Will it be Three in a Row for the Trilogy?

January 2, 2004

This week there are no new wide openings, so the top five should look a lot like last weekend. This includes another winning weekend for Lord of the Rings: Return of the King. The lack of new releases is not uncommon for this time of the year, nor is the number of potential $100 million movies. Of the top five, one has already crossed $100 million and three more could follow.

On New Years Eve, Lord of the Rings: Return of the King only managed $7.5 million, that’s below the New Years Eve performance of either of the other films in the trilogy. And while the film did rebound yesterday, its third week performance might be slightly below The Two Tower’s third weekend box office. Return of the King should capture $25 million and overtake The Matrix Reloaded for third place for the year. Even with the greater drop-offs, it should become the highest grossing film in the trilogy and push the total domestic take past $1 billion.

Cheaper by the Dozen surprised at the box office with $27 million opening and has already become the number one movie in the career’s of all but one of the 12 kids. (The only exception was Liliana Mumy, who was also in The Santa Clause 2.) This week it should finish a close second with just under $20 million and cross $100 million before too long.

Another movie with its sights on $100 milling is Something's Gotta Give. Another 8 digit box office will put its total at just under $80 million after 4 weeks. And with a more mature audience, and the longer attention span that comes with that, it should stick around the top ten for long enough to hit $100 million by the end of the month.

Cold Mountain should be buoyed by award buzz and word of mouth to give Something’s Gotta Give a run for fourth place, also with just over $10 million. Its chances at $100 million are not as slim as a $14.6 million opening first suggest. Miss Congeniality opened at the same time in 2000 with only $13.8 million, and it went on to make $106.8 million by the end of its run.

There will be a bit of a battle between Peter Pan and Paycheck for fifth place. Hopefully quality will prevail and Peter Pan will take a little more than $8 million and Paycheck will finish sixth with just under $8 million.

On last note, Calendar Girls has its first major expansion this week. When it opened two weeks ago it could only make $6,308. However, last weekend when it increased its theatre count by 75% it increased its per theatre average by almost 50%. This week the theatre count increases by almost 1700% so its per theatre average should increase by more than 1000%. That works out to $85.5 million this weekend. More realistically it should take in $4 million and finish at the lower end of top ten.


Submitted by:

Filed under: The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, The Matrix Reloaded, The Santa Clause 2, Cheaper by the Dozen, Something's Gotta Give, Cold Mountain, Paycheck, Peter Pan, Calendar Girls