People See Syriana but Buy Below

July 1, 2006

As I suggested when it came out, people rented Syriana to the amount of $7.93 million during its first week of release. That was enough to put it in first place during a close three-way race. Second place went to the overall sales leader, Eight Below, with $7.28 million while the final new release in the top 5, The Hills Have Eyes, was just a fraction behind with $7.12 million. The only holdovers this week were 16 Blocks, which was down 26% to $5.04 million for the week and $11.97 million in total, and The Pink Panther, which was down 34% to $4.30 million for the week and $10.92 million in total.

There was only one other new release to chart this week, but it was way down the charts in 32nd place. But that is still a very impressive result considering that release was Night Watch, which never made it past 158 theatres or $1.5 million at the box office. After a week of rentals it has $830,000 on the home market, and it did even better on the sales chart.

It was an excellent week on the rental charts with the total rentals hitting $154.5 million, up 2.3% from last week and 11.0% from last year. Year-to-date, 2006 has amassed $3.8 billion, which is 1.2% higher than last year's pace. If it can keep this recent pace up for a while longer, it could increase its lead by more than inflation, which would be a real sign that the rental markets have recovered.

As already stated, Eight Below led the sales chart with The Hills Have Eyes coming in second place. The specter of a special edition kept Syriana's sale down, but a third place finish is still a good result. Underworld: Evolution remains a strong seller in fourth place during its third week of release. On the other hand, The Pink Panther fell from first to fifth during its second week.

Other new releases include the special edition of Lady & The Tramp II - Scamp's Adventure, which I can only assume were based primarily on the Disney name and not the quality of the movie. Next up was the limited release, Night Watch in 12th place; no figures were released, but one could almost assume that more people bought the DVD than saw the movie in the theatres. The only other new releases to chart this week were a pair of TV on DVD releases, Justice League - Season 2 in 16th place and Adventures of Superman - The Complete Third and Fourth Seasons in 20th.

Leading the way on the TV on DVD charts, again, was High School Musical; the film topped the TV on DVD charts for the fifth week in a row while it finished 10th on the overall charts. A quartet of Superman releases filled out the rest of the top five led by Justice League - Season 2 in second place. Third went to Adventures of Superman - The Complete Third and Fourth Seasons while Superman - The Animated Series - Volume Three was fourth. Rounding out the top five was Lois & Clark - The New Adventures of Superman - The Complete Third Season. Warner Bros. should be very pleased by this result, especially with Superman Returns not performing as well as expected.

A few other new releases also charted this week led by Married... With Children - The Complete Fifth Season in seventh place with the Fifth Season of King of Queens just one place below. Lastly, in tenth place is the underrated NewsRadio - The Complete Fourth Season.


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Filed under: The Pink Panther, Eight Below, Underworld: Evolution, Syriana, The Hills Have Eyes, Nochnoy dozor, 16 Blocks