. Here the list of this week's releases, a couple of new sites and few updates, including this week's winner, Serenity - Official Site.
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2005-06-15
It's been eight years since the monstrosity that was Batman & Robin killed the successful movie franchise. And now with Batman Begins the studio hopes that the franchise will be born again.
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2004-06-01
After a rather mediocre May, June looks a lot stronger with two films that should break $300 million. Not surprisingly, these monster hits are being released unopposed during their respective weeks. And also not surprisingly, they are being released at opposite ends of the month. The rest of the films are unlikely to make much of an impact, although a few should cross the increasingly irrelevant $100 million plateau.
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2004-01-30
This week's new batch of movie release dates sees the studios start to position themselves for blockbuster performances in Summer 2005, and do some shuffling around of less ambitious releases in 2004.
Among movies with new or moved dates: a remake of The Longest Yard,
a revival of The Pink Panther, an adaptation of TV's Bewitched, Tarantino's Kill Bill: Volume 2 and many more.
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Tuesday, November 24, 2009
