DVD Sales: Avatar Annihilates Competition, Records
May 5, 2010
After two weeks of soft sales by new releases, this week's DVD sales chart was dominated by a new release, namely Avatar. That film sold 3.96 million units, generating $75.87 million in sales. This performance was made even more impressive, since the DVD was released on the 22nd, meaning it was only for sale for three days instead of the customary five days for the opening week of sales. In those three days, the film has become the third best selling DVD of 2010 in terms of units sold and second best in terms of dollars generated.
Second place went to Crazy Heart, which was well back with 373,000 units / $6.71 million during its opening week of release, which is fantastic for a limited release. The Lovely Bones opened in third with 194,000 units and $3.30 million, below expectations. After three weeks on top, Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel fell to fourth place with 178,000 units for the week for a total of 3.40 million units / $57.49 million after close to a month of release. Rounding out the top five was The Blind Side with 131,000 units / $2.09 million for the week and 4.16 million units / $67.61 million after five.
The best of the rest of the new releases was The Young Victoria, earning eighth place with 61,000 units / $1.09 million. The Drawn Together Movie: The Movie opened in 18th place with 26,000 units / $391,000 during its opening. I don't know if this is enough to keep the studio happy. Cheech & Chong's Hey Watch This opened in 26th place with 21,000 units / $346,000.
Thanks to Avatar's record breaking performance, the Blu-ray sales shot up 322% from last week to $66.6 million, which was up 243% from the same week last year. Compared to DVD, Blu-ray sold 22% of the total market and 30% of the top 20 comparison. The weekly dollar figure was the best for the year and fourth best ever, while the DVD comparisons were the best for the format. The number one selling Blu-ray for the week was Avatar, obviously, with an estimated 2.7 million units. This is reportedly more than The Dark Knight has sold in total. To emphasize, it was reported that Avatar sold more Blu-rays in just three days as the previous best selling Blu-ray sold in about a year-and-a-half.
Filed under: Video Sales, The Young Victoria, The Blind Side, Avatar, The Lovely Bones, Crazy Heart, Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel, Cheech & Chong's Hey Watch This