This graph shows Oprah Winfrey’s score on our annual analysis of leading stars at the box office. The Star Score represents points assigned to each of the leading stars of the top 100 movies (based on box office) in the current year and two preceding years. For appearing in the number one movie in a year a star gets 100 points, the number two movie 99 points and so on..
Latest Ranking on Selected Box Office Record Lists
February was an amazing month, thanks mainly to Black Panther, but Fifty Shades Freed and Peter Rabbit were also significant hits and overall the month was a massive improvement over last February. Looking forward, there’s nothing opening in March that will earn as much in total as Black Panther did during its opening weekend. That said, A Wrinkle in Time and Ready Player One should have no trouble getting to $100 million, while Tomb Raider has a 50/50 chance of getting there. Unfortunately, compared to last March, this is still a pittance. There’s a chance that no film opening this March will earn as much in total as Beauty and the Beast opened with last march. We will need Black Panther to have good legs to keep 2018 ahead of 2017 by the end of the month.
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Selma is the latest film about African-American history that I've reviewed in the past few years. Twelve Years a Slave and The Book of Negroes where both about slavery, while Selma is about the civil rights movement. The change of setting will be nice and I'm hoping the film will be just as good without being as difficult to watch.
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2014 is over and for the most part, December was a soft ending to a weak year. This is bad news for two reasons. Firstly, it means the overall box office is still soft and it is unlikely that January will start strong. Secondly, last January was a great month, thanks in part to Frozen and other holdovers. The slump can't last forever and Taken 3 should help 2015 get off to a reasonably fast start and it even has a shot at $100 million. American Sniper got off to a really fast start in limited release, so it too could be a hit when it expands wide. By comparison, last January was led by Ride Along, but there were only two other films that didn't completely bomb. I want to say 2015 will start out on a winning note, but given the box office losing streak, it will likely pay to be pessimistic.
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The Hundred-Foot Journey came out in August and was counter-programming, to be generous. It opened in barely more than 2,000 theaters and only managed fourth place during its opening weekend. On the other hand, its multiplier was 4.94, which is incredible compared to the average wide release, while it ended up a solid midlevel hit. Obviously the word-of-mouth was strong, but now that it is on the home market, will those who missed it in theaters want to check it out? And will those who saw it in theaters want to pick it up?
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